Chapter 2 - The Woman Who Locked My Son Away
I entered Matteo's bedroom without knocking.
Clara stood immediately, placing herself between me and the wheelchair. It was a small movement, almost instinctive, but I noticed it.
So did my son.
Matteo's entire body stiffened.
“Out,” I told Clara.
She didn't move.
“I said out.”
“And I heard you.”
My guards would have dragged a man twice her size into the hallway for that response. Clara merely looked at Matteo, who had begun pulling the blanket higher over his legs.
“I'm going to get you some water,” she told him. “I'll be right outside.”
He caught her wrist.
“Don't go.”
Two words.
Barely audible.
Yet those two words struck me harder than any bullet I'd ever taken.
Clara squeezed his hand.
“I'll be right outside the door. You can call for me.”
Only when he released her did she walk past me.
I followed her into the hallway and shut the door.
“What did you say to him?”
“I asked questions.”
“What questions?”
“The kind you should have asked fourteen months ago.”
My jaw tightened.
“You're a caretaker, Ms. Hayes. You're not a psychologist, a detective, or a member of my family.”
“Then stop expecting me to fix all three problems while you stand behind a camera.”
The slap of her words echoed between us.
One of my guards shifted at the end of the hall.
I raised one finger, ordering him to remain where he was.
“You're forgetting who signs your paycheck.”
“No, Mr. Rossi. I remember exactly who does.” Clara folded her arms. “That's why I haven't told you to go to hell yet.”
For one astonishing second, I nearly laughed.
Then I remembered what my son had said.
There was a man behind Mommy.
He wore Daddy's ring.
“Tell me everything Matteo said.”
Clara's expression hardened.
“Will you listen without interrupting?”
“Try me.”
“He remembers the explosion. He remembers his mother protecting him. He's convinced that if he hadn't screamed, she might have survived.”
“That isn't possible.”
“You don't get to decide what he remembers because you dislike hearing it.”
I looked toward the bedroom door.
“Did he identify my brother?”
“He described a ring.”
“His ring.”
“Possibly.”
“You believe him?”
“I believe a frightened child deserves to be heard before an adult decides he's confused.”
I stepped closer.
“Do you understand what you're accusing my brother of?”
“I'm not accusing anyone. Matteo is trying to explain what he remembers.”
“Luca was with me when the explosion happened.”
“Then he shouldn't be afraid of an investigation.”
I stared at her.
She had no idea what she was doing. Luca wasn't merely my brother. He controlled the accounts, coordinated our security teams, and managed half the businesses that kept our family powerful. Challenging him without proof could ignite a war.
Clara seemed to read the calculation on my face.
“You aren't thinking about your son,” she said. “You're thinking about what happens to your empire if he's telling the truth.”
“Be careful.”
“Why? Will you have me followed? Take away my room? Install another camera?”
Her gaze shifted to the ceiling.
“I saw the one in Matteo's bedroom on my first day. I knew he couldn't speak freely beneath it.”
“So you deliberately concealed him from me?”
“No. I gave him a room where, for five minutes, he didn't feel like a witness.”
I had no answer.
She continued, her voice quieter now.
“You know what frightens me most about this house?”
I said nothing.
“It's not the guards. It's not the locked gates. It's that everybody here is so afraid of upsetting you that they've started confusing silence with peace.”
She turned toward Matteo's door.
“If you want the truth, Mr. Rossi, you have to make it safe for him to tell you.”
I caught her arm before she could open the door.
“Does Matteo have any evidence? Anything specific about the man?”
She glanced at my hand until I released her.
“He remembers the ring. And he remembers something else.”
“What?”
“He said his mother told him to close his eyes before the explosion.”
A cold unease crept through me.
“Why?”
“I don't know. But I think he does.”
She went back into the bedroom.
I remained in the hallway, staring at the closed door.
Then I called my head of security.
“Get me every report from the night Isabella died. Every vehicle record, every personnel log, every maintenance receipt. I want originals, not summaries.”
“Understood, sir.”
“And don't inform Luca.”
There was a pause.
“Sir, your brother oversees the security archive.”
“Then find a way to access it without telling him.”
When I ended the call, I noticed movement behind the glass at the end of the corridor.
One of my oldest guards, Anton, stood watching me.
The moment our eyes met, he lowered his gaze.
I had known Anton for twelve years.
He had carried my father out of a burning building and taken a bullet meant for me.
Yet his face held something I had never seen before.
Fear.
Not fear of me.
Fear of what I might discover.
That evening, I returned to my study and opened the archived footage from Matteo's bedroom.
I watched Clara enter. I watched her kneel. I watched my son begin to speak.
Then, just before she closed the curtains, the camera caught her looking directly into its lens.
Her lips moved.
I increased the volume.
Her voice came through clearly.
“I'm sorry, Vincent. But if he remembers what I think he remembers, this family is in far greater danger than you know.”
I froze the image.
May you like
I had never told Clara my first name.
And I had never told her that Matteo's mother had been investigating our family before she died.
