Chapter 10 - The Family SecretThe train moved through darkness.
Nobody spoke.
My entire life felt fabricated.
My father alive.
My husband alive.
My daughter a Moretti.
A billionaire hiding a criminal empire.
And now my parents meeting the man who built it.
Alessandro watched me.
“You hate me.”
“I don't know what I feel.”
“You have every right.”
I looked at him.
“Did you know who I was when you hired me?”
He didn't answer quickly enough.
My heart dropped.
“You did.”
“Yes.”
“So Emma wasn't an accident.”
“No.”
“You brought us here.”
“I brought you here because I needed to protect you.”
“You recruited me.”
“I couldn't reach you any other way.”
I stood.
“You used me.”
“Yes.”
The train stopped suddenly.
Lights turned red.
Victor checked the controls.
“We're being tracked.”
Daniel opened a service hatch.
“There’s another route.”
Alessandro looked at him.
“You've been hiding for two years.”
“Yes.”
“Why come back now?”
Daniel stared at Emma.
“Because she is old enough to remember.”
Emma was sleeping against my shoulder.
“What does she remember?”
Daniel looked at me.
“The night the house burned.”
I froze.
“What house?”
“Your childhood home.”
I remembered flames.
Smoke.
My mother's screams.
A man carrying me outside.
I had always thought it was an accident.
“It wasn't,” Daniel said.
“Who started the fire?”
He looked at Alessandro.
I turned.
Alessandro's eyes lowered.
“I did.”
I couldn't breathe.
“You?”
“I was nineteen.”
“You burned my childhood home?”
“I was trying to destroy your father's records.”
“My mother was inside.”
“I didn't know she was.”
“You could have killed her.”
“I know.”
I stepped toward him.
“You destroyed my life.”
He looked at me.
“I know.”
Then he said something I wasn't prepared for.
“I have spent twenty years trying to repair what I did.”
Before I could answer, the train doors opened.
Matteo stood on the platform.
He was holding a gun.
Beside him were Elena and Victor.
Both had weapons pointed at each other.
Matteo smiled.
“Choose carefully, Alessandro.”
His gun moved toward Emma.
“Your niece.”
Then toward Daniel.
“Your brother.”
Then toward me.
“Your wife.”
I stared.
“Why would you call me that?”
Matteo smiled.
“Because the marriage certificate is real.”
I looked at Alessandro.
“What marriage certificate?”
He couldn't look at me.
Matteo laughed.
“He married you three years ago.”
I shook my head.
“No.”
“Under another name.”
He held up a document.
“Nora Reed became Nora Moretti the day Emma was born.”
My entire world collapsed.
And Emma opened her eyes.
May you like
She looked at Alessandro.
“Daddy?”
