Chapter 8 - THE SECOND BODY
Sebastian didn’t speak after the call ended. He sat very still, phone pressed against his ear even after the line went dead.
I took it from him gently and set it on the table.
“Who was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“But they knew you.”
“They knew my mother. They knew the family line. They knew enough to make sure I listened.”
The detective returned to the room and ordered the hospital’s security detail doubled. The call had been routed through a chain of prepaid numbers, but the last relay had pinged near the Romano cemetery.
The cemetery was where Elena had been buried. It was also where Antonio had insisted that Michael’s ashes were interred after the supposed car fire. If Michael had faked his death, the grave might be empty.
Sebastian wanted to go immediately. The doctor refused to release him, and for once Sebastian listened. Daniel, now under police protection and cooperating in the investigation, volunteered to lead the search.
“I owe you more than I can repay,” Daniel said.
“You owe your daughter a father who doesn’t make deals with kidnappers,” Sebastian replied. “Start there.”
Daniel accepted the rebuke without argument.
By evening, officers had opened the sealed mausoleum where Michael was supposedly buried. The casket inside was empty. Beneath it, they found a second compartment containing a set of identification papers, a burned watch, and a photograph of a young man standing beside Elena.
The man’s face had not been cut away.
He was Antonio’s younger brother, Michael.
Beside him stood another man, older, broad-shouldered, wearing the Romano signet ring.
The same ring shown in the greenhouse photograph.
The detective sent the image to Sebastian. He stared at it for a long time.
“That’s not my father,” he said.
“No,” I replied. “It isn’t.”
The detective enlarged the photograph. “Do you recognize him?”
Sebastian shook his head. “No.”
But when he showed it to Antonio in the hospital, my grandfather’s face went white.
“Frank,” he whispered.
“Who’s Frank?” Sebastian asked.
Antonio’s breathing grew shallow. He tried to sit up, but the nurse gently eased him back.
“Your mother’s brother,” he said. “Frank Bellini.”
Sebastian stared. “My mother had a brother?”
“Estranged. He disappeared before you were born. He blamed me for Elena marrying into this family.”
“Why was he wearing our signet?”
Antonio closed his eyes. “Because I gave it to him.”
The words seemed to take all the strength he had left.
“Why?”
“Because he promised… to protect her.”
“Did he?”
Antonio’s eyes filled. “No.”
He told us that Frank had arrived at the mansion the night Elena died. He and Michael had argued in the east wing. Frank believed Elena was planning to expose the family’s crimes and destroy the only legacy their mother had left them. Michael wanted the ledger, but Frank wanted something more personal: revenge against Antonio.
Antonio had arrived after the confrontation began. He found Elena injured, Michael shouting, and Frank standing by the window with blood on his cuff. Richard came soon afterward. Between them, the men had decided that Elena’s death would be called an accident.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Sebastian asked.
Antonio looked at his son. “I was afraid Frank would come for you. I thought if you believed your mother died in a crash, you could grow up without carrying the war.”
“You let me grieve a lie.”
“I know.”
“You let me trust Michael.”
“I know.”
“You let me plan to marry Vanessa, whose father was helping bury it.”
Antonio’s tears fell silently. “I know.”
Sebastian turned away. For a long time, he said nothing. Then he returned to his father’s bedside and took his hand.
“I don’t know how to forgive you.”
Antonio nodded weakly. “You don’t have to. Not tonight.”
It was the first honest thing either man had said to the other all evening.
The detective called shortly after midnight. Frank Bellini’s fingerprints had been found on the documents in the mausoleum. A witness had also identified him at a private marina two days earlier. He was alive and moving under a false name.
The detective had one more piece of information.
Frank had purchased a storage unit using a company connected to Sterling Holdings. Inside, investigators found a suitcase containing cash, passports, and a sealed envelope addressed to Sebastian.
The envelope was delivered to the hospital under police escort.
Sebastian opened it with trembling fingers.
Inside was a single page.
Your mother did not die because she found the ledger. She died because she discovered who your father really was.
Beneath the sentence was a second line:
Ask Antonio what happened before he married Elena.
Sebastian read it twice.
Then he looked at his father.
Antonio had gone pale, his eyes fixed on the paper.
“Dad,” Sebastian said quietly. “What happened before you married my mother?”
Antonio’s lips trembled.
“I loved someone else.”
The room went silent.
“Who?”
Antonio looked toward me.
Then he whispered a name I had never heard.
“Catherine’s mother.”
My mother gasped.
Sebastian stared at Antonio. “You had a relationship with Emma’s grandmother?”
Antonio nodded, tears slipping down his cheeks.
“She died before Catherine was born. Elena knew. She married me anyway. But Frank never forgave me for what he believed I had done to his sister.”
Catherine stood abruptly. “That’s impossible. My mother died in a house fire when I was a baby.”
Antonio closed his eyes.
“It wasn’t a fire.”
Catherine’s face drained of color.
Sebastian leaned forward. “Then what was it?”
Antonio tried to answer, but his breath caught. The monitor began to sound an alarm. Nurses rushed in, ordering us out while they stabilized him.
As I backed toward the door, the envelope slipped from Sebastian’s hand. It landed face down on the floor.
A final line was written beneath the fold, almost hidden from view:
The child survived.
Catherine stared at the words.
“What child?” she whispered.
May you like
Sebastian looked at me.
And for the first time since the dinner, I felt that the truth might be more dangerous than any of the lies we had uncovered.
