Chapter 2 - THE WORDS IN THE SHADOWS
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The dining room became so silent that the hum of the central heating sounded like an oncoming train.
Thirty-six guests sat frozen around the banquet table, their silverware suspended above their plates.
Luca Moretti remained on one knee beside his mother’s chair, his large hand gently gripping Teresa’s cold fingers.
His dark eyes did not waver as he turned his gaze up toward me.
Michael Moretti stood framed in the wide mahogany doorway, his handsome face frozen in a stiff, artificial smile.
Vanessa took a sharp, uneven breath, her red silk gown rustling against the edge of the dining table.
“Hannah,” Luca said, his voice dropping into a deadly, quiet register that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
“Answer my mother.”
My throat felt as dry as winter dust.
I looked at Michael, whose knuckles had turned white where his hands rested inside his trouser pockets.
I remembered the cold whisper in the second-floor corridor just twenty-four hours earlier.
If you repeat a single syllable of what you heard in this room, little maid, your mother will be out of her hospital bed and on the street before dawn.
I had been terrified all morning.
I had swallowed my fear because I had rent to pay and chemotherapy debts to clear.
But looking down at Teresa Moretti’s frail, shaking frame, the fear inside me burned away into something fierce.
This elderly woman had protected me with her own dignity just minutes ago.
She had agreed to be cast out of her own home just to keep me employed.
I took a deep breath, lifted my chin, and met Luca’s piercing gaze.
“Yesterday afternoon at three o'clock, I was changing the linens in the master suite,” I began, my voice steadying with every word.
Michael took half a step into the room, his voice tight and breathless.
“Luca, don't listen to the hired help making up fantasies.”
“Silence,” Luca ordered without even turning his head toward his brother.
The single word hit the room like a gunshot.
Michael’s mouth snapped shut.
I looked back at Luca.
“Mr. Michael entered your mother’s private sitting room without knocking.”
“He closed the door behind him, but the latch didn't catch.”
“I heard him tell Mrs. Moretti that the car would arrive at nine o'clock tonight to take her to the facility in Rockford.”
“Your mother began crying and asked why she couldn't stay until the wedding on Saturday.”
A muscle twitched violently in Luca’s clenched jaw.
“And what did my brother tell her, Hannah?”
I swallowed hard, looking straight across the table at Michael.
“He leaned over her chair and told her that her memory was becoming dangerous.”
“He said that every time she looked at Vanessa, she was looking at a ghost.”
Vanessa’s hand jerked, spilling several dark drops of red wine onto the pristine white tablecloth.
“He told Mrs. Moretti that four years ago, your father didn't suffer a sudden massive heart attack in his sleep.”
A collective gasp rippled through the seated relatives and syndicate capos.
Uncle Carmine, seated four chairs down, gripped the edge of the table with both hands.
“He said that on the night Don Roberto died, someone else walked into his bedroom before the doctor was called.”
Luca’s breathing became completely still.
He slowly rose to his feet, towering over the table like an avenging shadow.
“Who was in that room, Hannah?”
Tears welled in my eyes as I looked at the fragile woman holding my apron.
“Mr. Michael told your mother that if she ever spoke Vanessa Bellini’s name in connection with that night, he would ensure she was declared legally incompetent before the sun set.”
The entire dining hall seemed to run out of air.
Luca turned his head so slowly toward his fiancée that every guest seemed to stop breathing.
Vanessa took two frantic steps backward, her hands flying to her throat.
“He’s lying! She’s lying!” Vanessa shrieked, her voice cracking with pure terror.
“Luca, she’s a maid trying to tear your family apart!”
Luca did not look at Vanessa.
He looked directly into the eyes of his younger brother.
May you like
“Michael,” Luca whispered, the silence carrying the sound to every corner of the room.
“Walk over to this table.”
