Chapter 10 - The Signature
“My mother is standing beside me.”
Vanessa went silent.
I almost enjoyed it.
Almost.
Then she recovered.
“Is she?”
I looked at Elaine.
Her face changed.
Vanessa continued:
“Ask Elaine Fields what happened in Geneva eight years ago.”
My mother reached for the phone.
“Don’t listen to her.”
That was exactly the wrong thing to say.
“What happened in Geneva?”
Elaine didn’t answer.
Vanessa did.
“Your mother died there.”
I stared at Elaine.
“No.”
“The woman beside you is Elizabeth Fields.”
Silence.
My mother’s younger sister.
Aunt Elizabeth.
I remembered her vaguely from childhood.
Then she disappeared when I was eleven.
I looked at the woman I had just slapped, cried over, and called Mom.
“Tell me she’s lying.”
She couldn’t.
My knees weakened.
Dante caught my elbow.
“Cara.”
I pulled away.
“Who are you?”
The woman began crying.
“Elizabeth.”
My actual mother had survived the original poisoning attempt.
She went to Geneva.
Three years later, she was killed.
Elizabeth assumed Elaine’s identity afterward to continue the investigation and protect me.
“Protect me?”
My voice rose.
“You let me believe my mother was alive for ten minutes!”
“I wanted to tell you properly.”
“Everyone keeps deciding when I’m allowed to know my own life.”
Nobody answered.
Good.
Vanessa’s voice came through the phone.
“Tomorrow. Noon.”
The call ended.
I turned to Elizabeth.
“Who killed Elaine?”
“I don’t know.”
“Vanessa says she does.”
“Vanessa says whatever gives her leverage.”
“Then we take away the leverage.”
Dante understood.
“You want to go.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
I stared at him.
He sighed.
“Apparently that word doesn’t work with you.”
“Learning quickly.”
For the first time since the crash, something almost warm passed between us.
Then disappeared.
The next morning, attorneys reviewed Meridian.
I legally controlled the two-percent stewardship share plus portions of the Vale inheritance.
My signature could determine who controlled the company.
But one clause mattered more.
If a Moretti principal attempted to acquire stewardship through coercion, fraud, or violence, the entire trust could be frozen.
The brake sabotage might trigger it.
Meaning Vanessa’s attempted murder could destroy the thing she was trying to steal.
Unless she proved Dante had orchestrated the crash himself.
“Why would I sabotage my own brakes?”
“To manufacture evidence against your wife.”
It sounded absurd.
Until Grant found a transfer.
Five hundred thousand dollars.
From an account controlled by Dante.
To Owen Mercer.
Three days before the sabotage.
Dante stared at it.
“I didn’t send that.”
Luca had access to Dante’s credentials.
So did whoever else had been impersonating him.
Suddenly Vanessa had a plausible defense.
At noon we reached the Moretti estate.
Vanessa waited beside the pool.
Perfect dress.
Perfect makeup.
Original Meridian charter on the table.
Daniel Vale sat nearby.
Untied.
Not a prisoner.
Valeria froze.
“Dad?”
Daniel stood.
“I’m sorry.”
Vanessa smiled.
“My father was never my victim.”
Valeria looked shattered.
Daniel continued:
“This family stole from us for thirty years.”
Dante stepped forward.
“My father stole from Salvatore. Not from you.”
Daniel’s eyes moved to me.
“Cara is Salvatore’s rightful heir.”
“Then let her decide.”
“I intend to.”
He pushed a document toward me.
Transfer stewardship to Daniel Vale.
I laughed.
“No.”
His expression hardened.
“You haven’t read it.”
“I read enough signatures for one lifetime.”
Vanessa stepped closer.
“Then perhaps you’d like to know who killed Elaine.”
“Yes.”
She smiled.
“You did.”
The world stopped.
I stared at her.
“What?”
Vanessa slid a photograph across the table.
Eight years earlier.
Geneva.
My mother.
A hospital bed.
May you like
And nineteen-year-old me standing beside her.
I remembered none of it.
