Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN WHO GAVE MIA THE TRUCK
Mrs. Teresa Alvarez had vanished.
Her staff room was empty.
Clothes gone.
Passport gone.
No sign of struggle.
Alina felt stupid.
Teresa had trained her.
Helped her get Mia into the estate preschool room while Alina worked.
Brought soup when Mia had the flu.
Once loaned Alina two hundred dollars and refused repayment until payday.
“She used us.”
Vincent stood beside her in Teresa’s room.
“Maybe.”
Alina looked at him.
“You’re doing the maybe thing now?”
“What thing?”
“Refusing to decide before proof.”
His expression changed slightly.
“Apparently I’m learning.”
Good.
They found proof inside Teresa’s desk.
Not betrayal.
Photographs.
Gabriel.
Sofia.
Frank.
Teresa.
All together.
Years earlier.
“She knew Gabriel.”
“Yes,” Dominic said.
“Why?”
Frank answered from the doorway.
“Teresa is his aunt.”
Alina turned.
“What?”
“His mother’s sister.”
Alina sat.
Gabriel had told her his family was gone.
Another lie.
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
Frank looked ashamed for a man who had not caused that lie.
“Probably because Teresa worked here.”
Alina laughed bitterly.
“My entire relationship was compartmentalized like an intelligence operation.”
No one argued.
Then they found Teresa’s letter.
For Alina.
She opened it.
I am sorry.
I wanted to tell you who I was from the first day.
Gabriel made me promise I would not.
He believed you and Mia were safest if you stayed ordinary.
Alina’s eyes burned.
Again.
Ordinary.
Safe.
Uninformed.
The letter continued.
The truck was from Gabriel.
The key was real.
But Eddie Russo saw me place it in the donation box.
I believe he followed Mia afterward.
If something happens to me, Eddie is not working for Dominic.
He is working for someone older.
Vincent frowned.
“Older?”
Frank looked toward Dominic.
Dominic’s face hardened.
“Someone from Vittorio’s generation.”
Then a phone rang inside Teresa’s desk.
Hidden burner.
Vincent answered.
No greeting.
A man’s voice:
“You finally found her room.”
Vincent went still.
Alina recognized nothing.
“Who is this?”
The man laughed.
“You sound like your father.”
Vincent’s jaw tightened.
“Name.”
“You knew me once.”
Dominic’s face changed.
He mouthed:
Thomas Bellini.
The second name in Sofia’s notes.
Thomas Bellini had supposedly died eleven years earlier in Sicily.
Vincent put the call on speaker.
“You’re dead.”
“So are many useful men.”
Alina nearly rolled her eyes.
Apparently fake death was an epidemic.
Thomas continued.
“Give me Gabriel’s drive.”
“No.”
“Then Teresa dies.”
Alina’s stomach dropped.
“You have her?”
A woman cried faintly in the background.
Teresa.
Alive.
Thomas continued.
“And bring the child.”
Vincent’s face became terrifying.
“No.”
“She saw Eddie.”
“No.”
“She may remember more.”
“She’s three.”
“Children see what adults miss.”
Mia had already proved that.
Alina stepped toward the phone.
“You will not touch my daughter.”
Silence.
Then Thomas laughed.
“So this is Alina.”
“You know me?”
“I know exactly who you are.”
Cold moved down her spine.
“What does that mean?”
Thomas answered:
“Ask Vincent why his father paid your mother every month for nineteen years.”
Alina froze.
Her mother, Elena Ruiz, had died when Alina was twenty-two.
Housekeeper.
Single mother.
Always short on money.
“What?”
Vincent looked equally confused.
Thomas continued.
“Elena Ruiz wasn’t receiving charity.”
Alina’s voice shook.
“Then what?”
Thomas spoke slowly.
“She was being paid to keep quiet about which Marchetti man fathered her daughter.”
The room went silent.
Alina stared at Vincent.
No.
Impossible.
She was thirty-one.
Vincent was forty-two.
Not enough age difference to be her father, but—
His father.
Vittorio.
Her stomach turned.
Thomas laughed.
“Now you understand why Gabriel hid her from all of you.”
The call ended.
Alina could barely breathe.
Vincent looked horrified.
Not because of romance.
May you like
Because if Thomas was telling the truth, Alina might be his half-sister.
And whatever had been quietly growing between them instantly became impossible.
