Chapter 5 - WHY ADRIAN KNEW MY NAME
I had never met Adrian Moretti.
At least I thought I hadn’t.
That changed the moment I saw him standing beyond the iron gates.
He was forty-two.
Taller than Luca.
A scar crossed his left eyebrow.
And when his eyes met mine, recognition flashed across his face.
“Hannah Collins.”
My skin went cold.
Behind me, Luca said, “You know her?”
Adrian smiled.
“No.”
“You asked for her.”
“Because she knows someone I need.”
I frowned.
“Who?”
Adrian looked at me.
“Your father.”
The world seemed to move sideways.
“My father died when I was six.”
“That’s what your mother told you.”
Luca stepped between us.
“Choose your next sentence carefully.”
Adrian ignored him.
“What was your father’s name?”
“Daniel Collins.”
Adrian laughed once.
“No.”
My hands curled.
“You don’t know anything about my family.”
“I know Daniel Collins was the name on his driver’s license.”
“What was his real name?”
Adrian reached slowly into his coat.
Security weapons rose instantly.
He removed a photograph.
Marco took it first.
Then passed it to Luca.
Luca stared at it.
Finally he handed it to me.
The picture showed two young men outside a warehouse.
One was Adrian.
The other was my father.
Except underneath the photograph, someone had handwritten two names.
ADRIAN MORETTI + MICHAEL VESCARI.
I stared.
“My father was Daniel Collins.”
Adrian’s expression softened.
“Your father was Michael Vescari.”
The name meant nothing to me.
But it meant something to Luca.
He looked sharply at Adrian.
“Vescari?”
“Yes.”
Luca turned to me.
“The Vescari family handled accounting for my father for twenty years.”
I felt sick.
“Handled?”
Adrian said quietly, “Until Michael discovered someone was stealing from Moretti Holdings.”
Teresa reached the gate behind us.
“Adrian.”
He looked at his mother.
Twenty years seemed to pass across both their faces.
Teresa touched the bars.
“My boy.”
Adrian’s eyes filled, but he didn’t move.
“You shouldn’t have sent the money.”
“I thought you were in danger.”
“I was.”
Luca’s anger returned.
“You let us think you were dead.”
“I had no choice.”
“You had seven years.”
“I had people hunting me.”
“Who?”
Adrian’s gaze moved toward the mansion.
Then toward Vanessa, visible through the front windows.
“Her father.”
Vanessa Bellini’s father, Carlo, was one of the most respected businessmen in Chicago.
At least publicly.
Luca stared.
“What does Bellini have to do with this?”
Adrian looked at me.
“Everything.”
Then he said the sentence that changed my entire life.
“Your father wasn’t killed in a car accident, Hannah.”
My breathing stopped.
Adrian’s voice dropped.
“He was murdered because he found the same financial records I did.”
And from somewhere behind the gate, my mother’s voice whispered:
“I told you never to come looking for this.”
May you like
I turned.
My mother was standing beside Luca’s car.
