Chapter 8 - The Debt Between Two Families
Dominic read Vittorio’s confession without speaking.
We were back in New York.
Leo slept upstairs.
I sat across from Dominic in a study filled with books nobody seemed to read.
“Did your father know Carlo?”
Dominic looked up.
“Yes.”
“How well?”
“Too well.”
The Rinaldis and Bellinis had spent decades connected through business, politics and family alliances.
Some legitimate.
Some not.
Dominic did not decorate the truth.
His father, Matteo Rinaldi, had once helped Carlo move money between family companies and conceal ownership disputes.
I stared at him.
“So your family helped steal my inheritance.”
“Possibly.”
“That’s a very careful word.”
“It’s the only honest one until we have records.”
That mattered.
He did not defend his father automatically.
The 2018 accounts showed a large payment from Carlo-controlled entities to a Rinaldi security subsidiary.
Three weeks later, Vittorio died.
Dominic went pale.
“I didn’t know.”
“Could your father have—”
“No.”
His answer came too quickly.
He stopped.
Then corrected himself.
“I don’t want to believe it.”
Better.
We found records showing Matteo had ordered surveillance on Vittorio.
But another document showed something unexpected.
He canceled it.
Then wrote privately:
Carlo is moving beyond financial pressure. I will not participate.
Matteo may have helped create the machinery.
He apparently backed away before the worst part.
Too late to make him innocent.
Early enough to matter.
Dominic sat down heavily.
“My father died believing loyalty was the only thing holding this family together.”
“What do you believe?”
He looked toward the baby monitor.
“That loyalty without truth is just organized fear.”
For a mafia boss, it sounded almost revolutionary.
Then Grace Chen entered.
She had news.
The Bellini trust had received formal notice challenging my identity.
Carlo was moving fast.
He claimed I was an impostor Dominic had manufactured to seize Bellini voting control through Leo.
I almost laughed.
“What happens now?”
“Independent verification. Court filings. Trust review.”
“Fine.”
Grace looked uncomfortable.
“What?”
“Carlo has scheduled a family council tomorrow.”
“A what?”
“A meeting of major beneficiaries and directors.”
“I’m not going.”
Dominic remained silent.
Grace said:
“If you don’t, he will present his version uncontested.”
I hated that.
Then Dominic surprised me.
“You still don’t have to go.”
I looked at him.
“You want me there.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“But Sofia was right. Nobody gets to draft you into a family war because your DNA became useful.”
That sentence decided it.
“I’m going.”
The next afternoon, I walked into the Bellini headquarters wearing a twenty-dollar thrift-store blazer.
Not because I needed to prove anything.
Because it made Carlo Bellini visibly annoyed.
He was seventy.
Elegant.
Silver-haired.
The type of man who called cruelty tradition when it wore a tailored suit.
He stared at me.
Then smiled.
“A remarkable resemblance.”
“I hear that often now.”
He addressed the room.
“This young woman is either the greatest tragedy our family failed to prevent—or the most expensive fraud ever attempted against us.”
Grace placed DNA documentation on the table.
Carlo barely looked.
Then he smiled again.
“You came prepared.”
“So did you.”
His smile widened.
“I did.”
The side door opened.
A woman entered.
My age.
Dark hair.
Dark eyes.
Around her neck hung a winged-lion medallion.
Carlo stood.
“Ladies and gentlemen.”
May you like
He extended one hand toward her.
“Allow me to introduce Alessia Bellini.”
