Chapter 8 - The Second Bottle
The police searched until sunset.
No Isabella.
Her car was gone.
So was her phone.
Every airport received her photograph.
State police checked highways.
Nothing.
Alessandro brought Emma and Teresa to his Manhattan penthouse under protection.
That night, Emma refused to sleep alone.
So Alessandro sat beside her bed.
Rosie was tucked under her arm again.
“You really saved her?” Emma asked.
“Of course.”
“I thought I lost her forever.”
“She was smarter than both of us. She hid the flash drive.”
Emma smiled slightly.
Then her expression changed.
“Are you going to marry Miss Isabella?”
Alessandro almost laughed.
“No.”
“Good.”
“Why good?”
Emma thought about it.
“She smiles without being happy.”
Alessandro stared at her.
Six years old.
Yet somehow she had seen something he had missed for a year.
“Get some sleep.”
As he stood, Emma grabbed his hand.
“Mr. Alessandro?”
“Yes?”
“If somebody says they love you, they shouldn’t make you scared.”
His throat tightened.
“No.”
He squeezed her hand.
“They shouldn’t.”
Downstairs, Nathan waited with detectives.
They had searched Isabella’s apartment.
Inside the bathroom cabinet, police found digoxin tablets stolen under another patient’s name.
They also found Alessandro’s medical records.
His daily routine.
His allergies.
His weight.
Everything needed to calculate dosage.
Detective Sarah Mills spread photographs across the table.
“This wasn’t impulsive.”
“I know.”
“She’s been preparing for months.”
Nathan handed Alessandro another file.
“We also found life-insurance documents.”
Alessandro frowned.
“I never signed these.”
“You didn’t.”
Mills pointed to the signature.
“Forgery.”
Beneficiary: Isabella Moretti.
Twenty-five million dollars.
Alessandro stared at it.
“So it was money.”
“Partly.”
Mills placed another photograph down.
It showed Isabella and Enzo kissing outside a hotel.
Three months earlier.
Alessandro felt something inside him go quiet.
Not heartbreak.
Something colder.
Understanding.
The woman who had slept beside him had never been planning a marriage.
She had been planning an exit.
His phone rang.
Maria.
He answered.
“Mom?”
No response.
Then he heard glass breaking.
“Mom?”
A woman breathed softly into the phone.
Then Isabella spoke.
“You should have given Enzo the shares.”
Alessandro stood.
“Where’s my mother?”
“You really do collect people who make bad decisions.”
“Isabella.”
His voice shook with anger.
“If you touch her—”
“You keep saying that.”
“Put her on.”
A faint voice came through.
“Alessandro…”
His mother.
Alive.
“What do you want?”
“The original will.”
Alessandro froze.
“What?”
“Your father’s will. Not the version filed with the court.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.”
“No.”
Isabella sighed.
“Then ask Maria.”
In the background, Maria cried out.
“Don’t tell him!”
The line went dead.
Detective Mills stared at Alessandro.
“What original will?”
Alessandro looked at the documents on the table.
May you like
Then at Nathan.
“I think my father had one more secret.”
