Chapter 4: What Rosa Saw
Marcus was still at the window when Vittorio walked back in.
Bianca had poured herself a coffee.
She held the cup with both hands, standing near the fireplace, and she looked up when Vittorio entered with the careful expression of someone who has prepared several versions of the same conversation.
"I think we should talk privately," she said.
"Without—"
"Rosa saw it too," Vittorio said.
The coffee cup didn't move.
But Bianca's knuckle went white against the handle.
Marcus turned from the window.
"Rosa is a laundry attendant.
She's been here four months."
"Five," Vittorio said.
"And she lives on the property, which means she's available right now."
"You're going to take the word of a housekeeper and a laundry girl over your fiancée," Bianca said.
Her voice had dropped into something colder.
"Do you hear yourself?"
"I'm going to take the word of anyone who tells me the truth about what happened to my daughter."
"Your daughter," Bianca said, "is seven years old and extremely good at performing for an audience." She set the coffee cup down.
"I have been patient with Lucy.
I have tried.
But she does not want me here, and she has made that very clear in ways you have never seen because you are not here, Vittorio.
You are never here."
The room shifted slightly.
It was a good move — the kind that reframes the accusation, turns the camera around.
Marcus pressed it.
"She has a point.
You've been in Milan for three of the last four weeks.
Bianca has been managing this household, managing Lucy's schedule, managing—"
"Managing Lucy into eating from a dog bowl," Vittorio said.
Silence.
"That was one incident," Bianca said.
"Taken out of context."
"There are two videos."
"One video, edited into two clips—"
"Different rooms," Vittorio said.
"Different timestamps.
Different lighting.
Emma didn't edit anything.
She barely knows how to send an attachment."
Bianca looked at him for a long moment.
Then something in her face changed — not remorse, something more calculated than that.
She sat down on the edge of the sofa and pressed her fingers together in her lap.
"Vittorio." Her voice softened.
"I love you.
I want to be part of this family.
But Lucy has been difficult since the beginning, and I think — I genuinely think — she needs to speak to someone.
A professional.
Because the stories she tells, the things she says to the staff—"
"She told me Marcus said she would not be believed because she is a child."
Bianca opened her mouth.
"She reported that fact without crying," Vittorio continued.
"Without drama.
The way you report something you've already accepted as true because it has been told to you more than once."
Marcus stepped forward.
"You're reading into a seven-year-old's—"
"Get out of my house."
Marcus stopped.
"I'm not speaking to you again today," Vittorio said.
"If you are still in this room in two minutes, I will have you removed.
That is not a question."
Marcus looked at Bianca.
She gave him the smallest shake of her head.
He picked up his jacket from the chair, said nothing, and walked out.
The door to the hall didn't slam.
That was somehow worse.
Bianca waited until his footsteps faded.
Then she looked up at Vittorio with an expression that had dropped all its layers.
"You're making a mistake," she said quietly.
"I know things about this family that you would not want made public."
Vittorio looked at her for a long time.
May you like
"Then you should speak to my lawyer," he said.
"He'll be here at noon."
