Chapter 6: The Lawyer Who Lied
Liam took the document from my hands before I dropped it.
He read it slowly, then set it flat on the table and looked at Alessandro.
"If this is forged, you're holding evidence of fraud."
"Yes."
"Why do you have it?"
"Because Marcus sent it to me this morning along with his phone call.
He wanted me to believe Elizabeth had already agreed to disappear.
He wanted me to come here and pressure her to honor a document she supposedly signed." Alessandro's voice was calm, but his eyes were not.
"He didn't expect me to walk in and ask her directly."
"He thought you'd take his word for it," I said.
"He has worked for powerful men his entire career.
He is accustomed to powerful men not asking questions." Alessandro looked at the document.
"That was his mistake."
I stood up.
I needed to move.
I walked to the kitchen and stood at the counter and tried to organize what I knew into something I could hold.
Marcus had my mother's letter.
He had forged my signature on a legal document.
He had been watching my apartment.
He had called Alessandro with a prepared story designed to make me look like a criminal.
And he had done all of this to protect a secret that had been sitting in a sealed envelope for twenty-five years.
"I need that letter," I said.
"Yes," Alessandro said.
"You do."
"Do you know where it is?"
"No.
But I know who does." He stood.
"My father's personal attorney was a man named Gerald Foss.
He retired three years ago.
He and Marcus Hale worked together on my father's estate for over a decade.
If Marcus has been sitting on that letter, Gerald will know about it."
"Will he talk to you?"
"Gerald Foss has a great deal of respect for my father's memory and a great deal of guilt about the choices made during the estate process." Alessandro picked up his phone.
"I believe he will talk to me."
"Alessandro." I waited until he looked at me.
"Why are you helping me?"
He was quiet for a moment.
The question sat between us with everything it carried — the night at the hotel, the pregnancy, the name I had given him that wasn't mine, the father we apparently shared.
"Because if what you're telling me is true," he said carefully, "then you are my father's daughter.
And my father spent his life making choices that protected his empire and abandoned the people who deserved better." He held my gaze.
"I am not going to make the same choice."
Liam's phone rang.
He looked at the screen and his expression shifted.
"It's Marcus," he said.
Nobody moved.
The phone rang three more times.
Then it stopped.
A text arrived.
Liam read it aloud.
*Tell Elizabeth I have the original letter.
Tell her I also have something else — something her mother wrote that she will not want Alessandro Vitali to read.
She has until tonight to call me.
After that, I send everything to the family attorneys.*
Alessandro looked at the message.
Something in his face went very still.
"He's escalating," Liam said.
"He's frightened," Alessandro said.
"There's a difference." He looked at me.
"What else could your mother have written?"
I didn't know.
That was the honest answer.
I didn't know, and not knowing was the worst part, because Marcus clearly believed whatever it was had the power to change everything.
"I need to call him," I said.
"Not yet." Alessandro put his hand out — not touching me, just a gesture, a pause.
"Not until we know what we're walking into."
But then my own phone buzzed on the table.
Unknown number.
I answered it.
"Elizabeth." The voice was older.
Careful.
Not Marcus.
"My name is Gerald Foss.
Alessandro asked me to call you directly." A pause.
"I think it's time someone told you the truth about your mother's letter.
May you like
All of it.
Including the part Marcus has been hiding for twenty-five years."
