Chapter 3 - THE MAN WHO KNEW SOPHIA BEFORE ALEANDRO DID
Aleandro did not sleep.
At four in the morning, he stood outside the room where Emma had finally fallen asleep beside Mrs. Alvarez.
He did not enter.
Sophia had asked that he not overwhelm her.
That request hurt.
It also made sense.
Emma knew him as the serious man from the ballroom who danced badly.
Not Daddy.
Not yet.
Aleandro had spent three years without knowing she existed.
He would not make the first thing he did as her father another adult demand.
So he stood outside.
Frank joined him.
“The independent lab confirmed.”
Aleandro did not turn.
“Say it.”
“Emma is your daughter.”
99.9996%.
No uncertainty.
Aleandro closed his eyes.
Three years.
First steps.
First word.
Fever.
Birthdays.
All happened somewhere else.
Sophia had carried everything alone.
Anger returned.
Then he remembered the brake line.
The photographs.
Someone had known.
He turned.
“Find who watched her pregnancy.”
Frank nodded.
“Already started.”
“No Moretti internal team alone.”
Frank frowned.
“You don’t trust me?”
Aleandro looked at him.
“I trust evidence more.”
Frank accepted it.
“Fair.”
Detective Marina Cole had insisted on that distinction.
Aleandro disliked being instructed.
But the last twelve hours had shown what family-controlled investigations could miss.
Independent digital forensics.
Police subpoenas.
No intimidation.
No disappearing witnesses.
He could use his power to make people available, not to write the outcome.
Frank handed him a folder.
Sophia’s mother.
Elena Martinez.
Not “Carter.”
Sophia had used Carter later from a stepfather.
Elena worked for Romano Imports twenty-seven years earlier.
Aleandro frowned.
“Romano.”
“Yes.”
Valentina’s family.
“What did she do?”
“Bookkeeping.”
“Luca?”
“His father ran it then.”
“Connection to Moretti?”
“Joint port contracts.”
The older generation.
Money and crime braided together.
Sophia’s mother had worked inside Romano finances before Sophia was born.
Maybe that was why she knew someone inside Moretti had protected them once.
“Anything else?”
Frank hesitated.
“Your father.”
Aleandro went still.
“My father knew Elena Martinez.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Private payments.”
He stared.
“What kind?”
“Monthly. For six years.”
Aleandro’s father, Dominic Moretti, had been dead eleven years.
A brutal man.
Disciplined.
Feared.
Not charitable without reason.
“Why pay a Romano bookkeeper?”
“No memo.”
“Amount?”
“Three thousand a month.”
Enough to matter.
Not enough to look like hush money for a major secret.
Maybe support.
“Did my mother know?”
“Unknown.”
Aleandro looked toward Emma’s room.
“Keep going.”
Frank placed a photograph.
Dominic Moretti.
Elena Martinez.
And a young man Aleandro recognized.
Luca Romano.
All three outside a courthouse.
Date:
Twenty-six years earlier.
Sophia would have been an infant.
“What case?”
“Sealed juvenile guardianship.”
Aleandro stared.
“Whose?”
Unknown.
Then another photograph.
Elena holding baby Sophia.
Dominic beside her.
Aleandro’s chest tightened.
His father had held Sophia?
No.
He looked closer.
Dominic’s hand rested protectively on Elena’s shoulder.
Luca stood behind them.
Angry.
“What happened?”
Frank shook his head.
“We need the sealed file.”
Marina arrived.
“You’re not opening sealed juvenile records through friends.”
Aleandro almost smiled.
“Good morning to you too.”
She handed him a court petition.
“We’re requesting lawful access.”
He nodded.
No fight.
Marina looked toward Emma’s door.
“How is she?”
“Asleep.”
“Sophia?”
“Interview finished. Attorney taking her home.”
Aleandro’s expression changed.
“She’s leaving?”
“You expected her to stay in your mansion after someone poisoned a toast and planted evidence on her?”
Fair.
“Where?”
“Not your concern unless she tells you.”
He did not like that.
He accepted it.
“Protection?”
“She agreed to police protection.”
“Moretti detail too.”
“No.”
He stared.
Marina stared back.
“Someone knew your security architecture well enough to enter dressed as staff.”
Aleandro understood.
“No Moretti guards near her.”
“For now.”
That was painful.
Necessary.
Then Marina opened a file.
Luca Romano.
He denied involvement.
His phone showed no direct communication with the disguised server.
The bartender’s memory placed them together, but no audio.
Luca claimed the man approached him pretending to be a donor to a political foundation.
Could be true.
Could be lie.
“Where’s attacker?”
“Escaped before lockdown.”
“How?”
“Service tunnel.”
Aleandro frowned.
Only old staff knew the wine-cellar tunnel.
Frank went pale.
“Who still has plans?”
“Family archive.”
“Architect.”
“Security.”
“And?”
Aleandro thought.
Valentina.
As future mistress of house, she had renovation access.
But she was poisoned.
Again.
No easy line.
Marina continued.
“We found the attacker’s discarded jacket.”
DNA?
Partial.
Not in criminal database.
Pocket contained a theater ticket from six nights earlier.
Brooklyn Ballet.
Why?
Sophia sometimes took Emma to free community rehearsal viewings there.
Frank checked.
Emma attended that exact night with Sophia.
A man matching attacker sat two rows behind.
Photograph from lobby camera.
He had been following them.
Aleandro’s anger became ice.
“This started before engagement party.”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
Marina had more.
Preschool exterior camera.
Same man once.
Grocery store.
Maybe.
Someone had been watching Emma.
Then the sealed court file arrived.
Because one listed person was now deceased and relevant to attempted homicide investigation, a judge released a limited copy.
Juvenile guardianship.
Child:
SOPHIA ELENA MARTINEZ.
Aleandro stared.
Sophia herself.
Petitioner:
Elena Martinez.
Respondent:
Luca Romano Sr.
Valentina’s grandfather.
Reason:
claim of paternal guardianship.
Aleandro frowned.
“Paternal?”
Marina read.
Luca Romano Sr. claimed Sophia was his biological granddaughter through his son—
Luca Romano Jr.
Valentina’s uncle.
Silence.
Aleandro stared.
“No.”
Frank went still.
If true, Sophia and Valentina were cousins.
Sophia had never known?
Maybe.
The case included DNA.
Luca Romano Jr. excluded as Sophia’s father.
Then why claim her?
Another man listed.
Alleged father:
MATTEO DE LUCA.
Unknown to Aleandro.
Deceased?
No.
Missing.
But one note mattered.
Dominic Moretti appeared as character witness for Elena.
Aleandro’s father had helped Sophia’s mother defeat a Romano guardianship claim.
Why?
He read Dominic’s declaration.
I have personal knowledge that Luca Romano’s claim is false and motivated by an attempt to obtain custody of the child’s mother through coercion.
Aleandro stopped.
Custody of Sophia to control Elena.
Why was Elena valuable?
Bookkeeping.
Romano financial evidence.
She had discovered something.
Marina continued.
“The case was sealed because Elena entered a witness-protection relocation for eighteen months.”
Aleandro stared.
His father helped.
“He protected them.”
“Yes.”
Sophia’s mother’s letter.
Someone inside the Morettis protected you once.
Dominic.
Aleandro’s father.
The man Aleandro remembered as ruthless had apparently saved a young mother and infant from the Romanos.
Why?
Then they found a second sealed attachment.
Elena’s sworn statement.
Luca Romano Sr. and son had used Romano Imports to move illicit payments through children’s charities.
She copied ledgers.
Dominic Moretti wanted the ledgers because Romano money was being stolen from a joint venture.
Not pure altruism.
Still, he moved Elena and baby Sophia to safety.
The payments for six years were protection support.
Aleandro sat.
His father had known Sophia since infancy.
The family histories had crossed long before Aleandro met her.
Then Marina showed him one final page.
Elena’s witness statement named a Moretti intermediary who arranged her safe housing.
Name:
FRANCESCO BELLINI.
Aleandro looked at Frank.
His father.
Frank Bellini’s father had protected Sophia’s mother.
Frank looked stunned.
“My father never told me.”
Maybe.
Aleandro watched him carefully.
“Did you know Sophia’s real family?”
“No.”
“Did you know her mother?”
“No.”
“Did your father leave files?”
Frank hesitated.
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Private storage.”
Marina looked at him.
“Police will take custody.”
Frank nodded.
“No argument.”
Good.
The storage box contained old Romano ledgers, Dominic’s payment notes, and one cassette.
ELENA — IF THEY FIND SOPHIA.
Aleandro felt cold.
The recording was twenty-four years old.
Sophia’s mother’s voice.
“If my daughter is ever found by the people who wanted me silent, do not assume they want money.”
Static.
“They want lineage.”
Aleandro frowned.
What lineage?
Elena continued:
“Sophia’s real father is not Matteo De Luca.”
Silence.
Frank looked at Aleandro.
Marina leaned closer.
“He was a name Dominic created for court.”
Aleandro stopped breathing.
His father fabricated a father identity to protect Sophia?
Elena’s voice broke.
“The real father can never be named unless Sophia’s life depends on it.”
Then:
“Because he is a Moretti.”
Silence.
Aleandro stared.
No.
Frank’s face went white.
Which Moretti?
Dominic?
Aleandro’s father?
That would make Sophia—
No.
The dates.
Dominic could have.
Aleandro felt sick.
He had slept with Sophia.
Could they be related?
Marina immediately said:
“Do not jump.”
Facts.
The tape continued.
“Not Dominic.”
Aleandro exhaled so hard he nearly fell.
“His brother.”
Silence.
Dominic’s younger brother.
Vincenzo Moretti.
Killed in Sicily twenty-five years earlier.
Aleandro remembered him only from photographs.
Elena continued:
“Vincenzo was Sophia’s father.”
Aleandro stared.
Sophia was his first cousin.
No.
Wait.
Dominic and Vincenzo were half-brothers?
Family records?
Frank spoke.
“Vincenzo wasn’t Dominic’s biological brother.”
Aleandro turned.
“What?”
“Adopted after his parents died.”
No blood relation.
Again.
Still Moretti family legally.
Sophia was descended from an adopted Moretti branch.
That could matter to inheritance.
Marina listened.
Elena continued:
“Vincenzo left shares.”
Aleandro’s pulse changed.
“He left them to Sophia.”
Frank stared.
Vincenzo Moretti once held fifteen percent of Moretti Maritime.
After his death, shares were absorbed into Dominic’s branch because no heir was known.
If Sophia existed—
Her claim could be enormous.
And Emma, Aleandro’s biological daughter through Sophia, united two branches.
Aleandro looked toward the room where his daughter slept.
A child who had danced barefoot for a joke may have unknowingly combined Moretti and Vincenzo holdings into the strongest blood-and-legal claim in the family.
That could make her valuable.
Or dangerous.
Then Marina’s phone rang.
She listened.
Her face changed.
“What?”
Valentina had awakened.
First words after extubation:
“Emma.”
Aleandro stood.
“What about her?”
Marina continued:
“Valentina says the toast wasn’t meant to kill her.”
May you like
Silence.
“She says it was meant to kill the child.”
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