Part 4
Elena held the phone near her chest.
Matteo sat in the chair beside the bed, his suit wrinkled from the night. He had removed his shoes and lined them beneath the window. Without the jacket and polished posture, he looked younger, almost like the man who had once cooked pasta badly in her apartment because he did not know how to use her stove.
“Is the baby moving?” he asked.
“A little.”
“Do you want the nurse?”
“No.”
He watched her thumb hover over the screen. “Is that Mara?”
Elena locked the phone.
“What did my father tell you?” she asked.
Matteo’s shoulders shifted. “That she came about the trust.”
“I asked her to come.”
He said nothing.
“I sent her the documents.”
“Why didn’t you send them to your own attorney?”
“I don’t have my own attorney.”
“You have access to every lawyer we use.”
“They work for your family.”
“They work for us.”
Elena looked at him. “That isn’t the same thing.”
The answer irritated him because some part of him recognized it. He stood and went to the window.
“She frightened you.”
“No.”
“Then what happened?”
Elena looked toward the door.
The movement was small, but Matteo saw it.
“My father isn’t here.”
“He’ll come back.”
“What does that have to do with—”
She pressed a hand against her abdomen and inhaled sharply.
Matteo crossed the room at once. “Pain?”
“Tightness.”
He called the nurse. By the time the monitor was adjusted and the doctor consulted, the conversation had ended.
Paolo returned forty minutes later with clean clothes for Matteo and white roses for Elena. He spoke warmly to the nurses, remembered the obstetrician’s name, and placed the flowers where Elena could see them.
She asked him to move them.
“The scent,” she said.
Paolo carried the arrangement into the corridor without offense.
When he came back, Matteo was changing in the bathroom. Paolo stood at the foot of Elena’s bed.
“You gave Mara the documents,” he said quietly.
Elena’s fingers stopped moving over the blanket.
“She is not qualified to advise you.”
“She understands contracts.”
“She restores villas.”
“She also reads.”
Paolo smiled without warmth. “That tone may feel brave when you are lying in a hospital, but bravery is not what protects a child.”
Elena looked toward the bathroom door.
Water ran in the sink.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“I want you to stop allowing outsiders to turn ordinary family arrangements into threats.”
“The documents limit what happens if Matteo dies.”
“They protect continuity.”
“They prevent me from voting the shares held for our child.”
“You have never managed a company.”
“I’m carrying the person you want to control.”
Paolo’s face remained composed. Only his left thumb moved, rubbing once along the edge of his wedding ring.
“Yesterday became dangerous because you insisted on discussing matters you do not understand with a woman who enjoys conflict.”
“Elena.”
She flinched when he said her name.
The bathroom door opened.
Paolo stepped back from the bed and asked Matteo whether the doctors had given a discharge time.
Elena watched her husband button his clean shirt. She waited for him to look at her. When he did, she found herself unable to speak.
At the villa, Mara arrived just after nine with her ankle braced and her crutches sinking into the wet gravel of the courtyard.
The gate guard looked startled to see her.
“Signorina Bellini, I was told—”
“I’m here for my bag.”
“We can send it.”
“I also need the project drive from the restoration office.”
“I’ll call Signor Conti.”
“You can call whoever you like after you open the gate.”
The guard glanced at the security booth, where a camera recorded the entrance. He pressed the release.
Inside, the villa felt larger without guests. Staff moved through the rooms collecting abandoned glasses and folding table linens. The chandelier in the entrance hall had been turned off. Gray daylight rested on the marble.
Mara stopped beneath it.
The small white dome remained near the ceiling. Its red light was steady.
Carla appeared from the dining room carrying a stack of napkins. When she saw Mara, she nearly dropped them.
“Can you help me?” Mara asked.
Carla glanced toward the manager’s office.
“With my bag,” Mara added.
They went into the small restoration room at the back of the villa. Rolled plans leaned against the wall. Samples of plaster, wood stain, and marble filled labeled drawers. Mara’s leather bag sat beside the desk exactly where she had left it.
Carla closed the door.
“He was there,” she whispered.
Mara put the bag over one shoulder. “Who?”
“Signor Paolo.”
“Before Elena was on the floor?”
Carla nodded.
“What did you see?”
“Nothing. I told you. I was in the dining room.”
“You heard voices.”
“I heard Signora Elena say, ‘Give it back.’ Then something hit the console. I came to the doorway, but Signor Paolo was walking toward the private stairs.”
“And Elena?”
“I couldn’t see her. Signorina Mara, I need this job.”
“I’m not asking you to lose it.”
“You don’t understand. My mother lives in staff housing near the old gate. My brother works at the Rinaldi hotel in Menaggio.”
Mara did understand. The Rinaldis rarely threatened anyone directly. Their power lived in the number of ordinary things they could withdraw.
“Did Paolo see you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he tell you to stay quiet?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Mara waited.
Carla looked at the floor. “The manager told everyone we were not to discuss private family events.”
“That isn’t the same as telling you to lie.”
“No.”
“Did the camera record?”
Carla’s gaze lifted toward the ceiling.
May you like
“I don’t know.”
Mara had helped choose the camera housings during the restoration because the original devices looked too modern against the painted ceilings. After an attempted art theft two years earlier, the estate insurer required continuous recording in the entrance hall, galleries, and exterior approaches. The footage was stored locally and mirrored to a secure service used by several Rinaldi properties.
