Part 9
Mara’s mother had wanted to stay. Mara had insisted she go shopping, an instruction her mother recognized as exile and accepted with dignity only after rearranging every cushion in the living room.
Elena stood just inside the apartment.
Her gaze went immediately to Mara’s cheek.
The bruise had faded from purple to yellow.
“I’m sorry,” Elena said.
Mara balanced on one crutch. “Sit down.”
They sat opposite each other. Elena chose the armchair rather than the sofa, perhaps because it was easier to rise from. Mara noticed and hated herself for noticing.
“I told the police what happened,” Elena said.
“All of it?”
“As much as I remember.”
“Did you tell them Paolo held your wrist?”
“Yes.”
“Did you tell them he blocked you?”
“Yes.”
“Did you tell them I didn’t cause it?”
Elena looked down.
“I told them you tried to help me.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No. I told them you did not cause it.”
Mara nodded once.
Elena pressed her hands together over her abdomen. “I should have said it sooner.”
“You were in the hospital.”
“I could have sent a message.”
“Yes.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of Paolo?”
“Of everything. Of saying it wrong. Of Matteo choosing him. Of the press. Of the baby. Of being told I was confused.”
Mara looked toward the window. “And of me?”
Elena’s eyes filled.
“Yes.”
The answer surprised them both.
Mara turned back.
“I thought you would look at me and see someone weak,” Elena continued. “Someone who had invited you into a disaster and then let you be punished for it.”
“I did see that.”
Elena wiped beneath one eye. “You could have lied.”
“I’m not Matteo.”
The sentence came out harder than Mara intended.
Elena absorbed it without defending him.
Mara shifted her ankle on the cushion. “He arrived and saw what frightened him most. Then he decided fear was evidence.”
“I know.”
“He didn’t ask whether I was hurt.”
“I know.”
“He didn’t even let me finish.”
“I know.”
Mara’s voice rose. “Stop saying that.”
Elena folded her hands again.
Silence spread between them. A motor scooter passed below. Someone in the apartment upstairs dragged a chair across the floor.
Mara breathed through the anger until it changed shape.
“What did Paolo want?” she asked.
“The phone. The documents. He wanted me to sign before the baby was born.”
“Why the urgency?”
“He said the board needed certainty.”
“That means nothing.”
“I think he believed I was preparing to leave Matteo.”
“Were you?”
Elena looked at her.
Mara felt immediately intrusive, but the question remained.
“I had spoken to a lawyer,” Elena said. “Not about divorce. About what would happen if Matteo died or if something happened to me. The trust gives Paolo control over the child’s shares until the child is thirty-five.”
“That was not in the draft you sent me.”
“It was in an appendix he brought that afternoon.”
“Do you have a copy?”
“No. I photographed it.”
“With the phone he took.”
Elena nodded.
“Did he return the phone?”
“It appeared beside me after I was taken to the hospital. The photographs were gone.”
Mara leaned back.
“Cloud backup?”
“Disabled.”
“By you?”
“No.”
They sat with that.
“Matteo says the security footage is missing,” Elena said.
“It may not be.”
For the first time since arriving, Elena looked alert.
Mara explained the insurer’s mirrored storage requirement. She did not promise the recording existed. She described the layers of access, the preservation request, and the likelihood that Paolo’s lawyers would resist.
Elena’s hand moved over her abdomen.
“What would it show?”
“Enough.”
“What if it shows I simply stepped back?”
“Then it shows you simply stepped back.”
“And Paolo says I blamed him because of the trust?”
“Then the rest of us decide whether that explanation matches what we see.”
Elena’s eyes moved to Mara’s brace. “And if it shows you catching me?”
“Matteo already knows he was wrong.”
“That isn’t the same as everyone else knowing.”
Mara considered her.
“What are you afraid the footage will prove?” she asked.
Elena’s mouth tightened.
“That I stayed too long,” she said.
The answer carried more than the incident. Mara did not ask her to explain.
When the hour ended, Elena stood slowly. At the door, she turned.
“Matteo wants to apologize.”
“He told you that?”
“Yes.”
“Then he still uses you to deliver messages.”
Elena looked tired. “I offered.”
Mara softened slightly. “I’m not ready.”
“I’ll tell him.”
“No. Tell him nothing. Let him live without an answer for a while.”
Elena nodded.
After she left, Mara found a folded tissue on the armchair. Elena had twisted it into a narrow rope while they spoke.
Mara threw it away, then took it back out of the bin and placed it on the table before feeling foolish and throwing it away again.
The police obtained an order preserving the villa’s physical servers. By the time an independent technician examined them, the local entrance hall files had been deleted through an administrative account assigned to Tomas Valli.
Tomas denied deleting them.
His attorney said the credentials had been compromised.
The server logs showed the deletion occurred at 2:13 a.m., several hours after Elena entered the hospital and before Mara returned to the villa. The account had been accessed from the security office.
Tomas claimed he was asleep at home.
The villa manager claimed he had no access.
Paolo’s attorney described the matter as a routine automated purge.
The technician disagreed.
News of the deletion leaked before the report was complete. The story changed overnight. Matteo was no longer merely the heir who had struck a woman. Paolo became the patriarch accused of concealing evidence. Mara’s restoration work was examined for hidden disputes. Elena’s pregnancy became public property.
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Commentators who had never met any of them argued about whether wealth caused violence or merely hid it better.
A photograph appeared of Matteo leaving the police station. Someone enlarged the image until the exhaustion around his eyes became pixels.
