Chapter 3 - THE GLASS SHE KNOCKED AWAY
The ballroom glittered like money trying to look innocent.
Candles burned beneath crystal chandeliers. Musicians played near the terrace. Guests in elaborate masks moved beneath orange and gold lights while waiters carried champagne through the crowd.
At the top of the staircase, Isabella waited for me.
Her black gown reflected almost no light.
“You are late.”
“Yes.”
“Everyone noticed.”
“Good.”
She studied me.
“You look different.”
“I found an old memory.”
Her gaze sharpened.
I offered my arm.
For the cameras.
She took it.
Applause followed us down the staircase.
I saw politicians.
Bankers.
Judges.
Union men.
Shipping executives.
People who publicly would never admit to knowing me.
In private, many owed me favors.
Near the east wall stood Vittorio Conti.
Sixty-eight.
Silver hair.
White dinner jacket.
A man who built his empire by making violence look like accounting.
Beside him stood Bianca.
Dark green gown.
Black hair.
Diamonds at her throat.
Sophie’s other princess.
I did not look at her twice.
That would have been too obvious.
Marco moved through the room behind me.
His expression remained neutral.
The message he had sent ten minutes earlier sat inside my pocket.
BANCA FIORENTINA CONFIRMED. BOX 17 REGISTERED TO LUCA MORETTI. CLOSED TWO DAYS AFTER HIS DEATH. AUTHORIZED CLOSURE SIGNATURE: UNKNOWN.
Unknown.
Someone had used Luca’s credentials after he was dead.
And his missing medal had returned to my home.
Isabella lifted a champagne glass.
“To the future.”
The crowd repeated.
I drank nothing.
My attention moved toward the service doors.
Maria stood briefly inside the corridor, giving instructions to staff.
Sophie was supposed to remain upstairs with Rosa and Caesar.
Supposed to.
I knew better now than to trust that word.
Bianca approached.
She kissed my cheek.
“Alessandro.”
“Aunt Bianca.”
She smiled.
“Soon officially.”
“Perhaps.”
The word made Isabella’s hand tighten on my arm.
Bianca noticed.
“Still afraid of commitment?”
“I have other fears.”
“Do you?”
She looked directly at me.
Too directly.
I smiled.
“Does that surprise you?”
“Very little surprises me anymore.”
“You should spend time with children.”
Her smile froze.
I saw it.
Small.
There.
“Children?”
“They notice things adults miss.”
Isabella interrupted.
“Alessandro has been entertaining the cook’s daughter.”
Bianca laughed.
“A maid’s child?”
“Cook,” Isabella corrected.
“Even better.”
I felt anger again.
The strange new kind Sophie seemed capable of pulling out of me.
Before I could answer, Vittorio approached.
He kissed his daughter.
Then shook my hand.
“Tonight should be celebration.”
“It is.”
“You look like you are preparing an execution.”
“Old habit.”
He laughed.
Vittorio had stood beside me at Luca’s funeral.
He had placed one hand on my shoulder and promised the Contis would support whatever retaliation I chose.
Forty-eight hours later, I had gone to war with the Bellandis.
What if that support had been guidance?
What if the enemy had been chosen for me?
A waiter approached with red wine.
Barolo.
My usual choice.
He offered the tray.
I took one glass.
Marco, across the room, saw.
He gave no sign.
Vittorio lifted his own.
“To Luca.”
Everything inside me went cold.
He had not toasted my brother in ten years.
Why tonight?
Bianca watched my glass.
I noticed.
So did someone else.
A tiny voice behind me said, “No.”
I turned.
Sophie stood in the ballroom.
Fairy wings repaired.
Crooked wand raised.
Maria was thirty feet away, horrified.
Caesar walked beside the child.
Every guest near us went silent.
Isabella whispered, “Oh, for God’s sake.”
Sophie marched directly toward me.
“Sophie,” Maria called.
The child ignored her.
She looked at the wine.
“That’s bad.”
I stared.
“What?”
She swung the wand.
The tinfoil star struck my glass.
It flew from my hand.
Red wine covered the marble floor.
The crystal shattered.
Gasps.
Isabella went white with fury.
Maria reached us.
“I am so sorry.”
I looked at Sophie.
“Why did you do that?”
She pointed.
“There was something in it.”
My pulse stopped.
Vittorio laughed.
“Children.”
But Bianca did not.
She looked toward the waiter.
The waiter was gone.
Marco moved instantly.
Two of my men followed.
I crouched.
“What did you see?”
Sophie pointed toward the broken glass.
“A lady put fairy dust in it.”
“Where?”
“Before the man brought it.”
“What lady?”
She turned.
Her finger moved across the ballroom.
Not Bianca.
Not Isabella.
One of the masked guests near the terrace.
The woman saw.
She ran.
Marco shouted.
Security closed the doors.
The woman reached the terrace.
One of my guards caught her before she made the railing.
Guests screamed.
I stood.
“Take her downstairs.”
Isabella grabbed my arm.
“You cannot turn an engagement gala into an interrogation.”
“It appears someone already turned it into an assassination attempt.”
Vittorio’s face hardened.
“Assassination?”
I looked at the broken wine.
“Test it.”
Marco nodded.
The musicians had stopped.
Three hundred people watched.
This was exactly the kind of public scene I avoided.
Sophie stared up at me.
“Are you mad?”
“No.”
“At me?”
“No.”
“You look mad.”
“I usually do.”
She considered.
“Okay.”
Caesar sniffed the spilled wine and growled.
I pulled him back.
Maria took Sophie’s shoulders.
“We are going upstairs.”
Sophie resisted.
“But his wish.”
“What wish?”
“He wished nobody got hurt tonight.”
I stared.
“I did not.”
“You were thinking it.”
“That is not how wishes work.”
“It is for real fairies.”
Maria closed her eyes.
Several guests smiled.
One of them laughed.
The tension shifted.
For one absurd second, a five-year-old child in crooked wings controlled a room filled with people who had ordered murders and manipulated governments.
I looked at Marco.
“Clear the ballroom.”
Isabella stared.
“What?”
“Gala is over.”
“No.”
I turned.
She saw my face and stopped.
“Everyone goes.”
Vittorio stepped forward.
“Alessandro, think carefully. Panic creates rumors.”
“Good. Let the rumor be that someone tried to poison me inside my home and failed.”
Bianca’s hand tightened around her clutch.
I noticed.
Everyone began leaving.
Isabella followed her father into the corridor.
I heard them arguing quietly in Italian.
Not about the poison.
About the child.
“She saw too much,” Bianca said.
I stopped walking.
They were around the corner.
Isabella answered, too low to catch.
Bianca again.
“You should have handled the cook months ago.”
My vision narrowed.
Marco came beside me.
He had heard.
I looked toward him.
“Do not move them yet.”
“Boss.”
“Not yet.”
If Isabella knew more than she admitted, arresting anyone now would collapse the trail.
We needed the prisoner from the terrace.
We needed the wine test.
We needed the bank box records.
And we needed Maria and Sophie somewhere nobody could reach without passing through me.
I went upstairs.
The family sitting room door stood open.
Maria was kneeling in front of Sophie.
“You cannot run away from Rosa.”
“I didn’t run. Caesar came.”
“That is not better.”
“Caesar knows where he’s going.”
The dog sat proudly beside her.
Maria looked close to tears.
I entered.
She stood immediately.
“I am sorry.”
“Stop apologizing.”
She blinked.
“I should have watched her.”
“There were fifty employees between the kitchen and ballroom. She still arrived.”
“She is determined.”
“I noticed.”
Sophie raised her wand.
“Did I save your life?”
Maria said, “Sophie.”
“What? I did.”
I looked at her.
“Possibly.”
“Then that counts as a wish.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“I did not wish for you to assault my wine.”
She frowned.
“You’re difficult.”
Maria made a sound that might have been a laugh and immediately covered it.
I looked at her.
For the first time, I saw the woman rather than the employee.
Early thirties.
Dark hair pinned carelessly from kitchen heat.
Flour near one sleeve.
Tired eyes.
Strong hands.
She looked away.
“Mr. Moretti.”
“Alessandro.”
Her gaze returned.
“What?”
“If you are living in my family wing tonight, calling me Mr. Moretti every three seconds will become exhausting.”
“We are living here?”
“Until this is resolved.”
“No.”
The refusal surprised me.
“No?”
“I have an apartment.”
“Someone inside this house told my fiancée’s aunt that your daughter saw too much.”
Maria went still.
“What?”
I regretted the sentence the moment I saw fear enter her face.
Sophie looked between us.
I lowered my voice.
“You are not safe outside.”
Maria’s jaw tightened.
“I will take Sophie to my sister.”
“Where?”
“I am not telling you.”
“Good.”
She stared.
“If I know, someone can make me tell them. Stay here tonight. Tomorrow we decide.”
“We?”
“Yes.”
That word seemed to matter.
She looked toward Sophie.
The child was now lying against Caesar, using his shoulder as a pillow.
Maria’s fear softened.
“One night.”
“One.”
Sophie lifted her head.
“And my third wish?”
“You have not granted the second.”
“Yes I did.”
“What was it?”
She smiled sleepily.
“You wanted the night to end without blood.”
I looked down at my hands.
No blood.
The would-be poisoner had been captured alive.
No one shot.
No one hurt.
She had somehow done it.
“Fine.”
Sophie yawned.
“One left.”
Maria carried her toward the guest room.
At the doorway, Sophie looked over her shoulder.
“You should save the last one.”
“For what?”
“When you know what you really want.”
The door closed.
I stood in the hall.
Ten years ago, I knew exactly what I wanted.
Luca alive.
Everything else was second place.
Now, for the first time, the impossible wish had changed shape.
I no longer wanted to bring my brother back.
I wanted to know why he had been taken.
May you like
And downstairs, the woman who tried to poison me had just given Marco a name.
Bianca Conti.
