The dead man in the photograph was smiling.

That was what frightened me most.

Not the fact that he was supposed to have been buried six years earlier.

Not the fact that Julian Rossi was standing beside him.

The smile.

Because I remembered that smile.

I had seen it across a mahogany desk seven years ago, when Alessandro Moretti threatened to destroy my family unless I disappeared from his son’s life.

And now he was apparently alive.

“Christian.”

My voice sounded strange.

He looked at my phone.

The color left his face.

For several seconds, he said nothing.

Then he reached for the emergency stop button.

The elevator shuddered.

“Where did you get that?”

“It just arrived.”

“From whom?”

“I don’t know.”

He studied the photograph.

Then he enlarged the background.

A marble wall.

A brass sculpture.

A distinctive painting of three white horses.

Christian whispered something in Italian.

“What?”

“That’s my father’s private office.”

“Where?”

He looked at me.

“In the Moretti estate.”

I felt sick.

“But the house was sold after he died.”

“No.”

Christian’s voice was flat.

“It was transferred into a private trust.”

He pressed the elevator button again.

“We’re going there.”

I caught his arm.

“Christian, wait.”

He looked down at my hand.

It was the first time I had touched him in seven years.

Something flickered across his face.

Then he gently removed my fingers.

“Not yet, Elena.”

Those three words hurt more than I expected.

Not yet.

Not until he knew whether I was telling the truth.

Not until he understood why I had left him.

Not until we knew whether his father had truly died.

The elevator reached the underground garage.

A black Mercedes waited beside the exit.

Christian opened the passenger door.

I didn’t get in.

“Someone told me not to.”

He turned.

“Who?”

I showed him the message.

His eyes narrowed.

Then he did something unexpected.

He stepped away from the car.

“Good.”

I blinked.

“Good?”

“You’re finally questioning the people who tell you what to do.”

He took out his phone.

“New vehicle. Different driver. No electronic route.”

Within three minutes, another car appeared.

This one was an ordinary blue sedan.

Christian drove.

No security convoy.

No chauffeur.

No dramatic motorcade.

Just the two of us moving through Manhattan while the city slept.

I stared at the streets.

“Your father threatened my parents.”

Christian’s hands tightened around the steering wheel.

I told him everything.

The photographs.

The pension documents.

The five-million-dollar offer.

The threat.

The lie I told him in the rain.

By the time I finished, we were crossing the Queensboro Bridge.

Christian pulled into a quiet service lane.

He switched off the engine.

Then he looked at me.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was afraid.”

“Of him?”

“Of what he could do to you.”

Christian shook his head.

“You thought I would choose my father over you?”

“No.”

My voice broke.

“I thought you’d choose me. And I was terrified of what he’d do after that.”

Christian looked away.

For a long moment, the only sound was traffic moving above us.

Then he said, “I waited.”

I closed my eyes.

“Christian.”

“Every Friday for six months. At the coffee shop across from your laboratory.”

My throat tightened.

“I didn’t know.”

“I thought you might change your mind.”

A tear slipped down my cheek.

He noticed.

But he didn’t reach for me.

“I eventually stopped waiting,” he said.

I nodded.

“I know.”

“No, Elena. You don’t.”

He looked directly at me.

“I stopped waiting for you to come back. I never stopped wondering why you left.”

Before I could answer, his phone rang.

A woman.

“Mr. Moretti, we’ve located the photograph’s original file.”

Christian put the call on speaker.

“Talk.”

“The image was uploaded from a private server registered to Rossi Holdings.”

My stomach dropped.

“Julian?”

“Possibly. But there’s something else.”

A pause.

“The photograph was manipulated.”

Christian exhaled.

“So my father is dead.”

“Not necessarily.”

The woman sounded nervous.

“The background was altered. The people were not.”

Silence.

Then she continued.

“Mr. Moretti, the facial-recognition comparison returned a ninety-nine-point-eight-percent match.”

Christian closed his eyes.

“Where was the original photograph taken?”

“At a private medical facility in Switzerland.”

“When?”

“Thirty-six hours ago.”

I stared at him.

His father was alive.

And Julian knew.

Christian started the engine.

“We’re going to the estate.”

Forty minutes later, we arrived at a stone mansion in Westchester.

The gates opened before we reached them.

Inside, the house was dark.

Christian led me through a marble foyer and into a library.

He went directly to a painting above the fireplace.

Behind it was a biometric safe.

He pressed his thumb against the scanner.

A red light flashed.

ACCESS DENIED.

Christian frowned.

He tried again.

ACCESS DENIED.

Then a mechanical voice spoke.

“Secondary authorization required.”

I stepped closer.

A small screen illuminated.

It displayed a name.

ELENA VALE.

I stopped breathing.

Christian stared at me.

“What is this?”

“I don’t know.”

The screen blinked.

VOICE AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED.

Then a recording began.

A man’s voice filled the library.

Alessandro Moretti.

“If Elena Vale is standing beside my son, then the first part of my plan has succeeded.”

Christian looked as if someone had struck him.

The recording continued.

“Christian, you were never supposed to marry into the Rossi family. And Elena was never supposed to marry Julian.”

A long pause.

“I know what I did to both of you.”

The safe clicked open.

Inside lay a sealed envelope.

A flash drive.

And a photograph.

Christian picked up the photograph first.

It showed me at twenty-four.

Standing outside Columbia University.

Beside me was my father.

And beside him stood Alessandro Moretti.

The two men were shaking hands.

I whispered, “My father told me he’d never met yours.”

Christian opened the envelope.

His eyes moved across the first page.

Then the second.

Then he sat down.

“What is it?” I asked.

He handed me the document.

At the top were the words:

MORETTI MERIDIAN GROUP.

CONFIDENTIAL SUCCESSION AGREEMENT.

Below them were two signatures.

Alessandro Moretti.

And my father, Daniel Vale.

But it was the third name that made my knees weaken.

ELENA VALE.

BENEFICIAL OWNER: 51%.

I stared at the paper.

“I don’t understand.”

Christian looked up at me.

“Neither do I.”

Then a voice came from the doorway.

“That’s because neither of you was ever meant to find it tonight.”

We turned.

Julian Rossi stood in the library.

Behind him were two armed security guards.

And beside him, wearing a dark coat and holding a silver walking cane, stood Alessandro Moretti.

Alive.

Older.

But unmistakably alive.

He looked directly at me.

“Hello, Elena.”

Then he turned to his son.

“Christian, before you decide whether to hate me, you need to know something.”

His eyes moved back to the documents in my hand.

“Tomorrow’s wedding was never about love.”

He paused.

“It was about stealing a company that has belonged to Elena since the day she was born.”