Chapter 6 - The Key To The Missing Years
The photograph was slightly grainy, taken outside a dingy brick building at night.
It showed two people standing under a broken streetlight.
One was Vanessa, wearing a dark trench coat, handing a thick white envelope to a man.
The man was tall, heavily tattooed, with a distinctive jagged scar across his jawline.
“Marcus,” Matthew whispered, his face draining of all blood. His voice was hollow, filled with a sudden, horrifying realization.
I looked at my son. “Who is Marcus?”
Matthew couldn't take his eyes off the photograph. His chest heaved as if he were fighting for air. “He was my dealer, Mom. The one who supplied me for three years. The one who always found me whenever I tried to get clean.”
Vanessa let out a strangled, animalistic sound and tried to bolt for the door. Two of Luca’s security guards caught her instantly, dragging her back to the center of the room. She thrashed against them, her perfectly styled hair falling in messy strands across her face.
“Let go of me! I want my lawyer!” she shrieked.
Luca stepped forward, picking up the photograph. He looked from Vanessa to Matthew.
“Why is my fiancée handing an envelope of cash to your drug dealer, Matthew?” Luca asked, his voice vibrating with a terrifying, deadly calm.
Matthew looked at Vanessa, his eyes filling with a rage so profound it made my heart ache.
“Because she wasn't just paying off her brother’s gambling debt,” Matthew said, piecing it together aloud. “She was paying Marcus to keep me addicted.”
A collective gasp echoed from the engagement guests who were still huddled in the lounge, watching the destruction of the mafia boss's relationship.
Matthew stepped closer to Vanessa. “Every time I went to rehab, Marcus would miraculously show up outside the clinic. He’d offer me the first hit for free. He always knew exactly where I was. I thought it was just the devil finding me. But it wasn't the devil. It was you.”
“You’re insane!” Vanessa spat, struggling against the guards.
“Why, Vanessa?” I asked, stepping up beside my son. My voice broke, tears of absolute devastation blurring my vision. “Why would you do that to him? He was just a boy. Why destroy him?”
Teresa answered for her, her voice heavy with grief.
“Because you were too good at your job, Ellen,” Teresa said softly. “You noticed everything in this house. If your mind was clear, you would have noticed the charity accounts not adding up. You would have noticed Vanessa's late-night meetings. Vanessa needed you distracted. And what distracts a mother more than a dying child?”
My knees gave out.
Matthew caught me before I hit the floor. He held me tightly against his chest, both of us trembling.
For years, I had blamed myself. I had agonized over what I did wrong, why my love wasn't enough to keep my son sober. I had locked my purse, cried myself to sleep, and nearly broken my own spirit trying to save him.
And all along, this woman had been paying a monster to poison my boy, just to keep me too exhausted to notice her thievery.
“You fed him poison,” Luca whispered. He walked slowly toward Vanessa. He didn't yell. He didn't raise a hand. But the look in his eyes was a death sentence. “You kept an innocent woman in agony, you kept a man addicted to narcotics, and you stole from my family. From my sister’s memory.”
“Luca, please!” Vanessa begged, her arrogant facade completely shattered. She was sobbing, mascara running down her cheeks. “I had to! The Rossi family was going to kill my brother! I did it for my family!”
“You don't know the meaning of the word,” Luca said coldly.
Suddenly, Vanessa’s eyes darted past Luca, past me. They landed on Lily.
The little girl was standing near the door, holding the hem of her pink jacket, watching the adults with wide, frightened eyes.
May you like
Before anyone could react, Vanessa twisted out of the guards' grip. She was surprisingly fast. She lunged across the foyer, grabbing Lily by the arm and yanking the child against her chest.
“Don't touch me!” Vanessa screamed, pulling a small, silver stiletto knife from her clutch and holding it toward the room. “Nobody move! Or I swear to God, I’ll hurt her!”
