Chapter 7 - ISABELLA’S REAL REASON FOR MARRYING HIM
~1,100 words
“Which means Carlo knew Nicholas was found.”
Adrian walked toward the study.
Isabella followed him.
So did I.
Nobody told me to leave anymore.
Vittorio came last.
Adrian unlocked the room.
The study was dark wood, old books, and the sort of quiet that comes from generations of men believing walls could keep secrets.
Isabella stood near the desk.
“This is what I was searching.”
Adrian turned.
“For the note?”
“For a red ledger.”
Vittorio’s head snapped toward her.
That reaction told us more than her words.
Adrian noticed.
“What red ledger?”
Isabella looked at him.
“My father mentioned it before he died.”
“And you didn’t tell me.”
“No.”
“Why?”
She took a breath.
“Because I didn’t know whether I could trust you.”
The sentence landed harder than any accusation that night.
Adrian stared at her.
“We’re getting married in twelve days.”
“I know.”
“You accepted my ring.”
“I know.”
“You moved into my house.”
“I know.”
“And you didn’t trust me.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“No.”
At least she didn’t lie.
Adrian turned away.
“Why marry me?”
Vittorio gave a bitter laugh.
“There’s the question.”
Isabella looked at him.
“Be quiet.”
He almost smiled.
Adrian didn’t.
“Answer me.”
Isabella took off her engagement ring.
Not dramatically.
Carefully.
She placed it on the desk.
“When you first asked me to dinner two years ago, I said yes because of my father.”
Adrian’s face hardened.
“I thought so.”
“No. Listen.”
She stepped toward him.
“I had just found Nicholas’s cufflinks among Dad’s things. I found the receipt from Rachel’s father. I found the photograph.”
Her eyes moved toward me.
“And one page from Dad’s notebook.”
She reached inside the lining of her bag and removed a folded piece of paper.
Even Vittorio looked shocked.
She had hidden it from all of us.
Adrian almost laughed.
“Anything else in that bag?”
“Not after this.”
She handed him the page.
Thomas Crane’s handwriting filled both sides.
I could read only pieces from where I stood.
Vittorio made me leave him.
I went back.
Could not find book.
Carlo knows more than Adrian.
Never let Isabella near them.
Adrian read silently.
Then reached the final lines.
His expression changed.
“What?”
Isabella asked softly.
He looked at her.
“You knew Nicholas died because of my family.”
“I suspected.”
“And you dated me anyway.”
“At first, I wanted access.”
Nobody moved.
There are some truths so ugly that nobody needs to raise their voice.
Adrian nodded once.
“Access to my house.”
“Yes.”
“My records.”
“Yes.”
“My family.”
“Yes.”
Vittorio muttered, “There it is.”
Isabella turned on him.
“But I did not stay for that.”
Adrian said nothing.
She looked back at him.
“I fell in love with you.”
He gave a small, painful smile.
“Convenient.”
“I know how it sounds.”
“No, Isabella. You know how it is.”
Her face broke.
“I was going to tell you.”
“When?”
“Before the wedding.”
“Twelve days became eleven at midnight.”
She had no answer.
He picked up her engagement ring and held it out.
She did not take it.
“I don’t want it back like this,” she whispered.
“Neither do I.”
He placed it beside Nicholas’s gold band.
Two rings.
Two broken promises.
The symmetry wasn’t subtle.
Neither was the pain.
Vittorio cleared his throat.
“The red ledger won’t help you.”
Adrian slowly turned.
“So it exists.”
Vittorio cursed himself.
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“My father had it.”
“Yes.”
“What was in it?”
“Payments.”
“The four million?”
Silence.
Adrian stared.
“You stole it.”
Vittorio looked away.
“No.”
“You just hesitated.”
“Because it’s complicated.”
“Men say that when the simple version makes them look guilty.”
I almost smiled.
Adrian had learned that quickly.
Vittorio’s jaw tightened.
“The money moved through accounts I controlled.”
“Into what?”
“Political payments. Cash operations. Your father’s projects.”
“All four million?”
“No.”
“How much did you take?”
Vittorio said nothing.
Adrian stepped closer.
“How much?”
“One point two.”
Isabella closed her eyes.
There it was.
Another piece.
Nicholas had been blamed for stealing four million.
Vittorio had stolen part of it himself.
“You framed my brother.”
“I didn’t plan to.”
“That’s supposed to help?”
“The money had already been moved. When Nicholas disappeared, Carlo decided the story served everyone.”
“Everyone except Nicholas.”
Vittorio’s expression cracked.
“Yes.”
For the first time all night, I heard remorse without an excuse attached.
That didn’t make him innocent.
It made him human.
Which was harder.
Adrian looked around his father’s study.
“Where did Carlo keep old accounting books?”
Vittorio shrugged.
“Here. Sometimes the office.”
Isabella shook her head.
“I searched the obvious drawers.”
Adrian glanced at her.
“Apparently.”
She accepted the insult.
He walked to a tall cabinet behind the desk.
Inside were decades of appointment books.
Tax folders.
Property files.
Nothing red.
Then I noticed something strange.
One shelf had a clean rectangle where dust should have been.
“Something was removed.”
Adrian looked.
Marco stepped closer.
“Recently?”
“No.”
I ran a finger across the wood.
“The surrounding varnish faded. Whatever sat there was there for years.”
Adrian stared at the space.
Then looked toward Vittorio.
“Who cleared Carlo’s personal effects after he died?”
Vittorio answered reluctantly.
“Thomas.”
Isabella froze.
“My father?”
“He handled the private papers.”
Adrian looked at her.
“If Thomas found the red ledger—”
“He may have taken it.”
She thought for a moment.
Then her face changed.
“My mother’s house.”
Vittorio frowned.
“What?”
“Dad gave me one box I was never supposed to open while he was alive.”
Adrian’s eyes sharpened.
“Where is it?”
“In her attic.”
Nobody said attic with any excitement.
There was no dramatic rush.
No secret room.
Just five adults exhausted at four in the morning realizing the truth might be sitting between old Christmas decorations and tax returns.
An hour later, Isabella carried a plain banker’s box downstairs from her mother’s storage room.
Her hands trembled.
Inside were Thomas Crane’s personal papers.
A photograph of Isabella and her sister.
His wedding band.
A rosary.
A stack of birthday cards he had never mailed.
And beneath them—
a red leather ledger.
Vittorio sat down.
Adrian opened it.
The first pages were exactly what he expected.
Payments.
Names.
Amounts.
His father’s handwriting.
Then he reached December, fourteen years earlier.
One line was underlined twice.
Vittorio — bring Nicholas home. No violence. Let me speak to my son.
Adrian looked up.
Vittorio had gone white.
Carlo had not ordered Nicholas killed.
He had ordered him brought home.
Vittorio’s last defense disappeared.
Adrian kept reading.
Then he reached the following day.
His father had written:
Nicholas still missing. Vittorio says he ran. Thomas says otherwise.
And beneath that:
$4,000,000 transfer must be explained before Adrian sees books.
Adrian turned the page.
A banking reference number sat beside two initials.
V.D.
He looked at his uncle.
Vittorio whispered, “Adrian—”
But Adrian was already reading the next sentence.
It was the line that finally destroyed the story the DeLuca family had believed for fourteen years.
Nicholas did not take the money.
May you like
I know who did.
---
