PART 2.
Marco returned twenty-three minutes later with a face I had only seen twice in fifteen years.
The first time, three men had vanished with two million dollars of my money.
The second time, someone had tried to poison me at my own table.
Tonight, he looked worse.
“There’s no employee with a daughter matching her description,” he said.
Behind him, from Sophie’s room, came another sound I had almost forgotten existed in my house.
My daughter laughing.
And somehow, that frightened me more than Marco’s words.
I stared at him.
“Check again.”
“We did.”
“Then check a third time.”
“Lorenzo—”
My eyes lifted.
Marco stopped.
Nobody called me Lorenzo in that tone unless they were about to tell me something I would not enjoy hearing.
He shut the study door behind him.
“The service entrance camera went offline for eleven minutes.”
I said nothing.
“The guard stationed there says he never left his post.
The second guard says the same thing.
Neither remembers seeing the child enter.”
“Someone is lying.”
“That was my assumption.”
“And now?”
Marco placed a tablet on my desk.
A security image filled the screen.
The timestamp read 8:41 p.m.
Empty corridor.
8:42.
Empty.
8:43.
Static.
8:44.
Static.
Then the picture returned at 8:52.
The corridor was still empty.
I looked at Marco.
“She had to come through there.”
“Yes.”
“So where is she?”
“In Sophie’s room.”
“I know where she is now.”
Marco’s jaw tightened.
“I mean where did she come from?”
He didn’t answer.
That was answer enough.
I stood.
“Get the child.”
His eyebrows rose.
“Carefully,” I added.
“Do not frighten Sophie.”
We walked back toward the medical wing.
The house had changed in less than half an hour.
For months, everyone had moved through those corridors quietly, as though grief itself was sleeping behind Sophie’s door and any sudden sound might wake it.
Now there was a small voice inside.
Bright.
Fearless.
Endless.
“And then the princess told the dragon he had terrible breath,” the little girl announced.
Sophie whispered something.
The toddler gasped dramatically.
“No!
Dragons do not brush their teeth!”
Sophie laughed.
I stopped again.
It still did something unbearable to me.
Marco glanced sideways, pretending not to notice.
The nurse, Elena, stood by the monitors with tears shining in her eyes.
When I entered, Sophie looked at me.
Actually looked at me.
Not through me.
At me.
“Daddy.”
One word.
I would have traded half my empire to hear it.
I crossed the room before I could stop myself and lowered beside her bed.
“Yes, tesoro.”
She pointed toward the toddler.
“Emmy.”
The little girl beamed.
“My name is Emilia.”
My heart missed a beat.
It was a common enough name.
Still, my wife’s middle name had been Emilia.
Coincidence.
Nothing more.
“What is your last name?”
I asked gently.
The girl frowned.
“Last name?”
“The other part of your name.”
She considered this as if I had asked her to explain taxes.
“Emilia Rose.”
“That’s your middle name.”
“No.”
She shook her head firmly.
“That’s what Mama calls me when I’m bad.”
Sophie smiled.
I almost smiled too.
“Where is your mama?”
Emilia pointed toward the window.
“Over there.”
The curtains were closed.
I looked at Marco.
He moved to them, pulled one aside.
Beyond the glass was the eastern garden, drowned in rain and darkness.
No one stood there.
“Outside?”
I asked.
Emilia nodded.
“Did she bring you here?”
Another nod.
“Why?”
The child looked confused that I even had to ask.
“To see Sister.”
My skin went cold.
Sophie’s fingers tightened around the stuffed lion.
I kept my voice soft.
“Why do you call Sophie your sister?”
“Because she is.”
The nurse stopped moving.
Marco’s eyes found mine.
Sophie stared at the child with complete trust.
I felt something hard and ancient awaken in my chest.
Not anger.
Not yet.
Fear.
“Who told you that?”
“Mama.”
The word seemed to change the temperature of the room.
“What is Mama’s name?”
Emilia looked at me.
For the first time since I had seen her, the little girl became quiet.
Her eyes were pale gray.
I had not noticed before.
Or perhaps I had refused to.
Isabella’s eyes had been gray.
Not blue.
Not green.
Gray like rain over stone.
Emilia had the same eyes.
I stood too quickly.
The chair scraped the floor.
Sophie flinched.
Instantly, I regretted it.
“Daddy?”
“I’m here.”
Emilia hugged Bartholomew to her chest.
“You’re scary.”
The accusation was so simple that Elena nearly smiled despite herself.
I crouched again.
“I’m sorry.”
The toddler studied me with grave suspicion.
“Are you always scary?”
Marco coughed into his fist.
I ignored him.
“Sometimes.”
“Mama said that too.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“What else did your mother say about me?”
Emilia swung her feet.
“That you don’t sleep.”
Marco looked away.
“That you drink yucky brown water.”
Whiskey.
“That you hate oranges.”
I felt my pulse in my throat.
I hated oranges.
Not disliked.
Hated.
Isabella used to mock me for it.
She would peel one at breakfast just to annoy me, leaving the skin on my plate because she knew the smell irritated me.
Almost no one knew that.
Emilia continued.
“And you keep Mama’s music box in the drawer because it makes you sad.”
I stopped breathing.
No one knew that.
No one.
Not Marco.
Not the staff.
Not even Sophie.
After Isabella died, I had taken a small silver music box from her dressing room and locked it inside the lower drawer of my private desk.
I had opened it perhaps six times in two years.
Usually after midnight.
Always alone.
My hand closed around the edge of Sophie’s bed.
“Marco.”
He understood.
Without a word, he left the room.
I looked back at Emilia.
“Where did your mother hear that?”
“She knows.”
“Has she been inside this house?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
The toddler smiled.
“A long time.”
“How long?”
“Before me.”
Children measured time in impossible ways.
Tomorrow could mean next week.
Five minutes could mean forever.
Still, the answer lodged under my ribs.
I tried another question.
“Where do you live?”
“With Mama.”
“Where does Mama live?”
“At the yellow house.”
“What yellow house?”
“The yellow one.”
Of course.
“Is it near here?”
She shrugged.
“Do you know the street?”
“No.”
“The town?”
“No.”
“Can you show us?”
“Yes.”
Hope struck too quickly.
“Where?”
She pointed toward the rain-darkened window again.
“There.”
I followed her finger.
Past the garden.
Past the wall.
Toward the old northern woods.
No houses stood in that direction for almost three miles.
Only my property, abandoned vineyard terraces, and an old caretaker’s road no one had used in years.
Marco returned.
He did not come alone.
Dr.
Adrian Keller followed him.
Sophie’s neurologist had been staying in the guest wing while adjusting her treatment.
He was sixty, meticulous, skeptical, and one of the few men who spoke to me as though my money did not impress him.
“Mr.
Moretti,” he said, “Marco tells me there’s a child here.”
“There is.”
Keller stepped closer.
His expression changed when he saw Sophie sitting upright.
“She’s been speaking,” Elena whispered.
“How much?”
“Several words.
Spontaneously.”
Keller stared.
Sophie hid slightly behind Emilia’s shoulder.
That alone was remarkable.
She had barely moved voluntarily all week.
Keller approached slowly.
“Sophie?”
She did not respond.
Emilia leaned toward her.
“He has funny eyebrows.”
Sophie giggled.
Keller blinked.
I almost laughed myself.
Instead, I said, “Examine her.”
“Not yet.”
I turned.
He was watching the children.
“Excuse me?”
“Whatever is happening is producing a response we haven’t seen in months.
I’m not disrupting it because you’re impatient.”
Marco became very interested in the floor.
Few men survived telling me I was impatient.
Keller had done it at least twelve times.
I stepped back.
“Fine.”
Another fifteen minutes passed.
Sophie spoke nine words.
I counted every one.
Emilia told stories.
Sophie listened.
Once, she reached toward Emilia’s hair and touched the loose blonde strands near her ear.
Emilia did not pull away.
Then she yawned.
A huge, exhausted yawn that reminded everyone she was three years old and apparently had no adult looking for her.
I checked the time.
9:26.
“Emilia,” I said.
“We need to find your mother.”
The child immediately shook her head.
“Mama said wait.”
“For what?”
“She’ll come.”
“When?”
“When the bells ring.”
“There are no bells here.”
“Yes, there are.”
I glanced at Marco.
He looked equally confused.
The Moretti estate had no bell tower.
No church stood close enough to hear.
Then Emilia added, “The little bells.
In Mama’s song.”
Something inside me went still.
I walked out of the room.
Fast.
Down the corridor.
Past Marco calling my name.
Into the study.
I unlocked the bottom drawer.
The silver music box sat exactly where I had left it.
Dustless.
Untouched.
I lifted it.
My thumb found the tiny clasp.
For a moment I could not open it.
Then I did.
The mechanism began to play.
Six delicate notes.
Pause.
Four more.
Isabella’s melody.
She had played it on the piano while pregnant with Sophie.
It had no name.
She claimed she had invented it as a child.
No sheet music existed.
No recording.
Nothing.
Behind me, a tiny voice said, “That one.”
I turned.
Emilia stood in the doorway.
Marco was behind her, pale.
“That’s Mama’s song,” she said.
I stared at the music box.
“No.”
Emilia walked toward me.
“That’s what she sings when she’s sad.”
My fingers tightened around the silver case.
“Your mother sings this?”
“Yes.”
“Exactly this?”
The child hummed.
Six notes.
Pause.
Four more.
Perfectly.
My stomach turned.
For twenty years, I had believed fear was information.
A useful thing.
It told you where the danger was.
Who had betrayed you.
When to run.
When to kill.
But this fear had no direction.
It spread everywhere.
Into the walls.
Into the past.
Into memories I had buried.
I lowered the music box.
“Marco.”
“Yes.”
“Bring the car.”
Emilia clapped.
“We’re going to Mama?”
“If you can show me where she is.”
The girl nodded.
“Sophie comes too.”
“No.”
Her smile vanished.
“Sister comes.”
“Sophie is sick.”
“No, she isn’t.”
Dr.
Keller had followed us into the study.
His eyes sharpened.
Emilia looked straight at him.
“She’s scared.”
Nobody spoke.
The girl hugged her lion.
“Mama says scared can make your body forget things.”
Keller’s face changed.
Not because the statement was medically profound.
It wasn’t.
Because a three-year-old had said it with the certainty of someone repeating words she had heard many times.
Sophie appeared behind Elena in the doorway.
She had gotten out of bed.
For one second, no one reacted because what we were seeing did not make sense.
Then Elena gasped.
“Sophie!”
My daughter stood barefoot on the carpet.
Thin.
Pale.
Trembling.
But standing.
I crossed the room.
She raised one hand.
“No.”
It was the strongest I had heard her voice in months.
Everyone froze.
Sophie looked at Emilia.
“I go.”
My eyes burned.
“Sophie—”
“I go with Emmy.”
Keller approached and checked her pulse.
He looked at me.
“She shouldn’t be walking this far.”
Sophie’s face fell.
“But,” he continued carefully, “I’m beginning to think tonight is not a night for telling her what she shouldn’t be doing.”
I looked at him.
“Are you recommending I take my medically fragile six-year-old into the woods at night?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I’m saying you won’t stop her without destroying whatever breakthrough is happening.”
I hated him for being right.
Twenty minutes later, our convoy left through the eastern gate.
Mine was the lead SUV.
Marco drove.
I sat in the back with Sophie and Emilia.
Keller followed with Elena and emergency medical equipment.
Two security vehicles trailed us.
Rain struck the windshield.
Emilia pressed her nose against the window.
“Left.”
Marco turned.
“Right.”
We followed an old service road.
Branches dragged across the vehicle.
Another turn.
Then another.
The paved road vanished.
Marco slowed.
“This goes toward the abandoned vineyard.”
“I know.”
“There’s nothing out there.”
Emilia pointed.
“That way.”
Five minutes later, headlights illuminated a rusted iron gate almost hidden beneath ivy.
I knew the place.
Or thought I did.
The gate belonged to Belladonna Cottage, an estate once owned by my grandfather.
It had been empty for eighteen years.
I had never been inside.
My father had forbidden it.
When I inherited the property, I kept the same rule without questioning why.
Some doors in families remain closed because everyone forgets who first decided to lock them.
Emilia bounced in her seat.
“Home!”
Marco braked.
No one spoke.
Beyond the gate, through the rain, a house appeared between the trees.
Yellow.
A light burned in one upstairs window.
Marco whispered, “That house has no electricity.”
Emilia reached for the handle.
I caught her.
“No.”
“Mama’s waiting.”
Security moved first.
Four men entered the grounds.
I watched through the windshield as flashlights cut across the garden.
No movement.
No gunfire.
No alarms.
Marco received the all-clear.
We entered.
The front door was unlocked.
Inside, the cottage smelled of lavender and wood smoke.
Not abandonment.
Life.
A fire burned low in the sitting room.
Children’s drawings covered one wall.
A small pair of red shoes rested by the staircase.
On a table stood three framed photographs.
I reached the first.
My entire body went cold.
Isabella.
My dead wife.
She was younger in the photograph.
Perhaps nineteen.
Laughing beside a woman I did not recognize.
The second photograph showed Isabella holding a newborn baby.
Not Sophie.
The date written on the back was eleven years before Sophie’s birth.
The third photograph nearly dropped me to my knees.
My father stood beside Isabella.
His arm was around her shoulder.
Both were staring at the camera.
On the back, in Isabella’s handwriting, were six words.
HE PROMISED LORENZO WOULD NEVER KNOW.
Marco read them over my shoulder.
“Lorenzo…”
Footsteps sounded upstairs.
Every weapon in the room rose.
Emilia smiled.
“Mama!”
She ran.
I grabbed her before she reached the stairs.
“Wait.”
A woman appeared at the top.
Bare feet.
White nightdress.
Dark hair falling over one shoulder.
For half a heartbeat, the world ended.
Because she looked like Isabella.
Not resembled.
Not reminded me of.
Looked like her.
Then she stepped into better light.
Older.
Thinner.
A scar crossed her jaw.
And I understood.
Not Isabella.
Her sister.
The sister Isabella had told me died when they were children.
The woman looked down at Emilia.
Then at Sophie.
Finally, at me.
“Hello, Lorenzo.”
My mouth had gone dry.
“Who are you?”
Her expression was almost sad.
“My name is Lucia.”
Behind me, Marco swore quietly.
I remembered the name.
Lucia Valenti.
Dead at age twelve.
At least according to every story Isabella had ever told me.
“You’re supposed to be dead.”
“So was Isabella.”
The room became silent.
I took one step toward the staircase.
“What did you say?”
Lucia’s gaze moved to Sophie.
Her composure broke.
Tears filled her eyes.
“Oh, God.”
Sophie stared back.
Emilia pulled against my hand.
“Sister!”
Lucia descended slowly.
When she reached the last step, she knelt and opened her arms.
Emilia ran to her.
Lucia held the child tightly.
Then she looked up at me.
“You shouldn’t have brought so many men.”
“You kidnapped a child into my house.”
“I did no such thing.”
“You sent her.”
“I tried to stop her.”
Emilia protested into her mother’s shoulder.
“I wanted Sister.”
“I know, sweetheart.”
My patience snapped.
“Why does she call Sophie that?”
Lucia closed her eyes.
When she opened them again, she looked terrified.
Not of my guards.
Not of me.
Of the answer.
“Because Isabella made me promise that if anything ever happened to her, I would keep the girls apart until it was safe.”
I heard Keller inhale behind me.
“The girls?”
Lucia stroked Emilia’s hair.
Then looked at Sophie.
“They have the same mother.”
The sentence landed without meaning.
My mind rejected it.
“No.”
“Lorenzo—”
“No.”
“Sophie is Isabella’s daughter.”
“I know who my daughter is.”
“And Emilia is Isabella’s daughter too.”
I looked at the three-year-old.
Then at Lucia.
“That’s impossible.”
“Yes,” Lucia whispered.
“That’s what your father wanted you to believe.”
The floor seemed to move beneath me.
Emilia was three.
Isabella had died four years ago.
Possible.
Barely.
But possible.
“Who is her father?”
Lucia’s silence lasted too long.
I stepped toward her.
“Who is Emilia’s father?”
A sound came from upstairs.
A door opening.
Everyone turned.
Lucia went white.
Not pale.
White.
“No.”
The guards lifted their weapons.
A figure appeared at the end of the upper hallway.
A woman.
Thin.
One hand gripping the railing.
Dark hair.
Gray eyes.
For two years, I had dreamed of her face.
For two years, I had woken reaching for a woman buried beneath a marble angel in the Moretti family crypt.
My body forgot how to breathe.
Sophie whispered first.
“Mama?”
The woman looked down at her.
Then at me.
And smiled through tears.
“Hello, Lorenzo.”
Behind me, someone dropped a flashlight.
The crash echoed through the cottage.
I could not move.
Could not speak.
Could not understand why a dead woman was standing twelve feet above me.
Then Isabella’s gaze shifted past my shoulder.
Toward the open front door.
Her expression changed.
All the warmth disappeared.
“Close the door,” she whispered.
Marco turned.
“Why?”
Isabella came down one step.
“Because Emilia didn’t find your house by accident.”
Another step.
“And neither did Sophie get sick by accident.”
My blood turned cold.
“What are you talking about?”
Isabella looked directly at me.
Then she said the words that made every armed man in the room reach for his weapon.
“Your father knows Sophie is still alive.”
I stared at her.
“My father has been dead for fourteen years.”
Isabella shook her head.
“No, Lorenzo.”
From somewhere beyond the trees came the low growl of approaching engines.
One.
Then three.
Then many.
Headlights swept across the rain-soaked windows.
Isabella descended the final step.
Her hand found Sophie’s.
And for the first time since returning from the dead, she looked afraid.
“He’s been waiting for you to bring both girls together.”
…If you want to know what happened next, please type “YES” and like for more.
READ FULL PART 2:
FULL STORY: The Moretti Family Secret – PT04
Source: Stories of Destiny · Thao Thao
