Chapter 5: The Other Side of the Family
I kept my voice steady.
"What terms?"
"A meeting," Carver said.
"Tomorrow.
Somewhere neutral.
An hour of your time."
"And if I say no?"
"Then we proceed without you," he said.
"Which is less comfortable for everyone."
"That sounds like a threat."
"It's a description," he said.
"Ms.
Hale, you seem like a practical woman.
I'm offering you information.
What you do with it is entirely your choice."
I looked across the ballroom.
Giovanni hadn't returned from his phone call.
Renata was still near the far wall, still talking.
Mia had disappeared into the crowd.
"How did you get this number?" I asked.
"The same way we get most things," Carver said.
"Quickly."
I didn't like that.
I didn't like any of it.
But Mia's words were still sitting in my chest — she'll know everything by tomorrow morning — and I thought about Lily waking up in my mother's apartment, asking when I was coming home.
"Text me the address," I said.
"I'll decide in the morning."
I ended the call before he could say anything else.
The rest of the evening passed in a kind of controlled blur.
Giovanni found me twenty minutes later, near the edge of the room.
He looked at my face and read something in it.
"What happened?" he asked.
"Someone named Carver called me."
Giovanni went very still.
"On your personal number?"
"Yes."
He looked away.
A muscle in his jaw moved once.
"He works for my brother."
"Your brother."
"Marco." He said the name the way you say a word you've stopped expecting to feel anything about.
"He monitors most of what I do.
Has for years."
"And he knew about tonight?"
"He knows about most things before I'd prefer him to." Giovanni looked back at me.
"What did he offer?"
"A meeting.
Tomorrow.
Information."
"Don't go."
"He said proceeding without me would be less comfortable for everyone."
"That's Marco's version of a warning," Giovanni said.
"He uses polite language for impolite things."
"What does he want?"
Giovanni was quiet for a moment.
Around us, the wedding guests had begun to drift toward the tables for the late supper.
The orchestra had softened to background music.
Somewhere across the room, I could hear Sophia laughing — my sister, happy, surrounded by people who loved her, completely unaware of what was happening fifteen feet away.
"Marco wants the trust," Giovanni said.
"He has wanted it for a long time.
If I remain unmarried past the fiscal year, it transfers to him under the original terms our grandfather set.
He has spent the last eight months ensuring that every woman I've been introduced to has found a reason to walk away."
"He sabotaged the arrangements."
"Every one of them."
"And tonight?"
"Tonight he wasn't expecting me to arrive with someone already on my arm." Giovanni glanced toward the corridor where he'd taken his call.
"He's adjusting."
"So Carver calling me — "
"Is Marco trying to get to you before you decide anything." He looked at me directly.
"He'll offer you money to walk away.
More than I offered.
He can afford to.
The trust is worth considerably more than what either of us would pay you."
I thought about that.
"What happens to you if he gets it?"
"I lose the company my grandfather built," Giovanni said simply.
"Marco will liquidate it within a year.
Three hundred people lose their jobs.
The Fierro name becomes a holding company for his other investments." He paused.
"He's been planning it for a long time."
"And your mother?
Renata?"
"She prefers Marco," he said.
"She always has.
Tonight was the first time in years I've surprised her."
I looked at him.
Really looked.
The scar on his chin.
The steadiness in his eyes.
The way he delivered difficult information without flinching or asking for sympathy.
"You're asking me to walk into a family war," I said.
"I'm telling you what you already walked into," he said.
"The war started the moment you said two years, three months."
A waiter moved past us with a tray of champagne.
Neither of us reached for it.
"I need to think," I said.
"I know."
"And I need to know one thing first."
"Ask."
"Is there anything about this situation — anything at all — that you haven't told me?"
Giovanni held my gaze.
"Yes," he said.
I waited.
"My grandfather didn't write the trust clause about marriage," he said.
"Marco did.
He had it inserted four years ago, when our grandfather was ill and the legal team was being managed by Marco's attorney." He paused.
"I only found out six months ago.
I've been building a case to challenge it.
But I need time.
And I need the appearance of stability."
"Which is where I come in."
"Which is where you come in."
The supper bell rang.
Guests began moving toward their seats.
Giovanni offered his arm.
I didn't take it yet.
"If I help you," I said, "and this works — what happens to the clause?"
"It gets challenged in court.
With the right documentation, it gets removed entirely."
"And if it doesn't work?"
"Then Marco gets what he wants," Giovanni said.
"And I lose everything my grandfather spent forty years building."
I looked at his arm.
Still extended.
Still patient.
I thought about Carver's smooth voice.
About Renata on the phone.
About Tyler saying you can barely pay your bills with that particular smile.
I took Giovanni's arm.
"Then we'd better make it convincing," I said.
We walked toward the supper tables together.
At the far end of the room, I saw Marco Fierro for the first time — though I didn't know it yet.
He was watching us from near the bar.
Younger than Giovanni by several years.
Lighter in coloring.
A pleasant face that gave away nothing at all.
He raised his glass slightly in our direction.
Giovanni didn't look at him.
May you like
But his arm tightened under my hand.
Just once.
