Chapter 3 - HOUSEKEEPER'S DAUGHTER
Red lights flashed across the rehearsal room.
The alarm hammered through the ceiling speakers.
"Everybody out," the guard shouted.
Cesare wrapped his coat around Elsie and carried her into the hallway. Julian followed. Vanessa moved with them, but Cesare pointed at her.
"Not near my granddaughter."
"She's Julian's daughter too."
"Then maybe he should start acting like it."
Smoke rolled from the far end of the administrative corridor.
People poured from offices. Dancers in half-finished costumes ran toward the stairwell. A stage manager yelled that the children were already being evacuated through the south exit.
Elsie buried her face in Cesare's neck.
"My flower," she whispered.
"I've got it."
He slipped the torn pieces into his inside pocket.
Rosa Alvarez, the family's longtime housekeeper, pushed through the crowd.
"Elsie!"
Elsie reached for her. Cesare handed the child over, and Rosa held her tight.
Vanessa watched them and gave a humorless smile.
"See? That's why I believed she was Rosa's daughter. She's always with her."
Rosa's eyes hardened.
Julian muttered, "Vanessa, stop."
Cesare turned on him. "No. Let her talk. I want to hear how far this humiliation goes."
Vanessa folded her arms. "Julian said Elsie's mother walked out, that Rosa practically raised her, and that introducing a child right now would complicate our engagement announcement. He said people could mistake Elsie for staff."
Elsie's face crumpled.
"Dad said I had to call him Mr. Bellini when Vanessa was there."
Rosa closed her eyes.
Cesare stared at Julian.
"Tell me she is lying."
Julian couldn't.
"You made your own child pretend she didn't belong to you."
Julian swallowed. "I was going to explain after the gala."
"Children don't live after the gala. They live now."
A firefighter ran out. "The fire started in a records room near finance. Somebody poured accelerant into a file cabinet."
Marta called Cesare's phone at that exact moment.
He answered.
May you like
Her voice was shaking.
"Cesare, we found the first payment. Four hundred eighty thousand dollars. And you're not going to like the company that received it."
