Chapter 9 - Grace's Video
Grace's face filled the screen.
She looked thinner. There were shadows beneath her eyes, but her voice was steady.
"Luca, your mother thinks fear makes people obedient. She's wrong. It makes them careful."
I sat down because my legs stopped working.
Grace explained that Sofia had begun pressuring her to sign voting proxies after I left. When Grace refused, Sofia threatened to isolate her from me "for her own health."
Then the sedatives started.
"I pretended to take some of them," Grace said. "I needed her to think I was weaker than I was."
She had discovered a camera in the west-wing room and used it against them, speaking nonsense whenever she knew they were watching and writing real information only when the power cycled each night.
"Matteo found the first message. He didn't rescue me right away because he was trying to get Nicholas out safely. I hated him for waiting. I still might. But he is not the one you need to fear most."
The video flickered.
Grace leaned closer.
"Your mother has been planning to replace you since before we married. She believes love made you weak. She believes our son makes you controllable."
My throat burned.
"And Luca... if she tells you I left, don't believe her. I would crawl across broken glass before I abandoned you or our baby."
The video ended.
I could not speak.
Carlo rested a hand on my shoulder.
Then another file appeared automatically.
A scan of a signed order.
It authorized the transfer of Grace Rossi to a private psychiatric facility outside the country.
The signature at the bottom was mine.
Perfect.
Except I had never signed it.
Someone had forged my name.
Enzo whispered, "With this document, they could claim she was unstable and remove her legally."
"And if she vanished after that?"
"People would believe she had been committed."
A printer beside the laptop suddenly came alive.
One page slid out.
None of us had touched it.
May you like
On it were five words:
DON'T GO TO THE MAUSOLEUM.
