“What?”
I leaned forward.
“You were part of the ambush, Giulia. You helped plan it. You thought you could take control of the family if my father was gone.”
“That’s insane—”
“Is it?”
I pulled out another sheet of paper.
This one showed financial transfers. Large sums of money moving from her accounts to a shell company in Eastern Europe.
The same company that had employed the men who ambushed my father.
Her face crumpled.
“Lorenzo, please—”
“Sofia saw you.”
The words hung in the air like a death sentence.
Giulia’s mouth opened, but no sound came out.
“She saw you at the edge of the woods that night,” I continued. “Watching. Making sure the job was done. And when she pulled me out of that car, you realized she could identify you.”
Giulia’s hands were shaking violently now.
“I didn’t have a choice,” she whispered. “Your father was going to hand everything to you. Everything I’d worked for. Everything I deserved.”
“So you killed him.”
She didn’t answer.
I stood slowly.
“You’ve been hunting Sofia for fifteen years. You wanted her dead so she couldn’t testify against you. And when you found out she was working in my house, you tried to get her thrown out so your people could finish the job.”
Giulia looked up at me, tears streaming down her face.
“Please, Lorenzo. I’m family.”
“You stopped being family the night you killed my father.”
I walked to the door and opened it.
Carlo stood outside with two other men.
“Take her,” I said.
Giulia screamed as they pulled her from the chair.
“Lorenzo, please! You can’t do this! I’m blood!”
“So was he.”
They dragged her out of the room, her voice echoing down the hallway until a door slammed and the house fell silent.
