Chapter 4

After she got back to the estate, Serafina did not mention the wife's seal for two days.

She checked the Foundation accounts as usual, confirmed the Founders' Gala menu with the kitchen as usual, and even asked Luca whether he wanted a drink when he came up to the room late at night.

Luca stood in the doorway and looked at her for a long time.

"Have you come to your senses about what happened at the warehouse?"

"You were right." Serafina closed her book. "I shouldn't have gone to the docks without security arranged."

She said security, not seals. What Luca heard was obedience.

The next day, one of the two guards outside the master bedroom was gone.

Serafina had fooled him with the version of herself he knew best. For ten years she had kept up appearances and patched the holes, and she had never embarrassed him in front of anyone. Luca had taken that habit as proof that she would never leave.

Three days before the hearing, Luca offered to go with her to the Family clinic for her annual physical.

"You haven't been sleeping well." He opened the car door for her. "After the exam we'll go to dinner. Just the two of us."

Serafina got in. "All right."

The private clinic occupied an unmarked gray building by the river bend, with an underground garage connected directly to the elevator so no patient's name ever appeared in a public system. Moretti Family members used it for wounds and children that had to be kept out of public records.

The exam had barely begun when the hallway erupted into commotion.

A nurse rushed a wheelchair into the obstetrics wing. Gianna was curled up in it, blood on the hem of her beige skirt, one hand clamped over her lower abdomen.

"Luca..."

She only called out once.

Luca was already on his feet. He did not look at Serafina. He followed straight into the obstetrics suite and ordered the Family doctor to see to Gianna first.

"She's bleeding," he said. "Save the baby first."

Serafina sat on the edge of the exam bed and watched the door close behind him.

The nurse explained awkwardly, "Your exam can be pushed back to—"

"You don't have to explain," Serafina said. "Please pull up every appointment today that used Moretti Family insurance, with the responsible party listed. I am the legal signatory on the Foundation account and I need to confirm the scope of what we are guaranteeing."

The nurse hesitated for a moment. She had no authority to refuse the account holder, so she opened the system.

Gianna Rossi, nine weeks pregnant.

Fetal pre-registration status: direct Moretti heir.

Emergency contact: Luca Moretti.

Cost guarantee: the Serafina Moretti Art Foundation dedicated account.

Which meant Gianna was carrying her husband's child, the child was set up to inherit her position in the Family, and even the money keeping that pregnancy alive came out of the foundation she had built.

The obstetrics door opened. Gianna was propped against the head of the bed, pale but in good spirits. Luca stood beside the doctor listening to the instructions, holding her chart.

Through the glass, Gianna slowly raised her hand.

The black rose brooch was pinned to the collar of her hospital gown.

Once the nurse left, she pushed the door open a crack. "Serafina, you're still here?"

"This is my appointment."

"It's also my baby." Gianna touched the brooch. "The doctor says it was only a scare. Don't worry, the Moretti heir is perfectly healthy."

Serafina looked at Luca. "When did you find out?"

Luca's jaw tightened. "We'll talk about it at home."

"You registered an heir here, and you were going to tell your wife at home?"

"She was bleeding."

"So you saved the baby first."

"It's a life."

Gianna let out a soft laugh. "Ma'am, when the federal people come to take you away, the child will still need a mother with a proper claim. You've had Luca for ten years. Leaving a little something for someone else isn't too much to ask, is it?"

Luca whipped around. "Shut up."

But he only told Gianna to be quiet. He did not take the brooch off her, and he did not deny the heir registration.

Serafina's phone buzzed.

Mara had sent over a risk waiver just pulled from the board's independent archive. The first time the irregular shipping triggered a warning, Luca had signed in his own hand to keep it moving. The last page explicitly held the Foundation's legal officer of record responsible for all explanations and recovery claims arising from a compliance dispute.

The signature was real.

The date was three months ago.

By then Luca already knew the wife's seal verification was irregular, and he was already with Gianna.

"Luca." Serafina switched off her phone. "If only my name or this child's name can be saved, which one do you save?"

He clearly misread the question and thought she was finally going to use her standing as his wife to force him to deal with his mistress.

"You will always be my wife." He stepped closer and softened his voice. "Gianna and the child have to be provided for. I'll give her a house and money. I won't let her threaten your place. Just don't tear the whole Family down right now."

"And the risk waiver?"

Luca's eyes changed. "Who gave you that?"

"Your signature is on it."

"That shipment had to clear. If there's a real problem, the Family lawyers will handle it."

"But you wrote that I would bear the responsibility."

"You're Mrs. Moretti. The Family won't let anything happen to you."

"And if the Family has to protect the heir?"

He did not answer.

Serafina already had her answer. He wanted to keep his wife because her reputation, her foundation, and her name were useful. He also wanted to keep Gianna and the child because they embodied his desire and his bloodline. The only thing he had not preserved for her was the right to refuse.

When the nurse came back, Serafina requested a copy of the account guarantee record and had the nurse note that the account holder had retrieved it in person. Then she took the old painting she had been preparing for testing out of the Foundation car.

Three sets of evidence were divided among the painting frame's hidden compartments: the server timestamps on the file with the missing code, the crack scans and profit records from Pier Twelve, and Luca's signed risk waiver together with the heir registration.

She handed the painting to Mara, who had come to collect it.

"Start the hearing."

"Once it goes in, the Council will notify Luca."

"Send the notice after the Founders' Gala begins."

"You still plan to go back and host the gala?"

Serafina looked through the glass door. Luca was listening to the doctor's instructions about the pregnancy, and Gianna's hand rested on his wrist.

"That is the stage where he plans to show off a perfect marriage," she said. "It's time everyone saw what he uses to keep it perfect."

Back at the estate, she started packing.

No Moretti jewelry, no Family cash, no ledger that could let the Council rule she had stolen secrets. She took only her restoration tools, her private paintings, her original studio contract, and one old suitcase her mother had left her.

That night, three sealed sets of evidence were delivered into the Council vault.

Luca was still at the clinic, watching over Gianna's pregnancy.