Chapter 4: The Attorney's Thursday Appointment
Renato Fiore had worked for the Moretti family for nineteen years.
He had drafted Lorenzo's father's will.
He had managed the inheritance transfer.
He had sat across from Lorenzo at the library desk every Thursday for the past four years, reviewing contracts, signing documents, sharing espresso from the same silver pot the housekeeper always left on the sideboard.
Lorenzo had trusted him the way you trust a wall.
Without thinking about it.
Because it had always been there.
He found Renato in the library now, coat on, briefcase in hand, moving toward the side exit.
"Leaving early?" Lorenzo said.
Renato turned.
His face arranged itself into something professional and calm.
"I finished the contract review.
I didn't want to interrupt your evening."
"You knew I was home."
"Word travels in a house this size."
Lorenzo stepped inside and closed the door behind him.
"Sit down, Renato."
A pause.
"I have another appointment—"
"Sit down."
Renato sat.
Lorenzo remained standing.
"The library landline.
Four calls this week to a prepaid number."
Renato set his briefcase on the floor carefully.
"I make many calls from that line."
"To untraceable numbers?"
"I wasn't aware the number was untraceable."
"Then you won't mind telling me who you were calling."
Renato looked at him steadily.
"A contact regarding the Miami property transfer."
"Which Miami property?"
A half-second delay.
"The Biscayne acquisition."
"That closed two months ago," Lorenzo said.
"Try again."
Renato's hands settled flat on his knees.
"Lorenzo.
I have served this family—"
"I know how long you've served this family." Lorenzo pulled a chair close and sat directly across from him.
"That's why I'm asking you here instead of letting Marco ask you somewhere less comfortable."
Renato's jaw moved.
"The transfer clause," Lorenzo said.
"The one buried in my father's will.
The one that says my holdings pass to Nico in the event of my death before marriage, or to my spouse immediately upon marriage." He leaned forward slightly.
"You drafted that clause."
"Your father instructed—"
"My father has been d*ad for six years.
You've had six years to tell me that clause existed in its current form.
You didn't."
Renato said nothing.
"Valentina found it," Lorenzo continued.
"You helped her find it."
"That's not—"
"She called you four times this week.
She needed to know the exact legal sequence.
What triggers the clause.
What documentation is required.
What a court would need to see." Lorenzo's voice stayed level.
"You told her."
Renato looked at the window.
"She came to me eight months ago.
She said she had concerns about the estate planning.
She said she wanted to understand her rights as your future wife." He paused.
"I answered her questions."
"You answered her questions about how to inherit everything I own."
"I answered legal questions.
What she did with those answers—"
"Is something you chose not to report to me."
Renato's composure slipped, just slightly.
"She told me you were planning to change the will after the wedding.
That you intended to restructure the holdings in a way that would leave Nico with nothing." He looked back at Lorenzo.
"I believed her.
I thought I was protecting the family."
"You were protecting yourself," Lorenzo said.
"Valentina offered you something.
What was it?"
Silence.
"Renato."
"A retainer." His voice dropped.
"A guaranteed retainer with the Ricci family's holding company.
Regardless of outcome."
Lorenzo sat back.
"Regardless of outcome," he repeated.
Renato's face had gone the color of old paper.
"I didn't know about the mountain road," he said quickly.
"I didn't know anyone would be physically—I thought it was a legal strategy.
Documents.
Timing.
Nothing more."
"But when you heard about the mountain road, you stayed quiet."
Renato didn't answer.
That answered the question.
Lorenzo stood.
"My father trusted you with everything he built."
"Lorenzo—"
"Don't." He picked up Renato's briefcase and set it on the desk between them.
"Open it."
"I don't think—"
"Open it, Renato."
Renato's hands moved to the clasps.
The briefcase opened.
Inside, beneath a folder of routine documents, was a sealed envelope addressed to a law firm in Milan that Lorenzo had never heard of.
He took it.
"I'll need your keys," Lorenzo said.
"The estate keys.
The office keys.
All of them."
Renato reached into his coat pocket without argument.
The keys landed on the desk with a flat, final sound.
"You'll hear from my legal team," Lorenzo said.
"Don't leave the city."
Renato stood slowly, the way old men stand when something has gone out of them permanently.
He walked to the door.
He stopped with his hand on the frame.
"For what it's worth," he said, "I did care about this family."
Lorenzo looked at the sealed envelope in his hand.
"I know," he said.
"That's what made you useful to her."
Renato left.
Lorenzo stood alone in the library for a moment.
Then he opened the envelope.
Inside was a single document — a draft amendment to the Moretti estate plan, already signed by Renato in his capacity as estate attorney, restructuring Lorenzo's primary holdings into a joint trust effective on the date of his marriage.
Valentina's name appeared as sole surviving trustee in the event of Lorenzo's death within five years of the marriage date.
The document was dated three weeks from today.
Three weeks before the wedding.
Lorenzo set it on the desk.
He picked up the library phone.
He dialed his personal attorney in Rome — not Renato, never Renato again — a woman named Dr.
Carla Esposito, who had been his private counsel since his father's funeral and who answered on the second ring even at this hour.
"Carla," he said.
"I need you here by morning.
Bring whoever you trust."
A pause.
"How serious?"
May you like
Lorenzo looked at the document on the desk.
"Bring two people," he said.
