Chapter 7: What Vittoria Did Not Expect
The state attorney's office received the complaint on a Thursday afternoon.
By Friday morning, Vittoria Moretti had a different attorney.
Her original lawyer — a man who had handled Moretti family matters for twenty years — withdrew from representation without public comment.
His assistant called Luca's office to confirm the withdrawal.
No explanation was given.
None was needed.
Luca told me about it over the phone while I was at my desk between client meetings.
"His firm has done work for the state attorney's office," Luca said.
"He couldn't represent her once the complaint was filed.
Conflict of interest."
"She didn't see that coming."
"No.
She assumed he would find a way around it."
"What does she do now?"
"She hired someone from New York.
Expensive.
Aggressive.
Someone who specializes in making problems disappear quietly." He paused.
"Which tells me she's more worried than she's showing."
I thought about Vittoria in that North Shore house.
Forty years of careful construction.
A family name she had tended like a garden, pruning anything that didn't belong.
"She'll make an offer," I said.
"To settle.
To make it go away."
"She already did."
I sat up straighter.
"When?"
"This morning.
Her new attorney called mine.
She's offering a private financial settlement.
Significant.
In exchange for Petra withdrawing her statement and Raymond Holt retracting his."
"Can she do that?"
"She can try.
She can't force them.
But she can make it very attractive." His voice was even.
"She's also offering to issue a private acknowledgment.
Not public.
Just a letter, to me, admitting she interfered in our marriage."
"A letter you could never use."
"Exactly."
"And what did you say?"
"I told my attorney to decline." A pause.
"All of it."
I exhaled slowly.
"She won't stop," I said.
"A private settlement was her opening position.
She'll escalate."
"I know."
"She'll go after Petra again.
Harder this time."
"Petra has already moved.
New apartment.
I'm covering the cost." His voice was quiet but firm.
"She is not going to be left exposed."
I thought of Petra's four-year-old daughter.
The careful eyes.
The eleven years of watching.
"And Raymond Holt?"
"His statement is already with the attorney's office.
It's on record.
She can't reach it."
"She'll try to discredit him."
"She'll try." A pause.
"He kept the original communication.
The initial approach.
The wire details.
He kept all of it in a safety deposit box in Lisbon for seven years." Luca's voice shifted slightly.
"He said he kept it because he thought one day someone would need it."
I pressed my hand flat against my desk.
"He knew this day would come."
"He hoped it would."
Outside my office window, Chicago moved through its ordinary Friday.
Cabs.
Pedestrians.
The gray November sky that never quite decided whether to snow.
"Luca."
"Yes."
"Your mother is going to make this as painful as possible before it ends."
"I know."
"For you.
For me.
For the twins eventually, when they're old enough to search their own names."
"I know all of that."
"Are you prepared for that?"
The line was quiet for a moment.
"I wasn't prepared for any of this," he said.
"I wasn't prepared to walk into a restaurant and see my children for the first time.
I wasn't prepared to find out my mother had spent years making sure I never knew they existed." His voice was steady.
"But I'm done letting the things I wasn't prepared for make my decisions for me."
I said nothing.
"She took six years," he said.
"I'm not giving her one more day."
That evening, after the twins were in bed, I sat at the kitchen table with a glass of wine I had poured and not yet touched.
My phone lit up.
A message from a number I didn't recognize.
*You should have stayed gone.
This isn't over.*
I stared at it for a long moment.
Then I took a photograph of the screen and sent it to Luca.
His response came in forty seconds.
*Forwarding to my attorney now.
Don't respond.
This is good.*
I set the phone down.
I picked up the wine.
Good, he had said.
May you like
Because a threat sent in writing was not a threat anymore.
It was evidence.
