Chapter 13 - The Engagement Ring on the Witness Table
Giselle arrived at the prosecutor's office in a gray suit without jewelry. She looked smaller without the chandelier light and the audience that had once made her cruelty seem untouchable. When she saw me, she smiled as if we shared a private joke.
“The maid,” she said. “Still standing where she doesn't belong.”
“I belong wherever my testimony is needed,” I replied.
The interview lasted six hours. Giselle admitted she had tried to steal Marco's memory card and had broken the mirror to reach the strongbox. She said Lucien had ordered her to discredit Mia and Toby. But she claimed she had never intended for anyone to be killed.
The prosecutor produced messages in which she discussed the children as assets and suggested moving Mia to a private institution before the trust review. Giselle stopped smiling.
Then she revealed a second crime. Lucien had planned to assassinate Dante at the engagement wedding ceremony and use the resulting confusion to transfer control of the shipping trust. The ceremony had been scheduled for four weeks after the dinner.
Dante listened to the recording afterward. He sat very still, the canceled wedding invitation on the table before him. “She was going to stand beside me and watch me die,” he said.
I didn't know how to comfort a man grieving a person who had never existed. I sat beside him until he could breathe without shaking.
The evidence went before a grand jury. Warrants followed. Lucien's companies were frozen, and investigators began tracing victims beyond the Caruso family. Teresa and Rosa finally received formal protection and legal support.
At the end of the week, the prosecutor asked me to testify about the engagement dinner. I practiced answering questions without embellishment. The truth did not need dramatic language. It needed accuracy.
May you like
The morning before my testimony, someone slipped an envelope beneath my door. Inside was the missing silver badge, polished until it shone. On the back someone had scratched a single word: SORRY.
I had no idea who had sent it. But I knew the story was not over.
