Chapter One
“We need to talk.”
With those four little words, everything within Anastasia Renaldi went completely still—with the exception of her heart. It felt as if it would pound straight out of her chest and land on the floor. “Can it not wait until—after?”
Giorgio Renaldi’s lawyer shook his head slowly, his gaze never leaving her face. The grave expression Paolo Molinelli wore didn’t reassure her. It sent her already-frayed nerves straight into frazzled territory. “It’s imperative that I prepare you for what’s about to happen.”
Stasia rested her hand on his forearm, ironically offering him reassurance. “Mr. Molinelli.” She gave him the respect he deserved—she’d known him since she was a little girl, recalled when he used to slip her a piece of caramel candy whenever she accompanied her father to his offices. He’d been a part of her life since she could remember. “You’re about to read my father’s will to the family. Surely whatever you have to say may wait until it’s over, no?”
The old man pressed his thin lips together and shook his head once. “I must tell you now, Stasia. The news in the will…it is not good.”
She frowned. Was Renaldi not financially sound? Ridiculous. She knew the company was solid and its worth had skyrocketed in the last three years alone, despite the world economic woes. “And what does that have to do with me specifically? Is this not news for my brothers to be prepared for as well?”
“It has everything to do with you and only you.” Molinelli took a deep breath, appeared ready to launch into the details but was interrupted by the arrival of her three older brothers. Their late father’s most loyal and faithful friend and employee offered them all a weak smile. “Ah, are we ready to begin?”
“Absolutely.” Her eldest brother, Matteo, nodded, his expression stern, his jaw hard as granite. Only his dark brown eyes, filled with such sorrow, gave away any hint of emotion. He’d taken the loss of their father especially hard, being as he was the most like him. But they had all taken it hard. The illness had come fast, taken him even faster. “Though Mother…she won’t be able to attend this afternoon.”
“Not a surprise. There is much she doesn’t want to face.” Molinelli’s sigh was world-weary. “Let us get on with it.”
Stasia entered the room ahead of her brothers, her mind racing. What could her father’s lawyer want to warn her about before the actual reading? And why wasn’t their mother there? What could she want to avoid? She knew Claudia Renaldi was in deep mourning…they all were. Her father died not even a week ago. Within a month of his terminal cancer diagnosis, they’d lost him, their mother at his side. She’d become inconsolable after his death, hadn’t left her room since the funeral.
Perhaps she’d made herself ill. Stasia made a mental note to go visit her as soon as the reading was over.
“Shall we begin, then?” Molinelli asked once everyone was seated. He didn’t look in Stasia’s direction.
“Get on with it.” Her brother Rafael had absolutely no patience, his irritated growl loud in the otherwise small, quiet meeting room.
“Very well.” Molinelli cleared his throat, settled his reading glasses on the bridge of his nose. Nerves jumped in her stomach when he glanced up at her, their gazes locking before he hurriedly looked away.
Something wasn’t right. Whatever the man was about to say was going to be…bad.
And she didn’t know why.
Clutching her hands together, she listened as he rattled off the usual legal details, the “of sound mind and body” declaration, the “I bequeath this and that to my sons, my estate, to my company”. One mention of their mother, who inherited the three houses they owned.
No mention of his daughter. Ever.
After fifteen minutes of an endless list of assets, donations and divisions, her father finally acknowledged her.
“‘And now to my daughter, Anastasia, my darling, darling girl who doesn’t belong to me, who is not of my blood. How I wish I could make it so.’” Molinelli glanced over the top of his reading glasses before he continued. “‘It pains me to do this. I am not a cruel man, but only recently did I discover this betrayal and so therefore, consequences must be met. Long ago, twenty-six years ago, to be exact, I split from your mother.’”
Molinelli paused, letting the words hang heavy in the silence before he continued. “‘She left me, unhappy with our marriage, looking for excitement and adventure. She found it. I didn’t know, but she found it and she delivered it to me during what I once believed was one of my proudest moments.’”
“What the hell is going on?” Rafe interrupted, the irritation in his voice clear. “Get on with it, man.”
“I’m only reading what your father dictated to me, word for word.” Molinelli sniffed, offended. “The more you interrupt, the longer it will take.”
Stasia’s heart stilled. Everything around her slowed, as if time came to a stop. What her father’s words implied, she could hardly fathom.
“Leave him be,” Matt said sternly to Rafe before he turned to Molinelli. “Carry on.”
“‘Due to the facts that cannot be denied, I must disinherit Anastasia Renaldi from my will, from my life. She is not a part of me, not of my flesh and blood, for she belongs to another. A bitter rival who obtained his revenge against me by filling my wife’s belly with his child.’” The words dripped with disgust, even read in Molinelli’s thin voice.
Shock coursed through Stasia, rendered her silent, still. Completely frozen and confused. Whatever did the words mean? She wasn’t his daughter? She wasn’t a Renaldi?