Chapter 2 - The Unspoken Deception
Luca Moretti closed the distance between the doorway and the wheelchair in three long, predatory strides.
The sheer physical aura of the man was suffocating, radiating an explosive lethal authority that caused the air in the bedroom to drop several degrees.
Behind him, Patricia slipped into the room with theatrical panic written all across her face.
"Mr. Moretti, thank heavens you walked in!" the housekeeper gasped, raising her hands to her chest in feigned horror.
"I specifically instructed this agency cleaner to stay out of the master suite, but she forced her way inside!"
"Look at your poor mother—she’s having another hysterical fit because of this girl's rough handling!"
Patricia lunged forward, her claw-like fingers reaching down to violently jerk me upward by my uniform collar.
"Get your hands off her," I said firmly, pulling away from Patricia’s grasp with an icy defiance I didn't know I possessed.
"Quiet, both of you," Luca commanded, his voice cutting through the room like a serrated blade.
He dropped the fragrant bundle of white roses carelessly onto the vanity table, his dark eyes locking onto his mother's trembling form.
"Mom?" Luca said, his deep voice softening into a raw, fractured pitch that revealed the wounded child beneath the ruthless mobster.
Eleanor was weeping uncontrollably, her chest heaving as she hid her face behind both trembling hands.
Luca knelt beside her wheelchair, attempting to take her cold hands into his own calloused palms.
"Mom, it’s me," he pleaded softly, his broad shoulders hunching under an immense, invisible weight. "I brought you your white roses, just like every Thursday."
"Please, look at me."
"Don't turn away from me like you did last week, and the week before that."
Eleanor’s head snapped up at his words, her tear-stained eyes flashing with a mix of utter confusion and profound heartbreak.
Her right hand flew into the air, fingers twisting into rapid, jagged shapes that made no sense to him.
Luca stared at her fluttering hands in absolute, helpless despair.
"I don't understand, Mom," he whispered, running a frustrated hand over his cropped dark hair. "The neurologists told me the stroke took away your cognitive ability to process language."
"They said you only move your fingers because of chronic nerve damage."
"She isn't having nerve spasms, Mr. Moretti," I interrupted, stepping forward despite Patricia’s venomous glare.
"Shut your mouth and pack your things, you insolent little thief!" Patricia hissed, stepping between me and Luca.
Luca stood up slowly to his full, towering height, casting a shadow that swallowed the housekeeper whole.
"Let her speak," Luca ordered, his gaze shifting to me with terrifying scrutiny.
"What do you mean she isn't having spasms?"
I took a deep breath, swallowing the lump of fear in my throat, knowing that what I said next would either save this woman or cost me my life.
"Your mother is speaking American Sign Language, sir," I explained, looking directly into his cold, calculating eyes.
"My daughter Sophie is deaf, and I have signed with her every day for seven years."
"Your mother just asked you why you have abandoned her for eighteen months."
Luca’s entire frame went rigid, the color draining from his chiseled face until he looked like carved marble.
"What did you just say?" he asked, the words barely audible.
"She says she hears your car arrive in the driveway every single Thursday morning," I translated, watching Eleanor's hands as they signed through her tears.
"She says that every time you pull up, Patricia and the medical staff tell her that you refuse to step foot in this room."
"They told her you are repulsed by her condition, and that you have already signed the legal paperwork to place her into a locked psychiatric facility."
A dead, suffocating silence descended upon the grand suite.
The ticking of the antique grandfather clock in the corner sounded like gunshots against the silence.
Luca slowly turned his head toward Patricia, whose smug, arrogant demeanor had completely evaporated, leaving behind a pale mask of sheer terror.
"Patricia," Luca said, his voice dropping into a register that made the floorboards vibrate.
"Every Thursday, you meet me at the foot of the grand staircase with tears in your eyes."
"Every Thursday, you tell me that my mother threw an absolute fit at the mention of my name and locked herself in her bathroom."
"You told me her doctors strictly forbade me from causing her emotional distress by forcing my presence upon her."
"Mr. Moretti, please... you cannot believe the ramblings of a temp maid from the slums!" Patricia stammered, backing toward the hallway door.
"Your mother has severe vascular dementia—the medical reports from Dr. Vance state it clearly in her official charts!"
Eleanor’s hand slammed violently down onto the armrest of her wheelchair, producing a loud crack.
Her hands moved again, slower this time, deliberately enunciating every single letter with burning fury.
I watched her fingers, my blood turning to pure ice in my veins.
"She is saying," I whispered, turning my gaze back to Luca, "that Dr. Vance has not checked her pulse in five months."
"She says Dr. Vance only comes to this house on the first of every month to collect an envelope of cash from the safe in your study."
"And she says..." I paused, watching Eleanor's trembling fingers point directly beneath the seat of her wheelchair.
"She says the proof is hidden beneath her cushion."
Before Patricia could make a move toward the door, Luca moved like a strike of lightning.
He didn't yell; he didn't draw a weapon.
He simply gripped Patricia by the collar of her starch-pressed uniform and hurled her backward into the room, sending her crashing into an antique armchair.
"If you take one step out of this doorway, you won't survive to see the sunset," Luca warned, his voice sickeningly calm.
He walked back over to his mother's chair and knelt down, his large hands trembling as he reached beneath the velvet seat cushion.
His fingers touched something crisp, and when he pulled his hand back out, he was holding a folded, yellowed piece of legal paper.
May you like
Scrawled across the paper in shaky, painful pencil marks were dates, times, and seven distinct names.
Luca unfolded the page, his dark eyes scanning the frantic handwriting of a mother who had been screaming in absolute silence right under his own roof.
