Chapter 3 - The Woman Warren Erased)
Giulietta did not show Preston the message.
She did not show Warren.
She deleted the notification from her lock screen, copied the number to a secure note and spent breakfast pretending nothing had happened.
At ten thirty she and Preston left the lake house.
He drove.
For almost twenty miles neither spoke.
Then Preston reached across the center console.
"Last night got ugly."
Giulietta looked out the window.
"Yes."
"I don't want us fighting."
"Neither do I."
"My dad is under pressure."
"So he follows me?"
"He follows everybody."
"That isn't reassuring."
Preston sighed.
"I know he can be intense."
"Intense."
"You know what I mean."
Giulietta turned toward him.
"No. I don't think I did until yesterday."
His jaw tightened.
"Don't make my father the villain because he asked you to sign standard paperwork."
Giulietta studied him.
"Would you sign mine?"
"What?"
"If my attorneys gave you medical powers, financial proxies and control over your voting rights if a doctor declared you psychologically unfit, would you sign?"
Preston said nothing.
"That's what I thought."
His hands tightened on the wheel.
"Marriage requires trust."
"Then trust me enough not to control me."
He did not answer.
At noon Preston dropped her outside her apartment.
Giulietta waited until his car disappeared around the corner.
Then she called the anonymous number.
A woman answered on the second ring.
"Giulietta?"
The voice was soft.
Careful.
Older.
"Celeste?"
Silence.
Then, "Yes."
Giulietta closed her eyes.
"Where are you?"
"I can't tell you over the phone."
"Why did you contact me?"
"Because you're going to marry my son."
"I don't think I am."
Another silence.
Then Celeste said, "Thank God."
They met three hours later in a church garden in Westchester.
Celeste Hale arrived alone.
She was sixty, perhaps sixty one, though years of stress had carved deeper lines around her mouth.
Her hair was silver.
She wore dark glasses and a plain navy coat.
She looked nothing like the unstable woman Warren had described.
Giulietta stood when she approached.
Celeste stopped several feet away.
"You look like your mother."
Giulietta froze.
"You knew my mother?"
"Isabella and I met twice."
"When?"
"Before Warren made sure I stopped meeting people he disliked."
Celeste sat.
Giulietta remained standing.
"What did you mean about the medical papers?"
Celeste took off her glasses.
There was fear in her eyes.
Not old fear.
Current fear.
"I signed them twenty three years ago."
"What happened?"
"At first, nothing."
Celeste looked toward the church.
"Warren said they were for emergencies. He said wealthy families needed protection against kidnapping, illness, scandal. I trusted him."
"And then?"
"I questioned an investment."
Giulietta sat.
Celeste continued.
"Warren was using money from a foundation my father left me. I wanted an independent audit."
"What did he do?"
"He told people I was unstable."
Giulietta felt cold.
"He had two doctors evaluate me. One was his college roommate. The other owed Hale Capital three million dollars."
"And they declared you incapacitated?"
"Temporarily."
Celeste gave a humorless laugh.
"Temporary lasted eleven months."
Giulietta stared at her.
"Where was Preston?"
"Fourteen."
"He told me you became ill when he was nineteen."
"Warren changed the story more than once."
Celeste clasped her hands.
"I was placed in a private psychiatric facility in Massachusetts."
Giulietta's stomach turned.
"Were you ill?"
"I was terrified. Angry. Depressed after months of being told no one believed me. Warren used my fear as proof."
"How did you get out?"
"My sister."
Celeste smiled faintly.
"She hired an attorney Warren couldn't buy."
"What happened afterward?"
"I signed a settlement. Warren kept Preston. I received money and disappeared."
"You left your son?"
The question came out harder than Giulietta intended.
Celeste flinched.
Then she nodded.
"I did."
"Why?"
"Because Warren told me if I fought for Preston, he would reopen the incapacity proceedings and make sure I never saw daylight without permission again."
Giulietta said nothing.
"I was weak," Celeste whispered.
"You were afraid."
"Both can be true."
For the first time Giulietta understood why Celeste had contacted her anonymously.
"Why now?"
Celeste opened her handbag.
Inside was a small leather folder.
"I've been following Hale Capital's finances for years."
She removed several pages.
"Warren is insolvent."
Giulietta looked up sharply.
"How insolvent?"
"Enough that your forty eight million isn't the real target."
Celeste pushed the papers across the bench.
Giulietta read.
Loans.
Margin calls.
Personal guarantees.
A private debt vehicle she had never heard of.
Celeste tapped one entry.
"This comes due ten days after your wedding."
"Two hundred and seventy million dollars."
"Yes."
Giulietta stared.
"Why would my marriage solve that?"
"It doesn't."
Celeste looked directly at her.
"Control of your trust does."
Giulietta stopped.
The Marconi Family Growth Trust owned commercial properties, hotel shares and cash reserves worth more than nine hundred million dollars.
Emergency proxy authority would allow Preston to pledge certain assets temporarily.
Not permanently.
But long enough.
"They're going to borrow against my trust."
Celeste nodded.
"To save Hale Capital."
"Without my permission."
"If you're declared unable to give it."
Giulietta remembered the anonymous warning.
Do not eat or drink anything Warren gives you.
Her skin prickled.
"Why did you tell me not to eat or drink?"
Celeste looked away.
"Because Warren once put something in mine."
The church bells began ringing.
Giulietta barely heard them.
"What?"
"I can't prove what it was."
"Celeste."
"I woke in a hospital."
Giulietta stared.
"Warren told doctors I'd taken pills."
"Had you?"
"No."
"Did anyone test you?"
"They said the levels were consistent with sedatives."
"Who prescribed them?"
"A doctor Warren knew."
Giulietta's hands went cold.
This was no longer fraud alone.
It was a blueprint.
Celeste touched her arm.
"You cannot marry Preston."
"I won't."
"Then cancel it now."
Giulietta looked at the documents.
"If I cancel it, Warren destroys everything."
"What do you mean?"
"He'll erase files. Move money. Blame Elliot. Probably blame you."
Celeste's face changed.
"Who is Elliot?"
"The man who found the documents."
Giulietta took out her phone and messaged Marco.
NEED YOU. NOW.
Then she looked at Celeste.
"I need you to meet my uncle."
Celeste recoiled.
"No."
"He can protect you."
"Powerful men always say that."
Giulietta understood.
"Then don't trust Marco."
Celeste looked at her.
"Trust me."
They sat in silence.
Finally Celeste nodded.
That evening, Marco listened to her story without interrupting.
When she finished, he closed the study door.
"I believe you."
Celeste laughed bitterly.
"You don't know me."
"No."
Marco sat across from her.
"But I know Warren."
Giulietta looked at him.
"How?"
Marco's eyes shifted toward her.
For several seconds he said nothing.
Then he opened a locked drawer.
Inside was an old photograph.
Warren Hale.
Marco.
And Giulietta's father, Luca Marconi.
All three men were twenty years younger.
Giulietta picked it up.
"My father knew Warren?"
Marco's expression hardened.
"More than you were ever told."
Giulietta stared at him.
"What aren't you telling me?"
Marco looked at Celeste.
Then back at Giulietta.
"Your father's death wasn't the first time Warren Hale nearly destroyed this family."
May you like
And with that sentence, the wedding stopped being only Giulietta's trap.
It became an old debt.
