Chapter 9 - THE WEDDING WITHOUT A BRIDEAt eleven thirty-seven, Luca Moretti walked into Saint Aurelia Cathedral without a bride.
Six hundred guests stood.
Not because anyone told them to.
Because the entire room sensed that something had gone terribly wrong.
Reporters gathered outside.
Security lined every aisle.
Whispers spread through the pews.
Where is Celeste?
Why is Luca alone?
Was there another attack?
Had someone died?
I watched from the rear balcony beside my parents.
Dad’s arm was in a sling.
Mom had changed out of her dye-covered cardigan into a clean blouse someone found at the palace.
Marco stood near the altar.
Luca wore a simple black suit.
Not the white wedding suit.
That garment now sat in federal evidence.
Stripped of electronics.
Cut open.
A two-hundred-thousand-dollar symbol of betrayal.
Luca reached the microphone.
The cathedral became silent.
He looked over the crowd.
“When my father brought me to this church as a child, he told me that a man should never stand before an altar and lie.”
People shifted.
“So I will not begin today.”
Every phone in the room was already recording.
Celeste’s family sat in the front pew, pale.
Luca continued.
“There will be no wedding.”
Gasps.
“Celeste Romano has been arrested as part of a federal investigation involving extortion, kidnapping, financial fraud, attempted murder, and a criminal organization that has operated for decades.”
Chaos threatened to erupt.
Luca held up a hand.
Silence returned.
“My uncle, Raffaele Moretti, has also been arrested.”
More gasps.
“My family name will appear in reports that are published over the coming weeks. Some stories will be true. Others will be exaggerated. Some will be worse than anything you imagined.”
Marco looked down.
Luca took a breath.
“I cannot control that.”
Then he said something I did not expect.
“I will cooperate with investigators.”
Several Moretti associates exchanged nervous glances.
“I will provide access to company records. Any business connected to illegal activity will be closed or transferred to court supervision.”
The cathedral exploded with whispers.
Mom murmured, “That man just declared war on half his relatives.”
Dad nodded.
“Good.”
Luca continued.
“My father spent the final years of his life trying to correct decisions our family should never have tolerated.”
His voice tightened.
“I learned that yesterday.”
I watched his hands.
Still.
But only because he was forcing them to be.
“He failed to finish that work.”
Luca looked toward Marco.
“We won’t.”
Marco nodded.
For a man reputed to rule through fear, Luca was doing something far more dangerous.
Giving up secrecy.
Truth threatened criminal empires more effectively than bullets.
He concluded simply.
“For those of you who came to celebrate, I apologize.”
An elderly woman called from a pew, “We’re glad you’re alive!”
Nervous laughter spread through the cathedral.
Then applause started.
One person.
Then another.
Soon hundreds were standing.
Luca looked genuinely uncomfortable.
I smiled.
Mom noticed.
“Oh.”
I turned.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You said oh.”
“I said nothing.”
“You absolutely said oh.”
Dad looked between us.
“What am I missing?”
“Nothing,” I said.
Mom whispered to him.
His eyebrows rose.
I wanted to disappear.
“You two are impossible.”
Luca left the altar.
Our eyes met from across the cathedral.
He started walking toward the balcony stairs.
Oh no.
Mom fixed my hair.
“Mom.”
“What?”
“Stop.”
“You have threads in it.”
“I spent the morning being shot at.”
“No excuse.”
Dad straightened my collar.
“You too?”
“I missed fourteen years.”
“You don’t get to parent all of them today.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m twenty-nine.”
“Still my daughter.”
Luca arrived.
My parents immediately behaved as though they had done nothing.
“Mr. Marin.”
Dad extended his hand.
“Antonio.”
“Luca.”
They shook.
Mom hugged him.
Luca froze.
I almost laughed.
“Thank you for keeping my daughter alive.”
Mom released him.
He looked at me.
“She did most of that herself.”
“Correct answer,” Mom said.
I groaned.
“Can everyone stop evaluating him?”
Dad tilted his head.
“We’re parents.”
“You abandoned the job for fourteen years.”
Silence.
Dad winced.
I instantly regretted it.
“Dad…”
“No.”
He nodded.
“You’re allowed.”
We still had wounds.
They wouldn’t disappear because everyone survived.
That mattered.
A happy ending wasn’t pretending nothing hurt.
It was finally having time to heal.
Luca seemed to understand.
He asked my parents, “Could I borrow Isabella for five minutes?”
Mom smiled too quickly.
“Twenty.”
“Mom.”
“Go.”
Luca and I walked through a side corridor into the cathedral garden.
Early autumn sunlight covered the stone courtyard.
For the first time in nearly two days, there were no bullets.
No trackers.
No kidnappers.
No screaming radios.
I realized how exhausted I was.
Luca sat on a stone bench.
I joined him.
“You did something brave in there,” I said.
“You sound surprised.”
“I’m trying to compliment you.”
“My apologies.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
He smiled.
Actually smiled.
It changed his entire face.
Dangerous.
Very dangerous.
“What happens now?” I asked.
“Investigations.”
“To you?”
“Yes.”
“Worried?”
“Yes.”
Another truthful answer.
“I inherited businesses I should have examined more carefully.”
“That’s not the same as committing every crime associated with them.”
“No.”
“But?”
“But leadership means responsibility even when ignorance is convenient.”
I looked at him.
“That sounds like your father talking.”
He went quiet.
“I wish I had known him better.”
“You were young.”
“I spent years angry with him.”
“For what?”
“He tried to pull the family out of several businesses. I thought he was becoming weak.”
Luca stared at his hands.
“Raffaele encouraged that belief.”
There was grief in his voice.
The same grief I knew.
The horror of discovering you had misunderstood someone after losing them.
I touched his hand.
Without thinking.
His fingers closed around mine.
Neither of us moved away.
“You know what Bastien told me?” I said.
“What?”
“My father knew I was angry the night he disappeared. He knew I loved him anyway.”
Luca looked at me.
“Maybe yours knew too.”
His jaw tightened.
“I hope so.”
We sat in silence.
Then he said, “You should leave Chicago for a while.”
I pulled my hand away.
“What?”
“For safety.”
“Don’t.”
“Isabella—”
“You almost had a human moment.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
“Casa Nero has remaining members.”
“The government has the ledger.”
“That creates more danger before it creates less.”
“And you?”
“I have security.”
“So do I now, apparently.”
He frowned.
“You’re stubborn.”
“You’re controlling.”
“You climbed into my trunk.”
“Your security failed to check it.”
He stared.
I grinned.
His mouth twitched.
“I’m not leaving because you order me to.”
“What if I ask?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Because my parents were here.
Because Bastien needed help rebuilding his workshop.
Because I had spent years constructing a career and refused to surrender it to criminals.
But there was another reason.
One I wasn’t ready to say.
“You still owe me for repairing your suit.”
His eyebrows rose.
“That suit is federal evidence.”
“I repaired it first.”
“How much?”
“Considering emergency fees?”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
“You should be.”
His phone rang.
The moment ended.
Marco.
Luca answered.
“What?”
His expression shifted.
“What do you mean missing?”
I straightened.
“What?”
He listened.
“Lock every exit.”
My stomach sank.
“Who’s missing?”
Luca ended the call.
“Celeste.”
I stood.
“What?”
“She disappeared during prisoner transport.”
“Again?”
“Vehicle collision. Three agents injured. She escaped.”
I cursed.
“So much for peaceful afternoon.”
Luca looked toward the cathedral.
“She’ll leave the country.”
“No.”
He looked at me.
“Why?”
“She won’t.”
“You know her that well?”
“No.”
I thought about Celeste.
Her obsession with humiliation.
The wedding.
The money.
Luca.
Me.
“She lost in front of everyone.”
“So?”
“People like Celeste don’t run immediately after humiliation.”
“What do they do?”
“Rewrite the ending.”
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
A photograph.
Bastien Vale tied to a chair inside his workshop.
Celeste stood behind him holding my scissors.
The same shears she had taken from the warehouse.
Underneath:
YOU RUINED MY WEDDING.
COME FINISH THE DRESS.
I showed Luca.
He closed his eyes briefly.
“I am beginning to hate your profession.”
“She has Bastien.”
“And she wants you.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Luca.”
“No.”
I stared.
He stared back.
Then both of us realized the absurdity.
I sighed.
“Are we really doing this again?”
“Apparently.”
I looked at the message.
Finish the dress.
Something about it bothered me.
Celeste’s wedding gown was still at Palazzo Belladonna.
Unless—
Bastien had made a second dress.
I remembered seeing sketches.
Celeste rejected one design after it had been nearly completed.
A dramatic white satin gown with a hand-beaded train.
Bastien never threw away couture.
The dress would still be in the workshop.
Why did Celeste want it?
Not sentimental reasons.
The beading.
Hundreds of individually mounted gemstones.
I suddenly remembered Casa Nero’s money being frozen.
People fleeing needed portable wealth.
Jewelry.
Diamonds.
“Luca.”
“What?”
“She isn’t trying to kill me.”
“Comforting.”
“She needs me.”
“For?”
“To open the dress.”
He stared.
“The beads?”
“Some aren’t beads.”
Bastien once complained that Celeste insisted on supplying certain stones herself.
I had assumed she was controlling.
Maybe she had sewn an emergency fortune into her own wedding gown.
Millions in diamonds.
Untraceable.
Portable.
Luca understood.
“She goes to the workshop, retrieves the stones, leaves the country.”
“And Bastien doesn’t know where he sewed every stone.”
“You do.”
“Yes.”
His face hardened.
“That is worse.”
“Why?”
“Because she won’t release you after you remove them.”
Fair.
We returned inside.
Dad heard enough to immediately say, “Absolutely not.”
Mom said, “We’re going.”
Dad turned.
“Rosa!”
“What?”
“You can’t encourage her!”
“I’m not encouraging. I’m accompanying.”
“No!”
Mom stared at him.
“You disappeared for fourteen years. Your voting rights in family decisions are suspended.”
Marco, arriving behind Luca, burst out laughing.
Dad looked betrayed.
“This isn’t funny.”
“It’s a little funny.”
Luca stepped between everyone.
“We do this properly.”
Federal agents would surround the workshop.
No rushing in.
No improvising.
Mom stared at me.
“Can you locate the diamonds?”
“If they’re where I think.”
“How long?”
“Twenty minutes.”
Luca shook his head.
“Too long.”
“Ten if she already cut the lining.”
“Still too long.”
“Then pray she’s impatient.”
Dad squeezed my shoulder.
“You don’t need to prove anything.”
“I know.”
“Then why go?”
I looked toward Luca.
Then Bastien’s photograph.
“Because he protected me badly.”
Dad almost smiled.
“But he tried.”
“Yes.”
“And you want to repay him?”
“I want Celeste to stop taking hostages every time she loses an argument.”
“Reasonable.”
We left the cathedral through a secure rear entrance.
Thirty minutes later, I stood outside Bastien’s workshop for what I hoped would be the final confrontation of the longest forty-eight hours of my life.
Luca touched my shoulder.
“Stay behind me.”
I looked at him.
“You know that has never worked.”
“I know.”
For the first time, he laughed.
A real laugh.
Then the workshop door opened.
Celeste’s voice came from the darkness.
“Isabella.”
The laughter vanished.
“Come inside.”
May you like
I picked up my sewing bag.
And entered.
