Page 87 of Pretty Plaything

“Don’t worry your pretty little head with that,” he says. “Just let me know when it happens. I want to be among the first ones to know. It’s important. Never forget you’re my daughter.”

I press my lips into a tight line. He won’t tell me anything because he thinks I won’t understand or that it’s not my place to know.

But I’m not going to be his spy. I’m not going to do that to Alessandro.

As my father strolls away, I lean against the wall. Something’s weird about this, and I need to find out what exactly my father knows.

What if he found out the truth about Alessandro? It seems impossible, but I want to make sure.

When I’m sure no one’s coming my way, I hurry to my father’s office. It’s the only place where I may find answers to my questions.

The code is still the same, so I enter the office without a problem. I go through some of the papers, but I don’t find anything.

The safe.

If my father has something he values a little bit more than the rest, he’ll keep it in his safe. I remove the books from the shelf that’s hiding the safe.

I need another code because it’s not the same one as on the door. What could it be?

I try Fabio’s birth date. I’ve always had the impression that Fabio is his favorite.

It works, and the safe opens.

I see some papers, so I grab them, hoping they’ll be useful. If nothing’s here, then it might be in my father’s special crypt, but that’s like a completely different level of security, and I can’t get in there, even with all the codes in the world.

I flip through some contracts.

Nothing.

Nothing.

And noth—

I spot Mauro’s name on the bottom of the page with his signature. What the hell?

I quickly skim through the contract. My father and Mauro have a plan to control a very large area, even bigger than their actual territories.

I glance at the date of the contract.

My heart skips a beat.

What? It’s an old contract.

About twenty years old.

I read through it a little more carefully. Oh shit.

The Bellinis’ territory is included in the contract, and there’s a mention of Mauro’s heir. Apparently, if Mauro happened to have an heir, he’d be part of the deal too.

Wait a second.

This is all a little too convenient. How could Mauro and my father have planned all this? And why? Why include the Bellinis territory?

No one tried to take over their territory, especially not my father, as far as I’m aware. And even if my father ordered the hit on the Bellinis, then why leave Alessandro alive?

Unless...

Unless Mauro knew Alessandro was his son even back then.