Chapter 5 - THE HOUSE VINCENT BOUGHT HER
Z
The house Vincent bought Sophia had never really been a gift.
Not in the way he thought.
It was an investment.
Just not his.
Luca discovered that within twelve hours.
The property sat behind iron gates in Lake Forest, forty minutes north of Chicago, worth nearly four million dollars.
Vincent had purchased it because Sophia complained her apartment did not feel safe.
He never checked what she did after moving in.
Why would he?
Sophia was family.
At least that was what he had always told me.
Security footage from the property showed Marco Ricci visiting six times in four months.
Always late.
Always through the rear entrance.
Vincent watched the videos in a hospital conference room.
His grandfather, Salvatore Moretti, sat opposite him.
At eighty-one, Salvatore still had the kind of face that made younger men lower their voices.
“You gave that woman a four-million-dollar meeting place for a Ricci,” Salvatore said.
Vincent did not defend himself.
That was how everyone knew the situation was serious.
“She was my responsibility.”
Salvatore struck the table with his cane.
“No. Your wife was your responsibility.”
The words traveled through the room like a gunshot.
Vincent looked up.
Salvatore leaned forward.
“I watched Claire sit beside your mother’s grave every Christmas because you couldn’t stand going alone. I watched her learn our traditions. I watched her smile while half this family treated her like an outsider.”
His voice hardened.
“And you humiliated her publicly by bringing Sophia to my birthday while your pregnant wife stayed home.”
“I know.”
“No, boy. You’re beginning to know.”
Vincent looked toward the hospital window.
Salvatore had never called him boy in front of his men.
“You liked Sophia because she never asked anything difficult from you,” the old man continued. “She wanted money? Easy. A house? Easy. A car? Easy. Claire wanted respect.”
Vincent closed his eyes.
“And that required you to change.”
Nobody spoke.
Finally Luca placed several photographs on the table.
Marco entering Sophia’s house.
Marco leaving.
Sophia meeting him in a restaurant.
Another photo.
Sophia kissing Marco in a parking garage.
Vincent stared at it without visible emotion.
Salvatore watched him carefully.
“You loved her?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Vincent looked at the photograph.
“I loved being needed.”
That answer was worse.
Because it was true.
Sophia had mastered one thing Claire never tried to do.
She made Vincent feel indispensable.
Every crisis required him.
Every inconvenience became an emergency.
Every problem had only one solution.
Vincent.
And he had mistaken dependence for devotion.
“What did she give Ricci?” he asked.
“We’re still investigating,” Luca said.
“Find out.”
Back upstairs, I knew almost none of this.
My entire world had narrowed to Isabella’s oxygen numbers.
The medication was not working quickly enough.
Her cardiologist wanted another twenty-four hours.
I sat beside the incubator while my stitches burned and my legs trembled.
A nurse kept telling me to rest.
I couldn’t.
Vincent appeared around sunset.
He had changed clothes.
Dark sweater.
Black pants.
No suit.
He looked less like the man whose photograph sometimes appeared beside whispered newspaper stories and more like a father who had not slept in two days.
“You need to eat,” he said.
“I’m not hungry.”
He set a container beside me.
“I asked them what you’re allowed to have.”
I stared at it.
He had brought soup.
Five years earlier, when I had the flu, Vincent complained because the smell of chicken broth lingered in our bedroom.
I almost laughed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Claire.”
“I was remembering the last time I ate soup around you.”
He remembered too.
His face tightened.
“I was an ass.”
“Yes.”
“You can say worse.”
“I probably will.”
For a moment, something almost familiar existed between us.
Then I looked at Isabella.
It disappeared.
Vincent sat in the chair beside mine.
“I found out who Sophia called.”
“I know.”
“There’s more.”
I turned toward him.
He told me about the house.
The meetings.
Marco.
The photographs.
I absorbed it quietly.
When he finished, he said, “I’m going to find out what she was doing.”
“Why are you telling me?”
“Because you deserved the truth years ago.”
I stared at him.
“Don’t turn Sophia into an excuse.”
His eyebrows pulled together.
“She manipulated you.”
“Yes.”
“But you chose her.”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
“You bought the house.”
“Yes.”
“You bought the car.”
“Yes.”
“You stayed with her when Luca told you I was dying.”
His voice dropped.
“Yes.”
I looked away.
“I need you to understand something, Vincent. Even if Sophia turns out to be the devil herself, she did not make you treat me badly.”
Silence.
“You did that.”
He looked at our daughter.
“I know.”
I believed him.
That was almost worse.
A monitor suddenly sounded.
Three nurses moved at once.
I stood too quickly.
Pain tore through my abdomen.
“What happened?”
One nurse checked Isabella’s oxygen.
Another called the cardiologist.
Vincent caught my elbow before I collapsed but released me the second I steadied.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded.
The cardiologist arrived minutes later.
Isabella’s oxygen levels were falling.
The medication had failed.
She needed the procedure.
Tonight.
My entire body went cold.
“How dangerous?”
The doctor gave us the percentages.
I barely heard them.
All I heard was surgery.
Our premature daughter.
Our three-pound daughter.
Our daughter who had not even opened her eyes long enough to know my face.
They wheeled her away at 9:18 p.m.
I stood until the doors closed.
Then my legs gave out.
Vincent caught me.
This time, I didn’t tell him to let go.
For exactly ten seconds, I buried my face against his chest and cried.
His arms came around me.
Carefully.
Like he was holding something he had already broken once.
“I’m scared,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“Don’t tell me she’ll be okay.”
He swallowed.
“I won’t.”
“Just stay here.”
His eyes closed.
May you like
“I will.”
And for once, Vincent Moretti did.
