Chapter 2 - DOMINIC THOUGHT HIS WIFE WOULD BEG FOR HIM BACK AFTER TAKING HIS EMPIRE—BUT SHE SERVED HIM DIVORCE PAPERS AND DISCOVERED HIS MISTRESS HAD BEEN PLANNING THE ROMANO TAKEOVER BEFORE THEIR AFFAIR EVEN BEGAN
Chaos followed.
Not cinematic chaos.
Corporate chaos.
Which was worse.
Banks froze credit lines.
Vanguard's attorneys suspended Camila's appointment.
Three board members resigned before midnight.
Two politicians left through the kitchen.
A hedge fund manager reportedly vomited in a decorative planter.
Beatatrice returned to Oakbrook.
At 1:13 a.m., Dominic arrived.
He entered her father's library without knocking.
"You humiliated me."
Beatatrice looked up from her tea.
"Did I?"
"In front of everyone."
"That must be painful."
His jaw tightened.
"You planned this."
"For three months."
"You could have come to me."
Beatatrice stared.
"Like you came to me before publicly installing your mistress?"
Dominic looked away.
"That was personal."
"Fraud isn't."
"I didn't forge anything."
"Your signature appears beneath mine."
"I authorized my legal team to refinance."
"Using property you thought belonged to you."
"Property Carmine gave me."
"Operational control."
Dominic slammed his hand on the desk.
"Enough with that phrase."
Beatatrice almost smiled.
"It seems important."
"Your father manipulated me."
"Perhaps."
"He made me believe—"
"Stop."
Dominic fell silent.
"My father did not put Camila in our penthouse."
Beatatrice's voice remained quiet.
"He did not put his mother's sapphire around her neck."
Dominic flinched.
"He did not spend five years letting your men call me disgusting because of my body."
"I never—"
"You never stopped them."
Silence.
"Do you know what silence sounds like when you're the person being humiliated?"
Dominic stared.
"It sounds exactly like agreement."
Something shifted in his face.
Too late.
Beatatrice pushed an envelope toward him.
"What is this?"
"Divorce papers."
His expression changed completely.
"No."
She laughed.
"Interesting."
"Beatatrice."
"You publicly replaced me."
"Camila isn't—"
"Your wife?"
"No."
"Correct."
She leaned back.
"And soon neither am I."
Dominic did something Beatatrice had never seen.
He panicked.
"Don't do this."
"Why?"
"We can fix this."
"Which part?"
"The marriage."
"Why?"
His mouth opened.
Nothing came.
Beatatrice nodded.
"That's what I thought."
Dominic had expected anger.
Tears.
Perhaps revenge.
He had not expected indifference.
That frightened him.
Then Beatatrice placed Carmine's photograph on the desk.
"Did you know Camila knew my father?"
"No."
"Are you certain?"
"Yes."
"Did you know she received forty-two million through Vain Capital?"
His face changed.
"What?"
Beatatrice studied him.
"You really didn't."
Dominic grabbed the document.
Read.
Read again.
"Where did this come from?"
"Vanguard."
"I never authorized this."
"Someone did."
Dominic looked toward the photograph.
"When was this taken?"
"Four days before Dad died."
He became pale.
"Beatatrice."
"What?"
"The sapphire."
"What about it?"
"It wasn't mine to give Camila."
"I know."
"No."
He looked at her.
"It disappeared from my mother's safe two weeks before the gala."
Beatatrice stopped.
"You said you gave it to her."
"I lied."
"Why?"
"Because admitting she already had it meant admitting I didn't know how."
The room changed.
Camila had entered Dominic's family vault.
Transferred money.
Known Carmine.
And manipulated both of them.
"Where is she?"
Beatatrice asked.
Dominic called.
No answer.
The penthouse was empty.
Camila had disappeared.
So had the sapphire.
And inside the master bedroom safe, Dominic found something worse.
A copy of Carmine Romano's original trust agreement.
Covered in Camila's handwritten notes.
One sentence circled repeatedly:
UPON THE DEATH, INCAPACITY, OR LEGAL DISQUALIFICATION OF THE SOLE BENEFICIARY, BENEFICIAL OWNERSHIP SHALL PASS TO THE DESIGNATED SUCCESSOR NAMED IN SCHEDULE C.
Schedule C was missing.
Beatatrice stared.
"If I die, someone inherits."
Dominic whispered:
"Camila knows who."
Beatatrice shook her head.
"No."
She looked toward him.
"Camila thinks she knows who."
Because Carmine Romano had never been careless.
And if he had hidden ownership from Dominic—
what else had he hidden?
The answer waited beneath Oakbrook.
Behind a wall Beatatrice had walked past every day of her childhood.
A wall containing a safe.
May you like
And inside the safe—
Schedule C.
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