Chapter 8 - THE SECRET BURIED WITH LILY
For a moment, I could not understand the words.
“My daughter?”
Celeste’s expression twisted with guilt. “Sofia knew Bianca searched the mansion. She needed somewhere outside the Rossi world.”
“She didn’t know me.”
“No. Dean did.”
I turned toward him.
He sat handcuffed against the wall, suddenly interested in the carpet.
“What did you do?”
Dean sighed. “A woman paid me to place a small package in Lily’s memorial box.”
My body went numb.
“You went to her grave?”
“It was business.”
I crossed the room before anyone could stop me and slapped him.
The sound was not loud enough for what he had done.
“You put their secrets beside my child.”
He smiled, but fear lived underneath it. “You should be thanking me. That package might save you.”
A detective named Elena Park stepped between us. “We need the location.”
I gave it to her.
The cemetery was forty minutes away.
Lorenzo returned from the service corridor without Bianca. A tunnel beneath the estate opened onto the river road. She had escaped in a waiting car.
When he learned where the drive might be, his face darkened.
“I am sorry,” he said to me.
I almost laughed.
A feared man apologizing did not bring back a child.
But it mattered that he understood the grave was not evidence storage. It was sacred ground.
“I’m going with the police,” I said.
“You should stay with Leo.”
“He is going to the hospital under guard. My daughter is alone in the ground with something those people want badly enough to kill for.”
Lorenzo looked at Detective Park.
She nodded. “Mara comes with us.”
At St. Catherine’s, an independent doctor confirmed Leo had been exposed to repeated low doses of sedatives over several weeks. The damage appeared reversible, but only if the exposure stopped.
I left him in a protected unit with two officers and a nurse selected by the police.
For the first time since entering the nursery, my arms were empty.
The cemetery was wet from morning rain.
Lily’s grave sat beneath a young maple tree. Her stone was small because small was all I could afford.
LILY ELLIS.
LOVED BEFORE SHE WAS SEEN.
My knees weakened.
Detective Park called the cemetery director. A court order arrived. Workers carefully lifted the memorial box buried beside the marker, the place where I had left letters, a knitted cap, and the hospital bracelet I could not throw away.
Inside was a black flash drive wrapped in plastic.
And one of my letters had been opened.
Dean had read it.
I stood in the rain and hated him with a clarity that scared me.
Lorenzo remained a few steps away, giving me space.
Detective Park inserted the drive into a secured laptop.
Video files appeared.
The first showed Celeste adding liquid to Leo’s bottle.
The second showed Dr. Hale falsifying a chart.
The third showed Matteo disabling a camera.
The fourth was recorded in Sofia’s hospital room the night she died.
Bianca stood beside the bed.
Sofia was weak but awake.
“You will not touch my son,” Sofia said.
Bianca leaned close. “By tomorrow, you will not be here to stop me.”
Then another figure entered the frame.
A man wearing a doctor’s coat.
He turned toward the camera.
Lorenzo whispered his name.
“Dr. Hale.”
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But the final clip was worse.
It showed Bianca speaking to Dean outside my apartment two days before he pushed me down the stairs.
