MARRIED TO MY ENEMY

THE DEVIL’S NAME

CHAPTER 12:THE DEVIL’S NAME

The name hung in the air like smoke.

“And what about Matteo?” Carlos had asked quietly. “That devil?”

No one answered right away. The study felt suddenly smaller. The leather chairs and dark wood closed in. The faint smell of Lorenzo’s old cigars clung to the curtains like a warning.

Leo was the first to move. At thirty-three, he carried himself like their father already. He pushed away from the fireplace mantel and walked to the bar cart, but he didn’t pour anything. He simply stood there with his back to them, shoulders rigid beneath his black sweater.

“Matteo Moretti is not a man you embarrass,” Leo said at last, his voice low and controlled. The tone he used when he was fighting not to sound exactly like their father. “He’s not sending flowers and a get-well card if his bride disappears a month before the wedding.”

“He’s going to burn the house down,” Carlos muttered into his coffee. At twenty-two, he was the youngest, and for once the joke was gone from his voice.

“He’s going to burn the ports down,” Anthony corrected quietly from the couch, his laptop still closed on his knees. At twenty-five, the middle son understood numbers and risks better than people. “Gioia Tauro, specifically. The one Papa promised as part of the dowry. Forty million euros of Moretti product moving every month without customs asking questions.”

Isabella pressed a hand to her stomach beneath the desk, out of sight. She felt sick.

“You all talk about him like he’s a ghost story,” she said, trying to steady her voice.

“He is a ghost story, Mamma,” Carlos said, leaning forward. His wet hair dripped onto his t-shirt. “You didn’t see what he did to his second cousin at his twenty-first birthday in Taormina. Kid joked that Matteo’s watch was fake. Matteo smiled, bought another round for everyone, then took the kid outside and broke both his hands with a hammer. Still smiling. The kid can’t hold a fork anymore.”

Leo turned from the bar. “And that was family. Imagine what he’ll do to us when we tell him we lost his fiancée.”

“We didn’t lose her,” Isabella snapped, sharper than she intended. “She left.”

“Same thing to Matteo,” Anthony said.

Isabella looked at her middle son. “Have you tried to find her? Anything at all?”

Anthony shook his head. “No. We haven’t looked. You told us not to tell anyone three days ago, Mamma. We listened. No flagged cards, no calls to airports, no questions to friends. We have nothing. She could be anywhere. Paris, London, a train to nowhere. We don’t know.”

The truth landed harder than any lie. Her daughter had been gone three days, and her own sons had no idea where to begin.

“She’s smart,” Leo said softly. “Smarter than we gave her credit for.”

“She’s scared,” Isabella whispered.

“She should be,” Carlos said. At twenty-two he suddenly sounded older. “Matteo told Papa at the engagement dinner he wanted five sons from her. Five. Like she was a breeding mare. She sat there in that white dress, nodding, while he talked about her hips like she wasn’t even in the room. I saw her hands shaking under the table.”

Isabella closed her eyes. She remembered that dinner. She remembered wanting to scream and drag her daughter home.

Leo walked back to the fireplace and dropped heavily into his father’s chair across from her. “We need to start looking. Today. Now.”

“How?” Carlos asked. “We don’t even know what country she’s in.”

“We start with what we know,” Anthony said, finally opening his laptop. The blue glow lit his face. “She left a note. Told you she was going to Chloe’s. Chloe said she never showed. That means she lied to buy time. She planned this. She had help, or cash, or a passport we don’t know about.”

“She had her trust fund,” Leo said.

“She didn’t touch it,” Anthony replied, already typing. “I checked this morning. No withdrawals. She planned further ahead than that.”

Isabella felt a small, painful flicker of pride. Her daughter had outsmarted them all.

“We don’t have time for a full search,” Leo said. He looked at his brothers, then at his mother. “Papa lands in twenty minutes. Antonella Moretti is already texting Franco about the dress fitting. Matteo is in Mexico, but his mother is here and she’s worse.”

“What do we do?” Isabella asked. She hated how small her voice sounded.

Leo met their eyes. “We lie. We tell Papa exactly what you told the staff, Mamma. Ximena has a fever. Doctor’s orders. Highly contagious. She’s at the private clinic in Lugano for forty-eight hours of IV fluids and rest. No visitors.”

Carlos stared at him. “You want to lie to Dad? About his daughter? About the Moretti wedding? Are you insane?”

“I’m trying to keep us alive,” Leo shot back. “You want to greet him at the door with ‘Welcome home, Papa, by the way, your bargaining chip ran three days ago and we have no idea where’? He’ll have a heart attack or put a bullet in all of us for hiding it.”

“He’ll find out anyway,” Anthony said, fingers hovering over the keys. “He always does.”

“Then we buy forty-eight hours,” Leo said. “In forty-eight hours, Anthony starts the quiet search. No flags, no police, just our people. We find her, bring her home quietly, tell Papa she had a panic attack and needed air. We save face with the Morettis. Postpone the dress fitting one day. It’s not perfect, but it breathes.”

Isabella looked at her oldest son and felt a fierce rush of love. He was trying to clean up her mess.

“It’s a good plan,” she said quietly.

“It’s a terrible plan,” Carlos muttered, but even at twenty-two he knew they had no better choice.

Anthony nodded slowly. “Forty-eight hours. I can work with that. I’ll start with her laptop, iPad, cloud, anything. But keep Papa out of her room, Mamma. If he sees the bed hasn’t been slept in…”

“I’ll handle your father,” Isabella said, almost believing it.

Leo stood. “I’m going out. I need to clear my head and check a few things before Papa walks in. Keep the story tight while I’m gone.” He gave them all a single nod and left the study, closing the door softly behind him.

The room felt heavier without him. Isabella turned to her remaining sons. “We make this plan hidden. No slips. No one outside this room knows anything. Anthony, you stay on the digital side, quiet only. Carlos, you keep the staff distracted and make sure no one talks. I’ll manage the Morettis and your father. We buy the time, we bring her home, and we never speak of this again.”

Anthony’s fingers moved across the keyboard. “I’ll set up a private channel. Encrypted. Nothing goes through the usual servers.”

Carlos ran a hand through his damp hair, looking suddenly exhausted. “Yeah. I’ll keep the girls from last night quiet too. Pay them off if I have to. No loose ends.”

Isabella nodded, grateful for their focus. They were already tightening the circle.

Before anyone could say more, three sharp knocks sounded on the study door. Franco’s knock.

They froze.

Isabella unlocked the door with ice-cold hands.

Franco stood there, pale and breathless. “Signora. Signori. The Don’s car has just passed the front gates. He will be at the door in less than two minutes.”

Isabella’s throat tightened.

“And,” Franco swallowed, “Signora Moretti is on the house phone in the kitchen. She is demanding to speak with you immediately. The wedding planner is here with the dress. She wants to know why Ximena is not downstairs to greet her future mother-in-law.”

The room fell silent except for the ticking of Lorenzo’s antique clock.

Isabella looked at Anthony and Carlos. Anthony mouthed forty-eight hours. Carlos looked terrified but gave a small, determined nod.

She smoothed her cream blouse, lifted her chin the way she had learned at seventeen when she married Lorenzo Bianchi, and walked past Franco toward the front hall.

Behind her, she heard Anthony whisper to Carlos, “No one says a word about Matteo. Not yet.”

The front door opened before she reached it.

Lorenzo Bianchi walked in, carrying the cold winter air with him. Right behind him, stepping out of a black town car with her driver holding an umbrella though no rain fell, was Antonella Moretti in a crisp white Chanel suit, carrying a small velvet box that could only hold one thing.

A family heirloom. For the bride.

Isabella smiled, opened her arms, and lied to the devil’s mother with everything she had.

“Antonella, darling. Welcome. I’m so sorry. Ximena has come down with a little fever.”