Lorenzo confessed in Clemente’s study.
Not because Clemente threatened him.
Because Natalie asked the right questions.
Lorenzo had debts.
Not gambling debts.
Investment losses.
He had borrowed secretly to finance a development project, expecting to become wealthy enough that nobody would ever call him Clemente’s lesser cousin again.
The project collapsed.
His lenders wanted repayment.
Adrien Viscari offered a solution.
Information.
Nothing violent.
Nothing criminal-looking.
Corporate files.
Meeting schedules.
Acquisition rumors.
Lorenzo convinced himself he was not betraying family.
He was selling business intelligence.
Then Bellandi appeared.
“I didn’t know anybody would threaten Natalie,” Lorenzo said.
Clemente stood behind his desk.
“You stole her access.”
Lorenzo looked down.
“I copied the card.”
“You entered her office.”
“Yes.”
“You let them frame her.”
“I thought they only wanted the draft.”
Clemente moved.
Natalie stepped between them.
“Clemente.”
“Move.”
“No.”
Lorenzo stared at her.
“You’re protecting me?”
Natalie did not look back.
“I’m protecting him from doing something stupid.”
Clemente’s eyes narrowed.
“He betrayed you.”
“He betrayed you.”
“He used your identity.”
“And now he’s giving us information.”
Clemente’s voice became quieter.
“Move.”
Natalie held his gaze.
“No.”
Matteo watched from the wall, saying nothing.
Eventually, Clemente stepped back.
Natalie exhaled.
“Thank you.”
“I did not do that for him.”
“I know.”
The truth of those words stayed between them.
Lorenzo explained everything.
Adrien had acted as intermediary, but Lorenzo believed someone else was behind the operation.
Payments came from shell companies.
Instructions arrived anonymously.
The questions were strangely personal.
Who did Clemente trust?
Who had access to his home?
Who controlled his calendar?
Which employee saw him most frequently?
What made him change plans?
Natalie.
Again and again, the answer had been Natalie.
She listened quietly.
Then asked, “When did the questions about me start?”
Lorenzo hesitated.
“Months ago.”
Clemente’s expression sharpened.
“How many?”
“Six, maybe seven.”
Before the red dress.
Before Bellandi.
Before the fake engagement.
Someone had already identified Natalie as important long before Clemente publicly confirmed it.
That changed the theory.
The engagement had not created the danger.
It had exposed an existing one.
The investigation turned toward Viscari.
His financial records were clean.
Too clean.
His business contacts were legitimate.
His family had no obvious reason to attack Clemente.
Natalie kept returning to the wording of the threats.
Secretaries should stay invisible.
End the engagement.
The sender did not merely want Bellandi.
They wanted Natalie removed from Clemente’s inner circle.
Why?
The answer came from an old calendar.
Natalie found it at 2:17 in the morning.
She had stayed at Clemente’s mansion because security considered her apartment compromised.
She sat at the kitchen island wearing one of Carlotta’s borrowed robes over pajamas and scrolling through archived appointments.
Clemente entered barefoot.
He stopped.
“What are you doing?”
“Working.”
“It’s two in the morning.”
“So?”
“So sleep.”
She looked up.
“You’re awake.”
“This is my house.”
“Excellent observation.”
He moved closer.
“What are you looking for?”
“Patterns.”
“Again?”
“Always.”
He sat beside her.
For several minutes, neither spoke.
Then Clemente noticed the ring.
His grandmother’s ring.
Natalie still wore it.
“You kept it on.”
She looked down.
“I forgot.”
“Did you?”
Natalie removed her hand from the keyboard.
“Do you want me to take it off?”
Clemente looked at her.
“No.”
One word.
Dangerous.
Natalie turned back to the screen.
“Then stop distracting me.”
He almost smiled.
Twenty minutes later she found the connection.
Nine months earlier, Natalie had rescheduled a meeting between Clemente and the Marzano Development Group.
Nothing unusual.
Except the original meeting had been requested through Adrien Viscari.
Natalie had canceled it after discovering inconsistencies in the financing paperwork.
At the time, Clemente had praised her.
The deal disappeared.
Natalie searched deeper.
Marzano Development had collapsed three months later.
Federal investigators had later uncovered fraud involving municipal redevelopment funds.
Clemente stared at the screen.
“You kept us out.”
“Yes.”
“Who owned Marzano?”
“Publicly? Samuel Marzano.”
“Actually?”
Natalie opened another record.
A private investment entity sat behind the corporation.
Viscari Capital Partners.
Adrien.
Clemente leaned back.
“He lost how much?”
Natalie calculated.
“At least forty million.”
“And possibly exposure.”
“Yes.”
Now everything fit.
Adrien had not begun targeting Natalie because of Bellandi.
He had been targeting her because she had cost him forty million dollars and prevented Clemente from walking into a compromised deal.
But why the elaborate leak?
Natalie understood.
“He wants you to stop trusting me.”
Clemente’s face hardened.
“He tried to frame you.”
“And if that failed, he wanted me scared enough to leave.”
The next morning, Adrien called.
Not Clemente.
Natalie.
She answered on speakerphone while Clemente and Matteo listened.
“Natalie,” Adrien said pleasantly.
“Adrien.”
“I hear there was excitement at brunch.”
“You hear many things.”
“I worry about you.”
“How generous.”
A pause.
“You don’t belong in Clemente’s world.”
Natalie looked directly at Clemente.
His face changed.
“Interesting,” she said. “Anthony DeLuca implied the same.”
“Anthony likes theater.”
“And you?”
“I prefer solutions.”
Natalie’s pulse remained steady.
“What solution are you offering?”
“Walk away.”
“From my job?”
“From him.”
Clemente’s jaw tightened.
Natalie continued.
“And if I don’t?”
Adrien sighed.
“You’re intelligent. You know what happens to people who become important to powerful men.”
Natalie smiled without humor.
“You sound disappointed that I already was.”
Silence.
Got him.
Adrien had revealed too much.
He recovered.
“You think Clemente protects people?”
“Yes.”
“You’re wrong.”
“Maybe.”
She looked at Clemente.
“But I’m not leaving.”
Adrien’s tone cooled.
“Then whatever happens next is your choice.”
The line went dead.
Clemente reached for his phone.
Natalie stopped him.
“No.”
“He threatened you directly.”
“He also confirmed motive.”
“I don’t care.”
“I do.”
He stood.
“So do I.”
Natalie stood too.
“Then trust me.”
He looked at her.
Again those words.
This time something broke.
Not anger.
Distance.
Clemente stepped closer.
“You keep asking me to trust you.”
“Because you should.”
“I do.”
His voice was rougher now.
“That is the problem.”
Natalie’s breath caught.
“What does that mean?”
“It means every time you walk into danger because you think faster than everyone around you, I imagine every way I could fail to get you out.”
She stared at him.
Clemente continued.
“It means when DeLuca called you an employee, I wanted to put him through the wall.”
“Clemente—”
“It means I lied about the engagement.”
Natalie swallowed.
“I know.”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“I lied about it being entirely tactical.”
The room disappeared around her.
Matteo quietly left.
Natalie barely noticed.
Clemente looked at the ring on her hand.
“I called you my fiancée because it was useful.”
Her chest tightened.
Then he added:
“And because for one second, I wanted to know what it felt like to say it.”
Natalie could not breathe properly.
“You cannot tell me this now.”
“I know.”
“We’re being threatened.”
“I know.”
“I live in your house because somebody compromised my apartment.”
“I know.”
“You are terrible at timing.”
“I know.”
She stared at him.
Then, despite herself, laughed.
Clemente smiled faintly.
Natalie shook her head.
“This is insane.”
“Probably.”
“Your family thinks we’re engaged.”
“Yes.”
“Your enemies think we’re engaged.”
“Yes.”
“My mother is choosing dresses.”
That made him blink.
“What?”
“She moves quickly.”
His smile widened.
Natalie should have stepped away.
Instead, she looked at him.
“After this ends, we talk.”
Clemente’s expression became serious.
“After this ends.”
A crash sounded from the hallway.
Security shouted.
Natalie turned.
The lights went out.
Then emergency power snapped on.
Matteo ran back into the room.
“Garage breach.”
Clemente immediately moved Natalie behind him.
Matteo held up a phone.
“They didn’t come inside.”
“Then what?”
“They left a car.”
Natalie frowned.
“What car?”
Matteo turned the screen.
Natalie stared.
Her own car.
The one that had been sitting at her apartment.
It was parked inside Clemente’s supposedly secure garage.
On the windshield, painted in red letters:
LAST WARNING.
Adrien had crossed from threats into Clemente’s home.
And Clemente’s expression said there would not be another warning.
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