Chapter 5 - The Ghost of the Past
The name on the medical document seemed to burn a hole through the dim light of the study. Elena stared at the bold black letters printed across the top of the Zurich clinic’s intake form, her vision blurring at the edges. The room felt suddenly airless, the rich scent of leather and tobacco turning cloying and thick.
"You had no right to look into my family's private affairs," Elena whispered, her voice trembling so violently that the words barely formed. She pulled her hands away from the desk and pressed her palms against her temples as if trying to hold her skull together.
Lorenzo rounded the corner of the heavy oak desk, closing the distance between them with slow, silent strides. He stopped just a foot away, tall and imposing in his black suit, his dark beard shadowing a jaw set in stone.
"When family affairs involve draining our liquid assets and forging my signature on collateral documents, it ceases to be private, Elena," Lorenzo said, his voice dropping into a low, rumbling register. He reached out and tapped the edge of the paper with his index finger. "Now tell me why my sister-in-law, whom the family buried three years ago in a private ceremony, is currently receiving residential treatment in Switzerland under an alias you control."
Elena recoiled as if struck, her back hitting the edge of the mahogany bookshelf. A few heavy leather-bound volumes wobbled and slid out of alignment, tumbling onto the Persian rug with dull thuds.
"She’s dead," Elena gasped, her eyes wide with genuine horror, though whether it was for the sister she betrayed or the trap she had walked into remained unclear. "We attended the funeral. You saw the casket go into the ground."
"Did I?" Lorenzo tilted his head slightly, a dark, cynical smile touching the corner of his mouth for a fraction of a second. "Or did I attend a closed-casket memorial service arranged entirely by you while I was away negotiating the overseas merger? A service where no local coroner was present to verify the remains?"
Elena opened her mouth to scream a denial, but the memory of that rainy morning three years ago rose up to choke her. The heavy mahogany box. The sealed orders from the municipal health department. The sudden, convenient cremation certificate that arrived by courier two weeks later.
"She was unwell," Elena pleaded, her voice breaking into a ragged sob as real tears finally spilled over her lower lashes. "She threatened to expose everything—the foundation, the trusts, the inheritance. If the board found out about her condition, we would have lost everything, Lorenzo! I did it to protect our name!"
Lorenzo reached out, his long fingers wrapping firmly around her wrist, preventing her from retreating any further. His grip was not violent, but it was inescapable.
May you like
"Protect our name?" Lorenzo whispered, leaning down so his face was inches from hers. "Or protect your share of the stolen estate? Because I just received a call from the Zurich clinic five minutes before I walked through our front door. My sister woke up from her coma this morning."
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