247/🍷 The Cork Megan Cole Refused to Let Bianca Hide

Chapter 06 - Bianca’s First Lie

Bianca did not collapse. Megan had seen guilty people collapse before, usually into tears or outrage or religious language. Bianca did none of those things.

She stood beneath the yellow vault light with snow melting in her hair and studied the ledger as if it were an unpleasant menu.

“That handwriting isn’t my father’s,” she said.

Roman turned a page. “No. It’s my mother’s.”

The answer cut deeper because it was calm.

Lucia DeLuca had documented everything: auction dates, donor names, shipment codes, account numbers, and beside them, in precise notes, what she suspected and what she could prove. Samuel Cole had not counterfeited the wine. He had discovered the operation. When he threatened to expose it, Carlo Rinaldi turned the accusation on him.

Megan read until the words blurred.

Her father had not died guilty. He had died useful.

Elias stood beside her, shaking. “I should have known. He came to me the night before he disappeared. He said he had proof, but he wouldn’t say where. I thought he was ashamed.”

“He wasn’t ashamed,” Megan said.

Her voice sounded far away.

Roman closed the ledger. “Why didn’t my mother use this?”

Elias wiped his mouth with a trembling hand. “Because Carlo threatened something.”

“Who?” Roman asked.

No one answered.

Then Megan looked at Bianca.

Bianca’s face was still smooth, but her eyes had gone hard.

“Not something,” Megan said. “Someone.”

Roman followed her gaze. “Bianca?”

Bianca smiled sadly. “This is grotesque. You’re letting a maid invent tragedy because she wants revenge.”

Megan walked to the cabinet and lifted the ledger again. “Your name appears six times before you turned twenty.”

“I was a child.”

“No,” Megan said. “The first time, yes. The last time, no.”

Bianca’s nostrils flared.

Megan read the entry. “Bianca Rinaldi witnessed in east cellar. Removed two labels from damaged lot. Carlo instructed B. not to speak. B. asked whether Lucia knew.”

Roman’s eyes darkened.

Bianca laughed, but it trembled at the edges. “I was seventeen.”

“You were old enough to understand hiding,” Megan said.

Bianca stepped toward her. “And you were poor enough to hate anyone born above you.”

Roman moved before anyone else did, not touching either woman, simply placing himself between them. “Enough.”

Bianca looked up at him, and for the first time Megan saw not fear but fury.

“You think your mother was holy?” Bianca said. “Lucia kept this because it gave her power. She let Samuel Cole die with shame on his name because exposing Carlo would have damaged Saint Agnes, your family, her donors, all of it. She wasn’t protecting justice. She was protecting the DeLuca name.”

The words struck Roman. Megan saw it in the minute tightening around his eyes.

Elias whispered, “Lucia would never—”

But he did not finish.

Because perhaps Lucia would.

Powerful women could be kind and still choose reputation over truth. Megan had learned that from the women who donated winter coats to charity while underpaying the maids who cleaned their guest rooms.

Roman opened another letter with careful hands.

This one was not from Samuel.

It was from Lucia to Carlo Rinaldi.

Roman read in silence.

His expression gave nothing away, which somehow made Megan more afraid.

Finally he handed the letter to her.

Megan did not want to read it. She did.

Carlo,

If you release the photograph, I will release the ledger.

Neither family survives both.

—L.

Megan looked up slowly. “What photograph?”