Chapter 9 - THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
The story appeared online three days later.
BILLIONAIRE LUCA MORETTI’S SECRET TWINS?
The photograph showed Luca leaving Eli’s soccer practice.
Emma was holding his hand.
Eli was walking beside him.
I was ten feet behind them.
By noon, photographers were outside my apartment building.
By two, the school principal called.
By three, my children’s faces were everywhere.
I wanted to throw my phone through a window.
Luca arrived with security.
“I’m moving you.”
“No.”
“Nia.”
“You do not move me anywhere.”
“There are photographers outside your children’s school.”
“I know.”
“Then let me protect them.”
I hated that he was right.
We temporarily moved to a private residence Luca owned under a trust.
It was not the penthouse.
I had refused that immediately.
The house had a guarded garage and no public ownership record.
The twins thought the indoor movie room was incredible.
I thought the cameras outside our normal life were unforgivable.
“Who leaked it?”
Luca stood in the kitchen.
“We’re tracing it.”
“Who knew?”
“You.”
“I did not leak photographs of my own children.”
“I know.”
“Your security team.”
“Vetted.”
“Your attorneys.”
“Possible.”
“Evelyn.”
Luca said nothing.
That was enough.
Evelyn had moved out of the penthouse after Luca removed his wedding ring.
She had not agreed to divorce.
She had hired one of the most aggressive matrimonial attorneys in Illinois.
Then she gave one television interview.
She never mentioned the twins directly.
She only said she was experiencing an unexpected private family crisis.
The phrasing was calculated.
It made her look abandoned.
Me look suspicious.
Luca look guilty.
Then another article appeared.
This one was worse.
Sources close to the Moretti family alleged that I had intentionally hidden Luca’s children for financial leverage.
There was no mention of the intercepted letter.
No mention of the forged email.
Only me.
The ex-wife.
The secret twins.
The billionaire.
The story practically wrote itself.
Eli heard part of it from another child during online school.
“Mom?”
He found me in the kitchen.
“Did you hide us because you wanted money?”
I nearly dropped the glass in my hand.
“No.”
“Someone said you did.”
“Who?”
“A kid in class.”
I knelt beside him.
“I have never taken money from Luca for you.”
That was true.
I had built my own career.
I had worked.
Saved.
Raised them.
Sometimes struggled.
But no Moretti money had entered my account.
Eli looked relieved.
Then hurt.
“Why are people talking about us?”
I had no answer a six-year-old should have needed.
That night, Luca called a press conference.
His advisers begged him not to.
The board begged him not to.
His public relations team wrote a safe statement.
Luca threw it away.
He stood in front of cameras at Moretti Global headquarters.
“My children were not hidden for money.”
The room erupted.
He continued.
“Their mother attempted to inform me before they were born.”
More shouting.
More cameras.
“I did not receive that information because people around me interfered.”
A reporter shouted.
“Are you accusing your current wife?”
Luca’s jaw tightened.
“I am accusing myself first.”
The room became quiet.
“I failed my first wife long before anyone exploited that failure.”
I watched from the private house.
My hands started shaking.
Then Luca looked directly into the cameras.
“Nia Carter protected our children when I was not there to protect them.”
For the first time in seven years, he defended me publicly.
And somewhere across Chicago, Evelyn Shaw watched the same press conference.
May you like
Less than an hour later, she called someone from a burner phone.
“We need to release the second file.”
