Chapter 3 - THE PLANE THAT COULD HAVE LEFT NINE HOURS EARLIER“THE JET WAS READY AT 4:11 IN THE MORNING, CLAIRE. DAMIAN DIDN'T LEAVE BECAUSE THE PLANE COULDN'T FLY. HE DIDN'T LEAVE BECAUSE HE CHOSE TO STAY.”
Those words came from my husband's older sister.
Sofia Moretti had never been especially affectionate toward me.
She was a successful corporate attorney, a member of the Moretti Holdings board, and one of the few people Damian actually listened to.
We respected each other, but we had never been close.
That changed three days after Noah's death.
By then, I had been discharged from the hospital under my doctor's supervision.
I was staying in a quiet, medically accessible apartment arranged through Haven Protocol.
It was modest compared with the mansion I had left behind.
There were no marble staircases, private elevators, or expensive paintings.
Just two bedrooms, a small kitchen, and windows overlooking a tree-lined street.
For the first time in years, my surroundings didn't remind me of Damian's wealth.
Unfortunately, everything else reminded me of Noah.
The apartment had no nursery.
No crib.
No baby monitor.
And somehow, that made his absence even harder to bear.
On my first morning there, I stood in the kitchen holding a mug of coffee when I heard a baby crying outside.
My body reacted before my mind did.
I turned toward the sound.
Then I remembered.
I placed the mug on the counter and slid down against the cabinets.
Grace found me there.
She sat beside me until I could stand.
That afternoon, Miriam called.
“Sofia Moretti has requested permission to speak with you.”
“Why?”
“She says she has information about Damian's flight.”
I closed my eyes.
I didn't want another excuse.
I didn't want to hear about weather patterns, delayed pilots, or airport complications.
Nothing could change the time on Noah's death certificate.
But I also wanted to know the truth.
“Tell her she can come.”
Sofia arrived carrying a plain black briefcase.
She wore a navy suit and looked as though she hadn't slept properly in days.
When she saw me, she stopped in the doorway.
“Claire.”
I nodded.
Her eyes moved toward the small framed photograph on the table.
It showed Noah wrapped in his blue blanket.
Sofia's expression crumpled.
“Oh, Claire.”
I had never heard her voice sound like that.
She sat down slowly.
“I don't know what to say.”
“Neither do I.”
For several moments, neither of us spoke.
Then Sofia opened her briefcase.
“I asked our aviation operations director to preserve the records from Damian's flight.”
I looked at the documents.
Departure clearances.
Crew logs.
Fuel authorizations.
Communications between the airport operations team and the aircraft's captain.
Every page contained a timestamp.
Sofia pointed to one.
“At 4:11 A.M., the aircraft was ready for departure.”
I stared at the line.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“The pilot was there?”
“Yes.”
“The plane was fueled?”
“Yes.”
“What about the weather?”
“There were no restrictions preventing departure at that time.”
I felt something cold settle inside me.
“What happened?”
Sofia turned another page.
“At 4:19, Damian personally instructed the crew to hold departure.”
“Why?”
“He was waiting for Alessia.”
I looked at her.
Sofia's jaw tightened.
“She claimed she needed to retrieve documents from their resort. Then there were meetings and additional delays.”
I stared at the flight log.
For hours, Damian had remained on the ground.
Our son had been born at 3:17.
At 4:11, the plane was ready.
At 7:40, I had shown Damian our baby through my phone.
At 11:08, Noah's oxygen levels had begun falling.
And throughout those hours, my husband had remained thousands of miles away.
“When did Damian finally authorize departure?”
“Shortly before one in the afternoon, Chicago time.”
I tried to process the information.
“So when he told me there were complications…”
“There were delays,” Sofia said carefully. “But he had opportunities to leave earlier. The records are clear.”
I looked toward Noah's photograph.
My baby had fought for his life.
His father had waited for another woman.
“Did Alessia know I was in labor?”
“Yes.”
“Did she know Noah was premature?”
Sofia hesitated.
“Yes.”
I felt physically sick.
I had spent months telling myself that Alessia was simply a woman having an affair with a married man.
Cruel, selfish, and dishonest, perhaps.
But this was different.
She had known that a baby was fighting to survive.
And she had stayed beside Damian while the aircraft remained on the ground.
Sofia reached for my hand.
I pulled away.
“Don't.”
She lowered her eyes.
“I'm sorry.”
“Did Damian send you here?”
“No.”
“Does he know you're telling me this?”
“No. And he wouldn't be able to stop me if he did.”
I looked at her more closely.
For the first time, I saw something familiar beneath her polished composure.
Disappointment.
Not in me.
In her brother.
Sofia closed the flight records.
“There's something else.”
I waited.
“Damian has been reviewing the foundation's financial records.”
My body went rigid.
“Why?”
“Miriam informed our independent audit committee that an unauthorized transfer had been made using your credentials. Damian asked for a complete internal review.”
I stared at her.
“Does he know about Alessia's company?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“He says he didn't authorize the transfer.”
I almost laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because I had heard that sentence too many times.
He didn't know.
He hadn't authorized it.
There were complications.
Someone else had caused the delay.
There was always an explanation.
Always a reason.
Always another person standing between Damian and responsibility.
Sofia seemed to understand what I was thinking.
“Claire, I'm not asking you to forgive him.”
“Good.”
“I'm asking you not to assume that the financial misconduct begins and ends with Alessia.”
I frowned.
“What do you mean?”
She took out a third document.
It was an internal memorandum concerning charitable grants and international logistics contracts.
The document had been approved six weeks earlier.
At the bottom were two signatures.
One belonged to Victor Sloane, the chief financial officer of Moretti Holdings.
The other belonged to Damian.
I stared at the page.
“What is this?”
“A delegation of authority. It allowed Victor and Alessia's consulting team to administer certain foundation-related transportation contracts.”
“Damian gave them access to the foundation's money?”
“Indirectly. Subject to controls that may have been bypassed.”
I looked at Sofia.
“Did he read what he signed?”
She didn't answer immediately.
That silence told me more than any explanation could have.
Finally, she spoke.
“He trusted people he shouldn't have trusted.”
I looked down at Noah's photograph.
“That's becoming a pattern.”
Sofia gathered her papers.
Before leaving, she placed one final envelope on the table.
“Claire, I found this in the foundation's archived correspondence.”
“What is it?”
“A copy of a complaint submitted seven months ago. Around the time someone started following you.”
I opened the envelope.
Inside was a printed email from an employee of Blue Meridian Consulting.
The message warned that a private investigator had been hired to gather information about a member of the Moretti family.
There was no name in the body of the email.
But the attached expense report contained a description.
Surveillance subject: C. Moretti.
My hands began trembling.
The person who had followed me seven months earlier hadn't been some random criminal.
Someone connected to Damian's business had paid for it.
May you like
And on the final page of the expense report, beneath the authorization code, was a familiar name.
Alessia Vieri.
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