Trusting Him Was A Mistake

~ Alina’s POV

I stood there, dumbfounded as he continued to stare at me, “You’ve accessed things that don’t exist…officially,” he continued. “That puts you in a very… fragile position.”

“And what are you going to do about it?” I asked quietly, even though my heart drummed in my chest.

“Nothing,” he said.

I blinked, confused. “Nothing?”

“I’m not here to stop you,” he clarified. “Not directly. I’m here to make sure you understand what happens if you don’t stop yourself.”

“That sounds like the same thing,” I said.

“It’s not,” he replied.

I studied him carefully, something shifting in my thoughts. “If you were going to hurt me,” I said slowly, “you wouldn’t be standing here talking.”

A faint smile appeared on his lips. “Good,” he said. “You’re thinking.”

“Answer me one thing,” I said, my voice quieter now. “Are my parents actually dead?”

For the first time, he hesitated. It was brief, almost unnoticeable, but I saw it. “You’re in deeper than you realize,” he said instead of answering.

“That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting.”

Frustration tightened in my chest. “Then you’re wasting your time,” I said. “Because I’m not stopping.”

“I know,” he replied, and something about the certainty in his voice caught me off guard.

“Then why are you here?” I asked.

He looked at me for a moment, something unreadable flickering in his eyes. “Because someone has to be,” he said quietly, before turning and walking away as if the conversation had already ended.

I stood there long after he was gone, my mind racing, my heart still pounding. “What the hell was that…” I whispered to myself as I finally sat down, my hands trembling slightly as I turned back to my system.

I pulled up the files I had accessed the night before, my fingers moving quickly across the keyboard. There was nothing. My breath caught as I searched again, trying different entries, different filters. Still nothing. “No… no, no…” I muttered under my breath, my pulse quickening as realization settled in. The Russo archive was gone. The Moretti records were restricted. Access was denied.

I leaned back slightly, forcing myself to breathe through the rising panic. “You think this is enough to stop me?” I whispered, my voice steadier now despite everything. If the files were gone, then I would find another way. I had already come too far to turn back now.

My fingers moved again, this time pulling up external registries, cross-referencing names, estates, financial logs, anything that hadn’t been completely erased. “Russo… Milan…” I murmured as fragments of data began to appear, incomplete but enough to follow. And then I saw a transaction record. But it was large, extremely large.

My breath caught as I opened it, my eyes scanning the details quickly. The date made my heart drop; it was only days after my parents’ supposed death.

“Who authorized this…” I whispered, my voice barely audible as the signature field loaded. And then I froze.

“No…” Because right there, clear and undeniable—the authorization wasn’t hidden, or erased; it was signed by none other than Luca Moretti.

~ A Few Days Later

The estate stood in front of me like something untouched by time, and yet, it felt like it had been waiting. I tightened my grip on the strap of my bag as I stared up at the tall iron gates, my reflection faintly visible in the polished black surface. The structure beyond it was massive, elegant in that cold, calculated way only old money could achieve. Every window was shut, every corner too perfect, too controlled. It didn’t look abandoned… it looked protected.

“What are you doing, Alina…” I whispered to myself, my breath barely steady. “You can still leave.”

But I didn’t even move. Because deep down, I already knew that I had crossed that line the moment I saw my father’s name signed on a transaction made after his death. There was no going back anymore.

This journey here had been careful and calculated. I avoided direct bookings, used cash wherever I could, and kept my routes unpredictable. No official requests, no digital trails that could lead anyone back to me. It wasn’t paranoia anymore, it was instinct.

Because someone had already wiped my access once. And someone like Riccardo didn’t appear out of nowhere without reason.

I exhaled slowly and turned away from the estate, forcing myself to move. Standing here and staring wouldn’t get me answers. I needed information…real, documented, and undeniable.

The city of Milan felt different from Florence. Sharper. Faster. Less forgiving. People moved with purpose here, and the weight of power wasn’t hidden behind history; it walked openly through the streets.

I blended in as best as I could, keeping my head low as I made my way toward the local registry offices. If the archive systems were compromised, then the only place left to dig was the physical backbone of it all. Milan was the place that had records that weren’t fully digitized yet, records that people often forgot still existed.

Inside, the air was colder than I expected, the quiet hum of old systems and scattered footsteps filling the space. I moved toward the terminal stations, keeping my movements natural as I slipped into a seat and logged into the public registry interface.

“Let’s see what you’re hiding…” I murmured under my breath as my fingers began to move. I searched names, estates, transfers, and everything I could.

At first, it was the same pattern I had already seen: fragmented data, partial records, inconsistencies that didn’t quite align. But the deeper I went, the clearer it became. This was clearly not just manipulation or tampering of the documents; it was systematic in some way.

I leaned closer to the screen, my eyes scanning through a sequence of linked identities, my breath slowing as the realization settled in. “This isn’t property fraud…” I whispered. “This is identity control.”

The profiles that were marked as deceased still appeared in financial authorizations. The accounts were linked to individuals who, legally, no longer existed. My chest tightened. “They’re not just erasing people…” I said quietly, my mind racing. “They’re reusing them.”