Chapter 4

When I returned to the main house on Sunday afternoon, two contractors were dismantling my bed.

Bianca's gala dresses already hung along one wall. An interior designer stood in the middle of the room with a tape measure and a tablet.

"Mrs. Romano wants this converted into Miss Bianca’s formalwear archive,” she explained. “She said you wouldn’t need a bedroom until you learned to appreciate this family."

I was standing three feet in front of her.

"Where are my things?"

One contractor pointed toward the rear garage. "Old laundry room."

The room behind the garage had a draft in winter and black mold in both corners. My clothes and books had been shoved into contractor bags. Loose documents covered the concrete floor, and the locks on both suitcases had been forced open.

The black-walnut archive box was gone.

A maid hovered in the doorway, twisting her apron. "The temporary supervisor thought it was old paperwork. It went out with the gala trash this morning."

I ran.

The waste enclosure behind the estate was slick from the morning rain. Broken bottles, dead flowers, and soaked cocktail napkins had been dumped into open bins. My archive box lay on the pavement, split through the lid.

Medals and certificates floated in dirty water. A tire mark crossed my national coding championship award. The Montrose scholarship letter had been torn through the center, the ink bleeding across my name.

Beneath it all, I found an old photograph.

Six-year-old me stood outside the estate with gauze wrapped around my head. Vittorio held one hand and Elena held the other. They had always told me the picture showed the first day they brought home a frightened orphan.

It actually showed two parents bringing home their injured, amnesiac daughter.

"What are you digging through?"

Elena came down the terrace steps, frowning at the mess as if I had created it to embarrass her.

I rose with the ruined letter in my hand. "Who cleared out my room?"

"I did. Bianca needs an archive for her formal wardrobe now that she’s a junior director. You can use the laundry room until you apologize. Once you come to your senses, we’ll decide where you belong."

"You put my belongings in a moldy laundry room and threw my awards in the trash."

She glanced at the soaked papers. "They're school documents. Ask the schools to reprint them. Everyone worked through the night after the gala, Alessia. Do you really have to make a scene over this?"

Voices carried from the house. Within minutes Vittorio, Bianca, Francesca, Dominic, and several relatives who had stayed overnight gathered outside.

My father looked from me to Elena. "What's going on?"

"Alessia is furious because I gave Bianca the north-wing room," Elena said.

I held up the scholarship letter. Water ran from it onto my sleeve. "This isn't about a room."

Vittorio barely glanced at the paper. "That room belongs to the Romano estate. Letting you use it for twelve years didn't make it yours."

"And these? Did the estate own my certificates too?"

"Without the Romano name, you wouldn't have had the chance to enter those competitions."

Bianca's eyes filled. "I didn't know they'd throw anything away. If you didn't want to give me the room, you could've just said so."

Elena immediately put an arm around her. "This isn't your fault. Alessia has decided to be cruel."

"I planned her gala, wrote her speech, and completed the risk report she presented under her name. You erased my credit, handed my work to her, and threw every achievement I had into the garbage. But I'm the cruel one?"

Vittorio's face hardened. "Watch your tone."

"Because the elders are listening? God forbid they hear the truth."

Francesca looked away. Dominic said nothing. Bianca went white.

They all knew what truth I meant.

Vittorio walked down the steps until he stood directly in front of me. "Everything you have—the Romano name, this house, your education, our protection—you have because we allowed it. The family takes back one room, and you attack Bianca in front of everyone?"

Tears spilled down my face, but I no longer cared about the certificates. I cared about one thing.

I looked at both of my parents. "Is there anything about the crash twelve years ago—or about my birth parents—that you want to tell me?"

Elena froze. Bianca lowered her head. Around us, the relatives suddenly found the rain-slick pavement fascinating.

This was their last chance.

Vittorio didn’t hesitate.

“We’ve already told you everything. Your parents died in that accident. Elena and I took you in and gave you a new life.”

Something deep inside me went quiet.

Elena reached for my hand. “Apologize to Bianca, and we can put this behind us. Once you’ve calmed down, we can discuss whether Scotland is still a good idea.”

I pulled away. “And if I don’t apologize?”

Vittorio’s voice turned cold. “Then stay in the old laundry room until you remember who gave you everything you have.”

Bianca wiped her cheeks. “Why do you have to ruin my day, Alessia?”

They had stolen my identity, erased my name, and thrown away the only proof that I had ever accomplished anything on my own.

Yet somehow, I was still the one ruining everything.

I laughed once, because if I didn’t, I might scream.

“You’re right. It’s all my fault.”

Relief softened Elena’s face. She thought the obedient adopted daughter had returned.

At eleven forty that night, I took a cab to John F. Kennedy International Airport.

At five twenty the next morning, I boarded my flight to Edinburgh.

As the plane rose above the clouds, I removed my old SIM card and snapped it in half.

At eight ten, Elena carried my usual oat-milk latte to the old laundry room.

“Still asleep?” she complained as she pushed open the door. “You’ve sulked long enough. It’s time to get up and apologize to Bianca.”

The room was empty.

The bed was perfectly made. No one had slept in it.

There was only a single sheet of paper on the pillow.

It contained one sentence:

There is no adoption record on my birth certificate—I already know that you are my biological parents. You lied to me for twelve years, and as of today, I no longer want you.

The oat-milk latte slipped from her hand and shattered on the floor.