All Chapters of Married to my Fiancé Uncle: Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

ELENA POVTessa's gender reveal plans, as predicted, grew considerably more elaborate than anything I'd actually agreed to.Culminating in an afternoon gathering on the back lawn complete with two confetti cannons, a custom cake from a bakery three towns over, and a guest list that had somehow expanded to include nearly everyone we'd grown close to over the past several years."This is excessive," I told her, watching her direct the cannon placement with the focused intensity of a woman planning a military operation rather than a simple announcement party."This is appropriate," she corrected. "You survived actual warfare to get here, Elena. I refuse to let this baby's announcement be some quiet, forgettable moment. We're celebrating properly."Nathan arrived shortly after, carrying a tray of appetizers he'd apparently insisted on preparing himself despite Tessa's protests that the caterers had everything handled. He'd become a steady, welcome presence over the past several months,

ELENA POVThe second labor arrived faster than the first, something my doctor had warned me about repeatedly, and one I'd still somehow managed to underestimate. I woke at four in the morning to a contraction sharp enough to pull a startled sound from my throat, and by the time Damien had fully registered what was happening, I was already timing the next one against the clock on our nightstand."Already?" he said, scrambling out of bed with the same focused urgency he brought to every real emergency. "Elena, you're a week early.""Tell her that," I managed, pressing a hand against my stomach while another wave built. "She clearly has her own schedule in mind."We woke Tessa first, since she'd insisted on staying with Carolina at exactly this moment, arriving at the estate in pajamas and a coat within fifteen minutes of the call, her hair a chaotic knot and her expression equal parts terrified and thrilled."Go," she said, pulling me into a quick, fierce hug before shooing us toward

ELENA POVThe letter arrived on an ordinary Wednesday, delivered to the estate by a courier who refused to leave until Damien's head of security had personally signed for it. I noticed the unusual care in the way it was handled before I even saw the sender's name: a plain cream envelope with no return address, the kind of thing that used to send a quiet chill through me during the worst years of the war.Damien read it standing at the library window, Marianne asleep against his shoulder, one hand absently patting her back in the slow, steady rhythm he'd perfected over the past few months. I watched his expression shift as he read, surprise giving way to something more guarded, more careful, the particular stillness I remembered from far darker times."What is it?" I asked, closing the sketchbook in my lap."A request for a meeting." He handed me the letter without looking away from the window. "From a man named Daniel Voss. He claims to be Carlo's son."I read the single page twice

ELENA POVDaniel Voss arrived exactly on time, which I noticed because Damien had spent the better part of the morning pacing the length of the library and checking the clock on the mantel. A black sedan I didn't recognize came up the gravel drive at precisely two o'clock, and the man who stepped out of it paused for a moment beside the car, looking up at the house the way people do when they've imagined a place for years and are surprised by how real it turns out to be.He was younger than I'd expected, perhaps twenty-six, tall and slightly stooped, with dark hair he'd clearly tried to tame and a gray jacket that looked like it had been pressed that morning. Something about the line of his jaw caught me before I could stop myself, a resemblance to Carlo so faint and so unmistakable that my stomach tightened, and I felt Damien go quiet beside me."Mr. Rossi," Daniel said, stopping a careful distance away on the garden path. "Mrs. Rossi. Thank you for agreeing to see me. I wasn't su

ELENA POVThe idea to rename the company had sat quietly in the back of my mind for years, ever since the afternoon I first walked into my father's office with a folder of shell account records and a plan I wasn't sure I had the right to carry out. It wasn't the kind of thing I could announce casually. The name on the building had belonged to my father's family for three generations, and it carried a weight that had very little to do with what the company actually was now.I raised it with him on a Sunday afternoon at his small house, sitting in his garden among the white flowers while Marianne, almost two now, tried to pull up a handful of them by the roots and Carolina explained, with great authority, why that wasn't allowed."I'd like to change the name," I said. "Of the company. I wanted to ask you before I brought it to the board."He looked up from the girls, and I watched him understand before I said anything more, the way he always did lately, a quiet awareness arriving befo