Page 58 of The Strength Of A Woman

And now this happens, and things begin to make sense. What if it wasn’t the Gallos who eliminated their own daughter?

What if it was the man himself?

Stefano Varela.

What if he’d replaced one heiress with another, and now he wants a bride for himself?

His wife died after I got married to Bianca.

Interesting timing, but I won’t get into that.

His marrying Leilani would make him the de facto ruler of the Gallo Empire.

What do you think would happen next?

A war, and I’d become a prime target. I’d top his enemies list.

I’ll be damned.

Speaking of a chess master. I have a feeling Giorgio has lost control of this entirely, and a little blackmail might’ve done the trick.

If Varela arranged for the killing of Bianca Gallo, he showed her father that nothing could stop him from getting what he wanted.

No wonder Giorgio and Sylvia can't push Leilani out the door soon enough.

And all those red herrings.

All those names they dropped to make their search for a suitor look legit. It was never a real search.

They already had a suitor, and he asked them to make it happen.

If that truly happens, Varela gets what he wants, Giorgio and Sylvia stay alive and maintain control over their wealth, and I’m on the chopping block.

And Leilani?

I look at her as she runs her fingers through her hair, not having the slightest idea of how bad this really is.

What a horrible life awaits her.

She didn’t stand a chance, did she?

Barely opened her wings to fly, and they made a big bonfire to burn and morph the tiniest, most precious veins on her beautiful, like-silk wings into ashes.

She mattered to no one as she was born to be a pawn. A woman in the background. Flesh between the sheets in the bedroom of an old man.

Touched and tormented by every frustration of a man who could get anything by force but nothing as a gift.

And she had thought for a moment that she could live a normal life.

She was born cursed and could easily share her mother’s fate if nothing changed the course of her story.

“Stefano Varela is the man who helped your grandfather convince me to marry Bianca,” I say softly, gauging her reaction,craving to see that flicker of sharpness in her eyes as she puts two and two together, like I just did.

“How?” she asks.

Her eyes glint, confirming that I was right.

“I won’t get into details. He just did.”