Chapter 173: She's My Sister Enzo

SANCIA

Just like that I feel the sleep drained from my eyes as I sat up. From the serious expression on his face I have a feeling it's probably something I'm not going to like.

“Isabella might not really be a pawn as you want to believe; she’s probably in on it from the very beginning.”

I was shaking my head before he even ended his sentence. “No, Isabella has no reason to kill Papa; he’s our father, she’s far too kind and gentle to do something like that. I’m sure it was all Antonio's manipulations. If she knew he killed Papa, she would be devastated.”

“Oh, mia tigre, I only wish your sister were as innocent as she seems,” he gritted.

“What do you mean?” I sat up, dragging the bedsheets to cover my body.

Lorenzo was quiet for a few seconds before he sighed. “I never wanted to tell you because I don’t want you to feel betrayed by another person you love, but before the war three years ago, Isabella was sending me her nudes and messages.”

Shock momentarily stole my voice. “What?” I whispered. “Why would she do such a thing?”

He shrugged. “I don’t care for her reasons, but if you want to know more, or you don’t believe me. You can always ask Luca or Savio; he was the one who investigated her back then. She used a different phone and email address, but it was her; we confirmed it.”

I frowned, remembering the time I overheard Lorenzo and the others in his office talking about a woman sending him nudes. Could it really be Isabella?

I shook that thought away. No, it can't be.

“But she's my….” I swallowed. “She's my sister, Enzo.”

“I deleted all the nudes, but the messages are still there in my old phone. You can see the dates and everything.”

“I want to see them.”

Lorenzo slipped out of bed and took three phones from his pocket, then walked back to where I was sitting, my brain still dizzy from what he just told me.

“Here, you can read it all the way down,” he said as he handed me one of the phones. “She texts and emails almost daily, sometimes three or four times a day.”

I took the phone, my hand trembling, my eyes fixed on the screen. Even as I read the messages, I found it hard to believe that my sister would do such a thing.

One of the messages caught my eye even more than the provocative sexual ones.

“You should have been mine, Lorenzo. You were always meant to be mine, just as I was meant to be yours. I cannot understand why you keep choosing her—why you let Sancia hurt you, disrespect you, and still remain by her side.

When you could have me instead. Lorenzo

I would worship the ground you walk on. I would give you everything I have—my heart, my loyalty, my innocence, and my very soul. You need only to accept me, and I'll be more than happy to live as your mistress if that's all you could offer me.

I would abandon everyone and everything for you. My family, my future, my pride... none of it matters if I cannot have you.

From the first moment I saw you, I was lost. You became the center of my world, the man I dream about, the man I cannot forget no matter how hard I try.

Perhaps it is foolish, perhaps it is pathetic, but I do not care; I will forsake the world for you. Please choose me.”

While I want nothing more than to believe Lorenzo wrote this to himself to mess with me, I know this wasn't fake.

Not to mention the text timeline coincides with when she and Antonio got engaged. And yet I still refuse to believe it.

Because I couldn’t, for the life of me, understand why Isabella would do such a thing. Then a conversation I had with Tina years ago came back to me.

Isabella had changed her mind after she saw Lorenzo back then. It was shallow whatever she believed she felt for Lorenzo because before she saw him on the day of the engagement, Isabella had been sobbing and begging me and Mama to help convince Papa to call off the wedding.

She said she didn’t want to marry him and was afraid of him because of his frightening reputation. But then later, after he got married to me, Isabella always acted coy and shy with Lorenzo.

At the time, I thought it was because she was scared of him, but now I don't know what to think anymore.

Even so, I taste something bitter on my tongue. My anger and betrayal cut deep, but I still didn't want to believe it. I refuse to believe it; I tried to think logically.

“So she's attracted to you; while it's terrible, it doesn't necessarily make her Antonio's accomplice.”

“No, it doesn't,” he agreed. “But shooting me when she should have been hiding could.”

Shit, I almost forgot about that.

“Do you also know she went to Antonio’s room a few minutes ago?”

“What?” I asked incredulously.

Lorenzo nodded, before he fiddled with his phone for a few seconds and shoved it in my face. “Here, I have it on camera.”

I was too shocked from what I’d just learned to even comment on what I was seeing. I just stared dumbly from one phone screen to the other.

There was a big lump suddenly stuck in my throat. And although I couldn’t hear a single word they were saying. I knew Lorenzo was probably right.

“Sancia, I didn't tell you this to make you worry; I told you so you don't let your guard down around her, and because you deserve the truth.”

I nodded, my eyes flicking down to the open message on the screen. And the only thought that came to my mind right then was, Isabella must have really loved Lorenzo back then to have been willing to risk it all.

No, this is probably just a misunderstanding. Isabella is the kindest person I've ever known. Surely this isn’t what it seems like.

“Enough. Come here,” Lorenzo said, prying both phones from my hands and hugging me for a while. “We're going to take a shower and get some sleep. You need the rest, and I need to leave before dawn, so that's enough stress for one day, understood?”

I nodded.

"Good girl.”

He kiss my hair then pulled away, placed both phones on my bedside, then he strode back and swept me up into his arms, before I could protest and walk into the bathroom with me.