THE LAST MORETTI WIFE

PART 3 — THE TRUTH HE NEVER KNEW

Three days after I disappeared, Vincent arrived at our former bedroom carrying a bouquet of white roses.

He had intended to apologize.

Not because he suddenly understood how deeply he had hurt me, but because Evelyn had told him that his behavior was becoming an embarrassment to the family.

He pushed open the bedroom door.

My clothes were gone.

My jewelry was gone.

Even the little blue blanket Noah used to sleep with had disappeared.

Only one thing remained on the bedside table.

A photograph of the three of us.

Vincent picked it up.

In the picture, Noah was sitting on his shoulders, laughing while I stood beside them.

He remembered that afternoon.

Noah had begged him to come home early. Vincent had promised to take him to the aquarium the following weekend.

He never did.

“Where is Elena?” he demanded when he found his mother downstairs.

Evelyn calmly sipped her tea.

“She left.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know.”

Vincent slammed his hand against the table.

“You’re telling me you don’t know where my wife went?”

Evelyn finally looked at him.

“Your wife? Interesting. You didn’t seem particularly concerned about her when she spent seven days kneeling beside her son’s grave.”

Vincent’s jaw tightened.

“Don’t lecture me, Mother.”

“Then perhaps you should listen to someone else for once.”

She placed a thick medical envelope in front of him.

“Read it.”

Vincent opened it impatiently.

Then he stopped.

The first page contained Elena’s diagnosis.

Advanced brain cancer.

Terminal.

Estimated life expectancy: approximately thirty days.

His fingers began trembling.

“What is this?”

“Her medical records.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

Evelyn’s eyes filled with disappointment.

“She tried to tell you that she was dying. You were too busy worrying about Sofia’s scratched finger.”

Vincent stared at the documents.

He remembered Elena’s pale face in the chapel.

Her swollen knees.

The way she had held Noah’s ashes as though they were the last piece of her heart.

For the first time, he wondered how much pain she had been hiding.

Then his phone rang.

Sofia.

“Vincent, darling, where are you? I need you to come shopping with me.”

He stared at the screen.

For once, he didn’t answer immediately.

“Vincent?”

“I’ll call you back.”

He ended the call.

“Find Elena,” he ordered his security chief. “I want her location immediately.”

Two hours later, he received an address in Vermont.

He drove there himself.

But when he arrived, he found something unexpected.

The little house stood beside a beautiful lake. Flowers decorated the front porch, and a small wooden bench sat beneath an old maple tree.

Elena was sitting outside, wearing a cream-colored sweater. Her hair was tied loosely behind her neck.

She looked thinner than he remembered.

Beside her was a small wooden box containing Noah’s favorite toys.

Vincent stepped out of the car.

“Elena.”

I looked up.

For a second, I couldn’t believe he had found me.

Then I calmly closed the book in my lap.

“What are you doing here?”

He approached slowly.

“Why didn’t you tell me about the cancer?”

I looked at him.

“I did. You just weren’t listening.”

His face tightened.

“I didn’t know it was this serious.”

“You didn’t know Noah was seriously ill either.”

He fell silent.

Then his eyes landed on the wooden box.

“Can we talk about our son?”

I shook my head.

“No. You’ve had plenty of opportunities to talk about him. You chose not to.”

“Elena, please.”

It was the first time I had heard Vincent Moretti say that word to me.

He lowered himself onto the bench opposite mine.

“I made mistakes.”

I looked toward the lake.

“Mistakes are forgetting an anniversary. Mistakes are buying the wrong flowers. Leaving your dying son without his father wasn’t a mistake, Vincent. It was a choice.”

His eyes turned red.

“I’ll make everything right.”

I smiled sadly.

“You can’t.”

“I can take you to the best hospital in the world. I’ll bring the doctors here. Money isn’t a problem.”

“The doctors already told me there is nothing more they can do.”

“Then we’ll find someone else!”

His voice broke.

For a moment, I almost felt sorry for him.

But I had spent years waiting for this man to choose me.

Now that I was leaving forever, he finally wanted to hold on.

I reached into my pocket and handed him a small envelope.

Inside was a photograph of Noah and a handwritten note.

“Keep this,” I said. “It’s the last picture I have of him smiling.”

Vincent looked at the photograph.

Tears finally rolled down his cheeks.

Then he noticed another document inside the envelope.

It was a copy of my divorce agreement.

At the bottom was a message written in my handwriting.

Please don’t look for me after I’m gone. Let me spend my final days in peace.

Vincent looked up desperately.

“Elena, don’t do this to me.”

I gently shook my head.

“I’m not doing anything to you, Vincent. I’m simply choosing how I want to spend the little time I have left.”

He reached for my hand.

This time, I didn’t pull away immediately.

I let him hold it for a few seconds.

Then I whispered:

“Do you remember what you promised me when we got married?”

He nodded, unable to speak.

“You promised I would never be alone.”

I withdrew my hand.

“But when I needed you most, I was alone. And when Noah needed his father, he was alone too.”

Vincent lowered his head.

I turned toward the lake.

“Please go home.”

He remained seated for several minutes before finally standing.

As he walked toward his car, I watched him leave.

I knew he would come back.

But I also knew something he didn’t.

My lawyer had already prepared a final letter, scheduled to be delivered to Vincent on the day of my funeral.

And inside that letter was the truth about Sofia.

A truth that would destroy the last excuse Vincent had ever used to justify betraying his family.