Adam became pensive. It seemed that Vicenzo had forgotten that he could read his thoughts.
"I made a mistake, yes. But I regretted it almost immediately."
"Your regret doesn't erase what you did to her... Did you at least apologize to her?"
"No. She didn't give me the chance. She ran away before I could get my head together and understand that what I did was wrong."
"Maybe that's the first step I should take now to win her back."
"Do you think I have a chance of winning her back?" Adam asked wryly, but Vincenzo didn't notice.
"With the right words and attitude, you have a fifty percent chance of getting her love back. But if she accepts your apology but refuses to go back to you.... Well, there's no blackmail that works better than what I have to give you about her. As you know, I have a law degree, and I only don't practice law because research has become so lucrative and enjoyable. So I can give you all the tips on what you should do."
"First of all, Vincenzo, I want to make it clear that I don't care about being forgiven, or even about winning Anna back, she's mine. She belongs to me and I do what I want with what belongs to me, that's all. And secondly... Don't make me wait any longer, tell me everything you've found out." Adam said quietly, and the waiter arrived with the starter and served them. As soon as he left, they resumed their conversation. Neither of them seemed interested in the food.
"Adam. Here's the report from the day Anna left the United States, her journey until the moment she arrived here and... to the time you asked me to investigate her." He said, handing him the folder he had brought with him.
Adam took the folder and looked at it briefly, then closed it, looking at Vicenzo in disappointment.
"I know the day she left the United States. I was at the airport. Is that all you've got?"
"Adam, you should have read the report, but I'll summarize some of the interesting information that you don't already know. She arrived here in the country carrying a child. A newborn baby, not even a month old."
"So the child is really mine..." Adam concluded unsurprisingly. He already knew that information, too.
"If she abandoned you at the time you said, the child is definitely yours. She was lost for some time, as you told me. She ran away carrying your child in her womb. She went to England and stayed in a cheap hotel, eating broth and without clothes or any other luxury."
Adam felt his eyes water. How could Anna have deceived him like that? And Genevieve? He had dedicated his friendship to her, and had even protected her from Ryan, when he hinted that they should put her in the green house.
When he got back to the States, he was going to set Bonnie up to take it out on Genevieve. He wanted her dead.
"I should have noticed the changes... She fell down the stairs... Someone insinuated after a while that she'd been pushed, but I didn't pay much attention because she hadn't been hurt. But now things are different. Whoever pushed her wanted to kill my son, and that won't go unpunished."
"From what I know of you, I'm sure of that."
"I... Is there any way to get my son back?"
"Ah! This is the part where I give you the blackmail on a plate, to make Anna come back with you. It will be the 'shot in the arm' you needed to convince her."
They then sat down to eat and Adam listened in silence to everything Vicenzo said to him and how he recommended he act. They ate while Vicenzo discussed all of Adam's rights, and his ideas about how he should talk to Anna at first. Adam cleared up all his doubts on the subject, and as soon as they had finished lunch, he left happy. He would finally have arguments to take Anna away.
As soon as Adam had left, Vicenzo was getting ready to leave, since his friend had left the lunch bill paid, and even then, created a debt with Vicenzo.
He was ready to get up when he saw the man with a child in his arms, who, by all accounts, was the subject of that lunch, standing staring at him near the table. Vicenzo sat down again, his heart squeezing because he knew who it was. The man sat down and placed the boy in a chair next to him, very calmly.
"Look... He asked me for help. I couldn't refuse." Vicenzo began, but the man held up his hand to interrupt him.
"Tell me everything you said to him." Anna's father ordered simply.
Vicenzo regretted having ever met Adam's family, because he knew that after that conversation, his fate could be in the grave. So he didn't tell them everything, but he did say, without omitting the ideas with which he had advised Adam, to try to save himself, using sincerity without betraying Adam.
"You found out more than that, Vicenzo. You didn't talk to him about anything else?"
"No. He didn't need to know."
"Why didn't you tell him, Vicenzo?"
Vicenzo began to sweat. It seemed that the man didn't believe him, and he knew now that he would decide his fate based on the information he had and hadn't passed on to Adam. But he knew that Adam had read the truth in his mind and that Henry had become a danger to the werewolves after Ian's birth, because he used the child as a weapon, since he could manipulate the mist inside him without him realizing it.
"Because I have sympathy for Maxwell, and I feared that Adam would try to kill the children if he knew that Anna would have reason to stay..."
The man stared at him for a few minutes, then stood up, taking his grandson's hand, still pensive.
"You did the right thing, Vicenzo. I really wanted him to know about your son, but if I'd told him about my other grandchildren, I'd have gone straight to the bottom of the ocean, tied up in heavy chains, and we both know you wouldn't have drowned." The man said this and smiled at him as if he were talking about the weather, and left with the child.
Vicenzo left after letting a few minutes pass before the man had left. He went straight to his apartment, gathered his personal belongings and returned to Ireland. A land he should never have left, but he had traveled to find out what had become of his aunt. And when he found out who she had married, he hadn't looked for any more news. And he never knew he had a cousin. And that Anna would never know of his existence either. Vicenzo changed his name and was never found by anyone who could recognize him.