Page 334 of Niccolo

And hung up on Rachel, cutting her off.

Sofia had played her hand surprisingly well.

She’d gone up against a witness who hadactually been hired by Fausto to kill Dario –and who had seen Sofia there, to boot.

Yet, in the end, Sofia had completely cast doubt on Rachel’s reliability.

Coupled with the attempt on Dario’s life, the details of Rachel and Lars’s romance were hard to believe – even for someone like me, who had known Lars for almost a year.

To a stranger, the story would soundextremelyfishy.

The Council had no formal rules about what constituted burden of proof.

All Sofia had to do was call into question Rachel’s version of the story…

And she had done that masterfully.

“You should not have hung up on the witness,” Don Severino admonished her.

Actually, the ‘mic drop’ moment was well worth the reprimand.

“Mea culpa,”Sofia said.

My bad,essentially.

“Do you wish to examine the witness again?” Don Severino asked me.

If I did that, I would open Rachel up to a second interrogation by Sofia – and potentiallymoreundermining.

“No,” I said genially. “I’d like to call my next witness – my twin brother, Roberto Rosolini.”

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Roberto recounted everything that had happened in Hong Kong.

Our family’s initial investment of 50 million euros with Mr. Lau and the Gambling Syndicate…

The discovery thatsomeonehad embezzled all our money at the same time as the attempt on Dario’s life…

The decision to go to Hong Kong to ask for our money back…

The pattern of stalling that Lau had used to put off Robert’s request…

Culminating in the phone call where Fausto offered to let Lau keep the 50 million euros if Lau killed Roberto.

I also asked about Mei-ling, who had secretly worked for Lau, and how she had kept Roberto distracted from getting the money back.

Having learned my lesson with Rachel’s testimony, I made sure to have Roberto tell everyone how he and Mei-ling fell in love – and that they had married at the same time Rachel and Lars had.

I thought I’d done pretty well…

Until Sofia got started.

“I would like to request we speak to a witness who can refute key portions of what Roberto Rosolini has just said,” she asked Don Severino.

“NO,” I protested. “She can ask Roberto whatever she wants,thencall her witness later.”

“It would be valuable to immediately contradict Roberto Rosolini’s lies,” Sofia said.

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