Chapter 2 - The Man Who Was Supposed to Be DeadThe photograph remained on my phone long after the screen should have gone dark.
Dominic Moretti.
I knew his face.
I knew the thick silver hair combed backward from his forehead, the crooked nose broken in a fight years before I met the family, and the heavy gold ring he wore on his right hand.
More importantly, I remembered his funeral.
Three years earlier, Vincent had told me his uncle had died overseas.
There had been a closed casket, a private church service, and an entire procession of black cars moving through Chicago beneath a gray winter sky.
Vincent had stood beside the coffin without shedding a tear.
When I asked why Dominic's body couldn't be viewed, he told me the circumstances of the death had made it impossible.
I never questioned him.
In the Moretti family, certain subjects were forbidden.
Dominic was one of them.
Now he stood outside my stolen bakery, alive, wearing a charcoal overcoat and speaking to Sophia Reynolds.
I enlarged the photograph.
It wasn't old.
The window display behind them contained the pumpkin-shaped cookies I had prepared for the bakery's autumn reopening.
There was even a handwritten advertisement for the following Saturday.
The picture had been taken that evening.
I checked the unknown number again.
No name.
No identifying details.
I typed a response.
Who are you?
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Then appeared again.
Someone who made the mistake of trusting Vincent Moretti once.
I stared at the message.
What does Dominic want with Lily?
The response arrived almost immediately.
Ask your husband why Dominic had to disappear three years ago.
Then the conversation ended.
I tried calling the number.
It was disconnected.
I sat on the edge of the bed, listening to Lily breathe.
A year earlier, I might have telephoned Vincent.
I would have demanded an explanation, accepted half an answer, and spent the rest of the night wondering whether I had misunderstood something.
That Claire no longer existed.
Instead, I forwarded everything to Rebecca Hayes.
Her reply came twenty minutes later.
Do not contact anyone in the Moretti family. Keep the phone available. We need to talk first thing in the morning.
I checked the locks on the apartment door.
Then I checked Lily's inhaler.
Then I sat beside her bed until sunrise.
The apartment belonged to Eleanor Whitcomb, my grandmother's oldest friend.
Eleanor was seventy-four, sharp-tongued, and completely unimpressed by powerful men.
She owned the bookstore downstairs and had lived in the building for forty years.
When I telephoned her two days earlier, she hadn't asked why I needed somewhere to stay.
She simply said, "The upstairs apartment is empty, darling. Bring the child."
That morning, Eleanor found me standing in the kitchen with a cold cup of coffee.
"You haven't slept."
"No."
She glanced toward the bedroom.
"Is Lily all right?"
"She's still sleeping."
Eleanor pulled out a chair.
"Sit down."
I sat.
She poured fresh coffee and placed it in front of me.
Then she noticed the photograph on my phone.
Her expression changed.
"Who is that?"
"Vincent's uncle."
"Another charming Moretti?"
"He's supposed to be dead."
Eleanor looked at me for a long moment.
"That family has always confused being feared with being respected."
I almost smiled.
Almost.
Then my phone rang.
Rebecca.
I answered immediately.
"Claire, are you somewhere private?"
"Yes."
"I've reviewed the documents you sent. We need to discuss several things."
I moved into the hallway and closed the kitchen door.
Rebecca began with the divorce.
Vincent's attorneys had already received the filing.
His response had been immediate.
He contested temporary custody.
He objected to the requested protective provisions.
And he demanded the court order me to disclose Lily's location.
"He claims you've removed his daughter from her home without justification," Rebecca explained.
"She was hospitalized because of him."
"I know. We have the medical documentation. And we're requesting that any contact be supervised while the court evaluates the circumstances."
"What about his money? His influence?"
"Influence doesn't erase hospital records."
I wanted to believe her.
Rebecca continued.
"There's something else. Your bakery."
My stomach tightened.
"What about it?"
"The ownership documents you signed six months ago were not what you believed them to be."
I leaned against the wall.
"Vincent told me his attorney was helping establish the company."
"The documents included a management agreement giving a Moretti-controlled holding company broad voting rights. From what I've seen, your signature may have been obtained through material misrepresentation."
"Can we get it back?"
"Potentially. But there's more."
I closed my eyes.
"Of course there is."
"The holding company was recently transferred to an entity called R&R Hospitality Ventures."
I frowned.
"R&R?"
"Reynolds and Rossi, according to the corporate records."
Sophia Reynolds.
But Rossi?
I didn't recognize the second name.
"Who is Rossi?"
"That's what we're trying to determine."
I thought about the photograph.
About Dominic.
About the stranger's warning.
"Rebecca, I think something is happening that goes beyond my divorce."
Her voice became more serious.
"Tell me."
I told her everything.
The photograph.
Dominic's supposed death.
The messages.
When I finished, there was a long silence.
Then Rebecca said, "I'm going to arrange for an independent security consultant. Someone with no connection to your husband's organization."
"I don't want another stranger following us."
"I understand. But if someone has threatened Lily, we need to take that seriously."
I looked through the kitchen doorway.
Lily had awakened.
She sat at Eleanor's table eating toast with strawberry jam.
Her hair was tangled.
Mr. Buttons occupied the chair beside her.
She looked like an ordinary little girl on an ordinary morning.
I wanted that ordinary life so badly it hurt.
"All right," I whispered.
Across Chicago, Vincent Moretti was discovering that money couldn't make a woman answer her phone.
He stood in his home office, staring at the surveillance reports spread across his desk.
Sixteen hours.
That was how long Claire had been missing when he ordered the first search.
By the second morning, his men had checked every property she had ever visited, every hotel where she had once stayed, and every address associated with her former coworkers.
Nothing.
By the third morning, Vincent had stopped sleeping.
His chief of security, Gabriel Russo, stood near the door.
Gabriel was forty-six, broad-shouldered, and had worked for Vincent's father before Vincent inherited control of the organization.
Unlike most men surrounding Vincent, Gabriel rarely agreed merely to keep him happy.
"She's gone voluntarily," Gabriel said.
Vincent looked up.
"Find her."
"We're looking."
"Then look harder."
Gabriel remained still.
"She took Lily's medication, school records, and clothes. This wasn't impulsive."
Vincent slammed a folder onto the desk.
"I can see that."
"Then perhaps you should ask why she thought she had to leave."
The silence that followed was dangerous.
Vincent rose slowly.
"Careful."
Gabriel didn't move.
"I carried your daughter to bed after her fourth birthday party because you disappeared with a business associate. I sat outside her room during a thunderstorm because she was afraid. I've watched Claire explain your absence more times than I can count."
Vincent's face darkened.
"That's enough."
"No, sir. It isn't."
Gabriel removed his security badge.
"You ordered a sick child locked in her room."
"She was throwing a tantrum."
"She couldn't breathe."
Vincent looked away.
For three days, he had repeated the same explanation.
Lily had been dramatic.
Claire had overreacted.
The hospital had been unnecessary.
But whenever his mind became quiet, he remembered the way Lily had hidden behind Claire when they returned home.
He had assumed she was being stubborn.
Now the memory seemed different.
"She had an inhaler," he muttered.
"Downstairs."
Vincent looked sharply at him.
Gabriel continued.
"Margaret told me she tried to open the door. Your orders stopped her."
The room became very still.
Vincent turned toward the window.
Beyond the glass, Lake Michigan stretched beneath an iron-colored sky.
"Leave."
Gabriel didn't obey immediately.
"Your daughter isn't a disobedient employee, Vincent."
For the first time, Gabriel used his employer's first name without permission.
"She's a little girl."
Then he walked out.
Vincent remained beside the window.
He thought about Lily's bedroom.
About the tiny pink sneakers beside her closet.
About the drawings she used to tape to his office door.
Drawings he usually asked Margaret to remove because they spoiled the appearance of the polished wood.
He had expected Claire to forgive him.
She always did.
When he canceled dinners, she forgave him.
When Sophia interrupted vacations, she forgave him.
When he forgot Lily's school play, she forgave him.
Vincent had mistaken her forgiveness for an endless resource.
Now he was beginning to understand that he had spent it all.
His phone rang.
Sophia.
He rejected the call.
She called again.
On the third attempt, he answered.
"What?"
"Vincent, darling, are you coming to the bakery?"
"No."
"But we're meeting the investors."
"Cancel it."
Her voice sharpened.
"You can't cancel now."
"Watch me."
There was a pause.
Then Sophia spoke more softly.
"Is this about Claire?"
Vincent said nothing.
"She'll come back," Sophia assured him. "Women like Claire always do. She doesn't know how to live without you."
Vincent looked at his wife's wedding ring lying beside his keyboard.
It was the first time he had removed it from the velvet box where he'd found it.
"That's where you're wrong," he said.
Then he ended the call.
The independent security consultant arrived that afternoon.
His name was Daniel Mercer.
He was forty-nine, a former federal investigator with graying hair, a quiet voice, and the cautious manner of someone who had learned that danger rarely announced itself.
He met Rebecca and me in Eleanor's bookstore after closing.
The three of us sat between shelves of old novels while rain struck the front windows.
Daniel examined the photograph of Dominic.
"Where did you receive this?"
"An anonymous message."
"Have you shown it to anyone besides your attorney?"
"No."
He studied the image.
Then he looked up.
"Are you certain this man is Dominic Moretti?"
"Absolutely."
Daniel exchanged a glance with Rebecca.
"What?" I demanded.
He hesitated.
"There was a federal investigation involving Dominic three years ago."
"Investigation into what?"
"Financial crimes, suspected racketeering, and the disappearance of a witness."
I felt my pulse quicken.
"What witness?"
"A woman named Natalie Rossi."
The surname struck me immediately.
"Rossi?"
Rebecca leaned forward.
"Is she related to the company that now controls Claire's bakery?"
"We don't know yet," Daniel answered.
He turned back to me.
"Did Vincent ever mention Natalie?"
I searched my memory.
"No."
"Did he ever mention a former employee, accountant, or business manager disappearing around the time Dominic supposedly died?"
I thought about the strange months before the funeral.
Vincent had been away constantly.
There had been late-night telephone calls.
Arguments in his office.
Once, I had heard him shouting at someone about a missing ledger.
But I had been pregnant with Lily's younger sibling then.
A pregnancy that ended in miscarriage at eleven weeks.
The weeks surrounding it were blurred by grief.
I had spent most of that winter trying to survive one day at a time.
"I don't remember," I whispered.
Daniel's expression softened slightly.
"That's all right."
But something was bothering me.
"Why would Dominic want Lily?"
Daniel didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he asked a question.
"Does your daughter have any legal interest in the Moretti family assets?"
I stared at him.
"She's six."
"That doesn't mean she can't inherit."
"Vincent's father established a family trust when Lily was born. Vincent mentioned it once."
"Do you know the terms?"
"No."
Daniel closed the photograph.
"Then we need to find out."
That evening, I took Lily to the park.
It was a small park near the bookstore, with a wooden playground, a pond, and several benches beneath old maple trees.
For the first time since leaving Chicago, she laughed.
Not politely.
Not carefully.
She laughed with her whole body as she ran toward a pile of fallen leaves.
I watched her jump into them.
Then she turned and waved.
"Mommy! Look!"
I waved back.
"Beautiful jump, sweetheart!"
She began collecting red leaves for Eleanor.
I sat on a nearby bench, allowing myself one precious moment of peace.
Then I saw the black SUV.
It was parked across the street.
Dark windows.
Engine running.
At first, I told myself it was nothing.
Plenty of people drove black SUVs.
Then the passenger window lowered.
A man raised a phone.
Pointed it toward the playground.
Toward Lily.
I stood.
"Lily!"
She looked up.
"Come here, baby."
Something in my voice made her move immediately.
I took her hand and started toward the opposite entrance.
The SUV pulled away from the curb.
My heart began pounding.
We walked faster.
Then faster still.
"Mommy?" Lily whispered.
"It's okay, sweetheart. We're going to see Eleanor."
Behind us, tires rolled over wet pavement.
I glanced back.
The SUV had turned the corner.
And was now following us.
I pulled out my phone and called Daniel.
He answered immediately.
"Claire?"
"There's a black SUV following us."
"Where are you?"
I gave him the street.
"Can you see the plate?"
"No."
"Don't go directly home. There's a police station two blocks east. Go there."
I lifted Lily into my arms.
She was heavier than she had been a year earlier.
But fear gave me strength.
I ran.
Behind me, a car door slammed.
Then a man's voice shouted.
"Mrs. Moretti!"
I didn't stop.
"Claire! Wait!"
I turned a corner.
The police station appeared ahead.
Its illuminated sign was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.
I pushed through the doors carrying Lily against my chest.
Two officers looked up.
"Ma'am?"
"Someone is following us."
One officer rose.
"What happened?"
I tried to answer.
But Lily began coughing.
The running.
The cold air.
The fear.
I recognized the sound immediately.
I reached for her rescue inhaler.
And discovered that the small medical pouch was no longer attached to my shoulder bag.
It had fallen somewhere during the run.
My blood turned cold.
"Lily?"
She struggled to inhale.
"Mommy—"
I shouted for medical help.
Within moments, officers were moving, an ambulance was being requested, and I was holding my daughter upright while counting the seconds between her breaths.
She remained conscious.
She could still speak.
But every breath required effort.
The paramedics arrived quickly and began treatment.
I climbed into the ambulance beside her.
As the doors closed, I saw a man standing across the street.
He wore a dark coat.
He didn't approach.
He simply watched the ambulance pull away.
And then, as we passed beneath a streetlight, I saw his face.
Dominic Moretti.
Alive.
Watching my daughter.
Lily stabilized after treatment at the emergency department.
The physician recommended observation because she had experienced another attack so soon after her hospitalization.
I agreed immediately.
Rebecca arrived an hour later.
Daniel came soon afterward.
I told them everything.
The SUV.
The man with the telephone.
The pursuit.
Dominic standing outside the police station.
Daniel listened without interrupting.
Then he asked, "Did he speak to you?"
"No."
"Are you sure he was the same man from the photograph?"
"Yes."
Daniel looked toward Rebecca.
They exchanged another troubling glance.
"What aren't you telling me?" I demanded.
Rebecca reached across the table.
"Claire, Daniel found something while reviewing the Moretti family trust."
My stomach tightened.
"What?"
"Lily is named as a beneficiary."
"I knew that."
"But there's a particular provision."
Daniel opened his folder.
"Vincent's father established a restricted inheritance arrangement after a dispute with Dominic. Certain assets cannot be controlled by Dominic or his associates under any circumstances."
"What assets?"
"Warehouses, land holdings, and controlling interests in several legitimate companies."
I frowned.
"Why does that involve Lily?"
"Because the trust provides that if Vincent dies, becomes legally incapacitated, or is removed as trustee under specified conditions, those interests eventually pass to Lily, through an independent trustee until she's an adult."
I stared at him.
"So Dominic wants Vincent's property?"
"Possibly."
"Then why follow Lily?"
Daniel's expression hardened.
"Because she may be the one person who prevents him from getting it."
I looked through the glass wall of the hospital room.
Lily was watching cartoons.
She had no idea that people were discussing her inheritance.
No idea that her father's criminal world had followed us to a quiet town where I had hoped she could finally be safe.
I turned back to Daniel.
"What do we do?"
"We secure the original trust documents. We identify the people following you. And we make sure Dominic doesn't get near your daughter."
Rebecca's phone buzzed.
She read the message.
Her face changed.
"What?" I asked.
She looked at Daniel.
"Vincent just filed an emergency motion demanding Lily be returned to Chicago."
I felt the blood drain from my face.
Rebecca continued quietly.
"He's claiming Claire is emotionally unstable and that the child's repeated medical emergencies prove she can't care for her."
For several seconds, I couldn't speak.
My husband had locked our daughter in her room until she couldn't breathe.
He had refused to visit her in the hospital.
And now he was trying to use her illness to take her away from me.
Then Daniel's telephone rang.
He listened for less than ten seconds.
"What location?"
Another pause.
"Are you certain?"
He ended the call.
"Claire, the officers reviewed the traffic-camera footage near the park."
My heart hammered.
"Did they find Dominic?"
Daniel looked directly at me.
"The black SUV wasn't registered to Dominic."
"Then who?"
He hesitated.
"The vehicle belongs to a security company under contract with Vincent Moretti."
I stared at him.
My husband had found us.
And Lily had nearly stopped breathing because we ran from his men.
Then my phone lit up.
A message from Vincent.
I know where you are.
Another followed.
You can hate me all you want, Claire.
But you're not taking my daughter away from me.
For a moment, I couldn't move.
Then one final message appeared.
And whatever Dominic has told you, don't believe him. He's already destroyed one family.
I looked up at Daniel.
"Vincent knows Dominic is alive."
May you like
Daniel nodded slowly.
"And from that message, I suspect he's known for a long time."
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