Chapter 2 - Jack Moretti Saw What Everyone Else Pretended Not to See
The ride home was silent for the first 10 minutes.
Rocco drove.
I sat in the back seat staring at the card in my hand.
Jack Moretti.
One number.
No title.
No office.
No explanation.
Just a name that carried enough power to make entire rooms become quiet.
My phone buzzed.
Ruth again.
“Everything okay?”
I typed:
“Running late. Please keep Noah asleep.”
Then I deleted the message.
I didn't want her frightened.
I wrote:
“Everything is fine. Be there soon.”
I hated lying.
That night, I was becoming very good at it.
When the car stopped outside Ruth’s house, I expected Rocco to stay.
He didn't.
“Mr. Moretti wants me to make sure you enter the house.”
“I can see the front door.”
“I'm aware.”
I looked at him.
“You always follow orders?”
He almost smiled.
“Only the smart ones.”
Ruth opened the door before I knocked.
Her face changed the moment she saw me.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
She looked at the broken shoe.
“Lily.”
I sighed.
“Bad night.”
She pulled me inside.
Noah was asleep on the couch under a superhero blanket.
My heart softened.
I crouched beside him.
His small hand held a little plastic robot with 1 wheel missing.
I touched his hair.
“Hey, baby.”
He stirred.
“Mom?”
“I’m here.”
He smiled without opening his eyes.
“The robot is broken.”
“I know.”
“Need a piece.”
“I know.”
He fell asleep again.
I kissed his forehead.
Then I felt someone watching me.
Rocco stood outside.
I walked to the door.
“Tell Jack thank you.”
“I will.”
“And tell him I don't need rescuing.”
Rocco looked at me.
“I'll tell him.”
He paused.
“Whether he listens is another question.”
Then he left.
I closed the door.
But the night wasn't over.
At 2:13 a.m., someone knocked.
3 slow knocks.
I froze.
Ruth woke up.
“Who is it?”
I looked through the blinds.
Black sedan.
2 men.
I grabbed my phone.
Then my bedroom window shattered.
Glass exploded across the floor.
I screamed.
Ruth pulled Noah against her.
A man climbed through the window.
I grabbed the metal lamp.
He rushed toward me.
I swung.
The lamp struck his shoulder.
He cursed.
Another man came through the door.
Then headlights flooded the room.
3 black SUVs stopped outside.
Rocco's men.
The attackers ran.
Shots cracked outside.
I crouched over Noah.
Someone shouted.
“Stay down!”
Then the front door opened.
Jack Moretti walked inside.
He looked at me.
Then Noah.
Then the broken window.
His jaw tightened.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
He crouched in front of me.
His gaze moved to the glass scattered across the floor.
“Who did this?”
“I don't know.”
He stood.
“Rocco.”
“Already working on it.”
Jack looked back at me.
“You're coming with me.”
“No.”
He frowned.
“Your house was attacked.”
“I noticed.”
“You can't stay here.”
“My son is here.”
“He comes too.”
“No.”
“Lily.”
“I don't know you.”
“You know enough.”
“I know you're a dangerous man.”
“Yes.”
“And I know people are shooting at people because of you.”
Jack's face remained calm.
“Not because of me.”
“Then why?”
“Because you helped me.”
I stared.
He lowered his voice.
“Someone wants to know what you heard.”
I looked at Noah.
Jack followed my eyes.
“How old is he?”
“4.”
“Father?”
My body went tense.
“Not in the picture.”
Jack's eyes sharpened.
“Dead?”
“No.”
“Then why isn't he here?”
I looked at him.
“He decided being a father was inconvenient.”
Something dark crossed Jack's face.
“His loss.”
I wasn't sure why those 2 words affected me.
Maybe because no one had ever said them before.
Usually people asked what I had done wrong.
What had I expected?
Why hadn't I kept my husband?
Why hadn't I been thinner?
Why hadn't I been easier to love?
Jack asked none of those questions.
He simply looked at Noah and said,
“His loss.”
Then he turned to Rocco.
“Move them.”
Ruth packed what she could.
We left before dawn.
Jack's house was unlike anything I expected.
It wasn't a castle.
It was a modern stone estate outside the city, guarded but warm, with large windows and a kitchen that smelled like coffee.
A woman named Mrs. Bell took Noah upstairs.
I followed until Jack spoke.
“She knows how to handle children.”
I hesitated.
“She won't hurt him?”
Jack's expression hardened.
“Anyone who hurts your son answers to me.”
I looked at him.
He didn't seem to realize how much that sentence meant.
Later, I woke from a short sleep and found Jack in the library.
He was sitting alone.
A glass of water in front of him.
No alcohol.
No phone.
No guards.
Just silence.
I stood in the doorway.
“You don't sleep?”
“Sometimes.”
“That's not an answer.”
He looked at me.
“Neither was that.”
I almost smiled.
Then he noticed the sleeve of my sweater.
It had ridden up again.
A scar showed along my forearm.
His expression changed.
“You've got more.”
“What?”
“Scars.”
I pulled the sleeve down.
“Everyone has them.”
“Not like that.”
I looked away.
For years, Ethan had made me ashamed of them.
One scar on my arm.
Another near my shoulder.
A faint mark along my side.
He used to say I looked like I had been assembled from damaged parts.
He stopped touching me after Noah was born.
Then he stopped pretending our marriage was salvageable.
Finally, he left.
Jack's voice was quiet.
“Who did it?”
“An accident.”
“Liar.”
I stared at him.
He didn't move closer.
He didn't demand.
He simply waited.
That was somehow worse.
“My ex-husband.”
Jack's jaw tightened.
“He hurt you?”
“Not with his hands.”
“Then how?”
“Words.”
Jack looked at the scars again.
“Words leave marks too.”
Something inside me broke.
I sat down.
I told him a little.
Not everything.
Enough.
Ethan had mocked my body.
My weight.
My scars.
The way pregnancy changed me.
When Noah was born, he said I looked like a stranger.
He wanted a wife who looked like a magazine.
Not a woman who had survived a complicated pregnancy.
He left after another argument.
His mother stayed.
Ruth chose me.
Ethan chose himself.
Jack listened.
When I finished, he said only 1 thing.
“He was a coward.”
I wiped my eyes.
“You don't know him.”
“I don't need to.”
Jack stood.
Then he did something unexpected.
He took off his expensive black coat and placed it around my shoulders.
“You're cold.”
“I’m fine.”
“I didn't ask.”
I looked at him.
He smiled slightly.
“That's an order.”
I laughed.
It was the first real laugh I had in weeks.
The next morning, Jack had breakfast sent upstairs.
Real breakfast.
Eggs.
Toast.
Fruit.
Coffee.
No one treated me like a guest.
No one treated me like a servant.
For the first time in a long time, I ate without apologizing.
Then Jack walked into the room holding a file.
“We found Victor.”
My stomach tightened.
“Where?”
“Gone.”
“Then who?”
He placed photographs on the table.
The security guard.
Marco.
Victor.
Then another man.
I stared.
“That's Ethan.”
Jack looked at me.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“What is he doing with Marco?”
“I don't know.”
Jack's face went still.
“We found something else.”
He showed me a bank record.
A payment.
$25,000.
From an account linked to Marco.
To a company registered under Ethan's name.
My hands went cold.
“My ex worked for them?”
“Looks like it.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“He hated the Moretti name.”
“Maybe he only pretended to.”
I looked at the date.
The payment was 2 months before Ethan left me.
Another transaction.
Another.
Another.
Then I saw the last one.
$250,000.
Sent the day before my divorce papers were finalized.
Jack studied me.
“Now you understand why they targeted you.”
I stared at the numbers.
“No.”
“Lily.”
“I don't understand anything.”
Jack stepped closer.
“They didn't choose you because you were weak.”
He pointed at the payment trail.
“They chose you because someone knew your connection to Ethan.”
I shook my head.
“I have no connection.”
Jack looked at me.
“You're wrong.”
“What?”
“Your ex didn't marry you by accident.”
The room went cold.
I stared at him.
“What did you just say?”
Jack's expression hardened.
“He was looking for something.”
“What?”
“We don't know yet.”
Then he turned the page.
At the bottom was a single handwritten note.
Ask Lily about her father's company.
I stopped breathing.
May you like
My father had been dead for 12 years.
And for the first time, I wondered whether my marriage to Ethan had begun long before I ever met him.
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