Chapter 2 - The Man Waiting Beyond Customs
The first thing Hannah saw when she walked into the arrivals hall at Leonardo da Vinci Airport was a man holding a white sign.
MERCER.
Nothing else.
No first name.
No company logo.
Just Mercer.
Her steps stopped so suddenly Sophie bumped into her leg.
“Mommy?”
Adrian’s hand closed around Hannah’s elbow.
Not hard.
Not possessive.
Steadying.
She flinched anyway.
His fingers released immediately.
“Sorry.”
The apology startled her almost as much as the touch.
Vincent spoke softly into the microphone hidden near his collar.
Three men in dark jackets separated from the crowd.
Hannah had not realized they were Adrian’s security until that moment.
The man holding the sign was in his forties, clean-shaven, wearing a navy sport coat and the patient expression of a professional driver.
He looked harmless.
Daniel always preferred harmless-looking people.
“Do you know him?” Adrian asked.
“No.”
“Is anyone supposed to meet you?”
“My friend Julia. She said she would try to come, but her son has school. I told her I could take a taxi.”
“Did you give Daniel Julia’s address?”
“No.”
“Could he find it?”
Hannah laughed once without humor.
“Daniel found the new password to an email account I made while hiding in a motel. I don’t know what he can find anymore.”
The man with the sign spotted them.
His gaze landed on Hannah.
Then Sophie.
Then Adrian.
He folded the sign.
That was all.
He did not approach.
He turned and walked away.
Vincent said, “Take him.”
Two security men disappeared after him.
Hannah grabbed Sophie’s hand.
“This is insane.”
“Yes,” Adrian said.
“You say that like it’s normal.”
“For me, it is.”
“That isn’t reassuring.”
“It wasn’t intended to be.”
Oliver slept against Adrian’s chest in a carrier someone had produced after landing. The sight remained bizarre.
A feared criminal leader.
An eight-month-old baby.
A diaper bag slung over one shoulder.
If Hannah had not been terrified, she might have laughed.
Instead she asked, “Where are you taking us?”
“Nowhere yet.”
“You said stay with you.”
“I said until the terminal is secure.”
“And after?”
“You choose.”
Hannah stared at him.
Daniel had made choices sound generous too.
You choose the restaurant.
You choose the dress.
You choose whether we argue tonight.
The choice was always safe only if she selected what he wanted.
Adrian read the suspicion in her face.
“My home is outside Rome. I have security. You and Sophie can stay there tonight. Tomorrow, if you want a hotel, an apartment, your friend’s house or the American embassy, I’ll arrange transportation.”
“Why?”
“Because Daniel Mercer may have followed you here.”
“That doesn’t answer why you care.”
Adrian’s gaze went to Oliver.
“You helped my son.”
“That doesn’t mean you owe me asylum.”
“No.”
“Then why?”
His gray eyes returned to hers.
“Because I think your husband knows who killed my wife.”
Hannah felt Sophie’s fingers tighten around hers.
She lowered her voice.
“And you think I know something.”
“I think you might know something you don’t realize matters.”
“That sounds dangerously close to holding me until I remember.”
Vincent returned before Adrian could answer.
His expression was grim.
“The man dumped the sign and went through an employee corridor. Airport security stopped our guys.”
“Identification?”
“False Italian license. Name Pietro Conti. Photo matches a contract driver associated with the Bellandi network.”
Adrian went still.
Hannah did not know what the Bellandi network was.
She understood from Vincent’s expression that she did not want to.
“Daniel?” Adrian asked.
“No visual.”
Adrian looked at Hannah.
“My offer just became more urgent.”
Hannah wanted to refuse.
Every scar inside her screamed not to get into a car with powerful men.
Then Sophie tugged her sleeve.
“Mommy, I’m hungry.”
The ordinary complaint almost broke her.
She had spent four days running.
Three nights barely sleeping.
Eleven hours on an airplane.
She had thought reaching Rome would be the finish line.
Instead, men she did not know were waiting with signs bearing her last name.
Hannah crouched.
“Do you want pancakes?”
Sophie’s eyes brightened.
“With strawberries?”
“With all the strawberries.”
Adrian said, “My house has a chef.”
Hannah shot him a look.
He added, “Apparently, according to Vincent, she makes acceptable pancakes.”
Vincent looked offended.
“Mrs. Moretti’s pancakes are excellent.”
Sophie looked at Adrian.
“Do you have syrup?”
“Yes.”
“Chocolate chips?”
Adrian glanced at Vincent.
Vincent sighed.
“I’m sure we can obtain chocolate chips.”
Sophie nodded decisively.
“Okay.”
Hannah stared at her daughter.
Four-year-olds, apparently, could negotiate with mafia bosses more efficiently than governments.
Forty minutes later, Hannah and Sophie sat in the rear of an armored SUV traveling through the outskirts of Rome.
Adrian rode opposite them with Oliver asleep beside him in a secured infant seat.
Vincent sat in front.
Two vehicles traveled ahead.
Another followed.
Hannah noticed everything.
The tinted windows.
The route changes.
The way Vincent spoke in codes.
The pistol briefly visible beneath his jacket when he reached for his phone.
Her stomach twisted.
Sophie pressed her face to the glass.
“Mommy, look! A castle.”
“It’s probably a church.”
“It looks like a castle.”
“Then it can be a castle.”
Adrian watched them.
Hannah noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That wasn’t nothing.”
He looked away.
“Emily used to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Let ordinary things become whatever she wanted them to be.”
His voice had changed.
The man from first class had vanished for one sentence.
In his place stood a widower remembering his wife.
Hannah softened despite herself.
“You loved her.”
“Yes.”
The answer was immediate.
That, too, surprised her.
Many men would have hidden emotion.
Adrian did not seem ashamed of it.
He seemed angry that emotion existed.
“How long were you married?”
“Four years.”
“And Oliver was your first?”
“Yes.”
Hannah hesitated.
“I’m sorry.”
He looked through the window.
“So am I.”
The villa appeared behind tall stone walls near Frascati.
It was not a house.
It was an estate.
Cypress trees lined the private road.
Terraces stepped down toward vineyards.
The main building was pale stone with dark shutters and balconies wrapped in ivy.
Sophie gasped.
“You really do live in a castle.”
Adrian glanced at Hannah.
“You were right.”
That almost made her smile.
Inside, the villa was warmer than she expected.
No marble mausoleum.
No gold statues.
Books crowded shelves.
Framed photographs sat on tables.
A worn wooden rocking horse rested near the fireplace.
A woman in her sixties hurried from the kitchen and stopped when she saw Oliver.
“Madonna, give me that child.”
Adrian surrendered his son instantly.
Hannah blinked.
The woman kissed Oliver’s head.
Then she scolded Adrian in Italian for something involving his hat.
Vincent translated under his breath.
“She says he’s dressed the baby badly.”
“I understood that much,” Hannah murmured.
The woman finally noticed Hannah and Sophie.
Adrian said, “Hannah Mercer. Her daughter, Sophie.”
The woman smiled.
“Lucia Moretti. I have fed this miserable man since he was seventeen.”
Adrian’s expression tightened.
“You worked for my father.”
“And he was also miserable.”
Sophie whispered to Hannah, “I like her.”
“So do I.”
Lucia heard.
“Good. You have judgment.”
Within thirty minutes Sophie sat at a kitchen table eating pancakes shaped like hearts.
Hannah had showered in a guest room and changed into the cleanest clothes left in her suitcase.
When she returned downstairs, she found Adrian alone in the library.
Oliver slept in a bassinet beside his desk.
A file lay open.
Hannah’s passport photograph was clipped to the first page.
Her blood chilled.
“You investigated me.”
Adrian closed the file.
“Yes.”
“You said I could choose whether to stay.”
“You still can.”
“You ran a background check before I made it upstairs.”
“I began it on the aircraft.”
Hannah stared at him.
“That’s exactly the kind of behavior that makes people afraid of you.”
“Yes.”
The lack of denial made her angrier.
“What did you find?”
“You were a registered nurse in Columbus for five years. Labor and delivery, then private maternity care. No criminal record. No major debt before you married Daniel. Your nursing license is active in Ohio. You stopped working fourteen months after Sophie was born.”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Daniel made it my business when one of his associates waited for you at the airport.”
“My marriage is still none of your business.”
Adrian leaned back.
“Then tell me what is.”
She folded her arms.
“You first. Who was your wife? Really.”
His face closed.
“You saw photos.”
“I mean why would Daniel know something about her death?”
Adrian was silent for a long time.
Then he opened a drawer.
Removed a photograph.
Placed it on the desk.
Emily Vale smiled beside a hospital administrator at a charity gala.
She was brunette, elegant, maybe thirty.
Hannah studied her.
There was something kind in her expression.
“She started a maternal health foundation,” Adrian said. “Prenatal care, postpartum support, shelters for women leaving abusive homes.”
Hannah’s eyes lifted.
Adrian noticed.
“She believed money should solve problems before violence did.”
“That must have created arguments between you.”
A humorless smile touched his mouth.
“Constantly.”
Hannah looked back at the photograph.
“The night she died?”
“She attended a fundraiser. I was supposed to join her. A security issue delayed me.”
“The car was yours?”
“Yes.”
“Who planted the bomb?”
“We believed Bellandi.”
“The people from the airport?”
“A faction connected to them.”
“You said Daniel knew more.”
“Six months after Emily died, my auditors discovered funds moving through three construction subsidiaries. Money disappearing, returning under different names. My uncle Marcus supervised those companies.”
“And Daniel?”
“Daniel was an outside forensic accountant.”
Hannah’s skin prickled.
“He told me he worked in corporate restructuring.”
“He did.”
“So he worked for you?”
“For Marcus.”
Hannah shook her head.
“Daniel never mentioned the name Vale.”
“He had reasons not to.”
“What reasons?”
Adrian opened another folder.
Inside was a grainy security photograph.
Daniel.
Hannah’s husband.
Standing outside a Manhattan hotel.
Beside a man she did not recognize.
And Emily.
Hannah’s fingers went numb.
“When was this?”
“Three days before my wife died.”
“That’s impossible.”
“The timestamp is authentic.”
“Why was Daniel meeting her?”
“I don’t know.”
Hannah looked closer.
Emily seemed upset.
Daniel was holding a folder.
The third man stood half-turned away.
“Who is that?”
“My uncle Marcus.”
The room blurred.
Hannah sat without meaning to.
Daniel had met Emily Vale.
Daniel had never told her.
Daniel had worked for Adrian’s family.
Daniel had been connected to a woman murdered in a car bombing.
And Hannah had spent years sleeping beside him.
“There’s more,” Adrian said.
“I don’t want more.”
“You need to know.”
“No.”
“Hannah.”
She shot to her feet.
“I said no.”
Oliver stirred.
Both adults froze.
The baby made a small sound and settled.
Hannah lowered her voice.
“I came here to escape him. I don’t want his secrets. I don’t want yours. I want to find a job, keep Sophie safe and wake up one morning without wondering what mood my husband is in.”
Adrian stood.
“You deserve that.”
“Don’t tell me what I deserve.”
“Fine.”
“I mean it.”
“So do I.”
Hannah stared at him.
Again, he was not fighting back.
Daniel always fought back.
Daniel could turn a grocery list into a trial.
Adrian simply absorbed her anger.
That made it harder to hate him.
Her phone rang.
Hannah went completely still.
The number was hidden.
She had changed SIM cards.
Only Julia knew the new number.
Adrian saw her face.
“Don’t answer.”
She almost obeyed.
Then rage rose beneath the fear.
For four years Daniel had decided when she spoke.
Not anymore.
Hannah answered.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then breathing.
Her husband’s voice arrived softly.
“Hannie.”
Every muscle in her body locked.
Adrian’s eyes hardened.
Daniel continued.
“You made me chase you halfway across the world.”
Hannah could not speak.
“I’m disappointed.”
Adrian held out his hand for the phone.
She shook her head.
No.
This was hers.
“You’re not getting Sophie.”
Daniel chuckled.
“You think this is about Sophie?”
Hannah’s heart stumbled.
“What does that mean?”
“You took something that belongs to me.”
“I took my daughter.”
“Not her.”
A pause.
“The rabbit.”
Hannah looked toward the kitchen.
Sophie’s stuffed rabbit sat on a chair beside her.
“What about it?”
Daniel’s voice became cold.
“Open the seam behind the left ear.”
The line disconnected.
Hannah stared at the toy.
Adrian was already moving.
“Don’t touch it.”
Vincent entered at a run.
“What happened?”
Adrian pointed.
“Scan the rabbit.”
Sophie looked up from her pancakes.
“That’s Bunny.”
“I know, sweetheart,” Hannah said, forcing calm. “Mr. Vincent just needs to check something.”
Sophie frowned.
“Don’t hurt him.”
Vincent carried the rabbit away like evidence.
Ten minutes later he returned with a small plastic memory card sealed inside a bag.
Hannah stared at it.
“No.”
Vincent placed it on the table.
“MicroSD. Hidden beneath the stitching.”
Adrian’s face became unreadable.
Hannah whispered, “I didn’t know.”
“I believe you.”
“What’s on it?”
Vincent looked at Adrian.
“We need an isolated system.”
Adrian nodded.
Hannah suddenly understood why Daniel had chased them.
Not because he loved her.
Not because he wanted Sophie.
Not even because he wanted control.
He believed Hannah had stolen evidence.
And whatever was hidden inside her daughter’s stuffed rabbit was valuable enough for men to follow them across an ocean.
Adrian looked at Hannah.
“Until we know what’s on that card, you’re not safe.”
She hated that he was right.
“What happens now?”
May you like
His answer was quiet.
“Now we find out why your husband was meeting my wife three days before she died.”
