Chapter 2 - The Name Buried Beneath the Mansion
The ring had rested against my skin for twenty-two years.
It was scratched.
Heavy.
Dark with age.
Three tiny stars surrounded a crowned wolf etched into the silver.
Adrian saw it.
And went pale.
That frightened me.
Adrian Moretti did not go pale.
Not when doctors told him he might never walk normally again.
Not when armed men surrounded his house.
Not even when bullets shattered windows downstairs.
But one old silver ring almost emptied the blood from his face.
"Where did you get that?"
"My father."
"Who was your father?"
Gunfire erupted outside again.
One of Adrian's guards moved toward him.
"Boss, we need to get underground."
Adrian didn't look away from me.
"Thirty seconds."
"Adrian—"
"My real name isn't Melissa Hart."
His eyes sharpened.
I swallowed.
"My name is Melissa Romano."
Silence.
The surname moved through the room like a gunshot.
One guard actually whispered, "Jesus."
Adrian didn't.
He simply stared at me.
"Gabriel Romano," he said slowly.
"My father."
Another explosion shook the building.
Adrian looked toward the passage.
"Move."
I ran upstairs first.
Our son was crying in the arms of his nurse.
I took him.
"Stay close."
Adrian reached us moments later, two guards maneuvering his chair.
We entered the hidden passage.
The bookshelf closed behind us.
Emergency lights flickered along stone walls.
For the first time in decades, I was inside the tunnel where my mother had carried me away from death.
My body remembered before my mind did.
Smoke.
Screams.
My mother's heartbeat against my ear.
"Melissa."
Adrian's voice pulled me back.
"Tell me."
I held our son closer.
"I was six."
The tunnel descended beneath the mansion.
"I remember waking because men were shouting downstairs. My mother came into my room barefoot. There was blood on her nightgown, but it wasn't hers."
Adrian said nothing.
"My father appeared behind her. Gabriel Romano."
I could still see him.
Thirty-eight years old.
Strong.
Terrified.
Trying not to show it.
"He gave my mother this ring."
I touched the silver crest.
"He told her to take me through the tunnel. She asked him to come."
"What did he say?"
"That he'd hold them off."
Adrian closed his eyes briefly.
"I never saw him again."
Our son stirred against my chest.
I kissed his forehead.
"Victor Salazar was my father's lieutenant. He wanted his territory, his political connections, his businesses. He sold him out."
"Salazar disappeared years ago."
"My mother never believed he was dead."
"You lived under another name because of him?"
"Several names."
Ohio.
Colorado.
Arizona.
Oregon.
Different apartments.
Different schools.
Different versions of my mother.
Every few years she would hear a rumor that somebody was asking about survivors of the Romano family.
Then we moved.
"Why come back to Chicago?" Adrian asked.
"My mother's oncologist."
"You could have taken her anywhere."
"Not when we came back. We had no money."
His gaze hardened.
"And that's when you entered the surrogacy arrangement."
"I didn't know the intended father was you until after the preliminary screening."
"But once you knew?"
"I stayed."
"Five million dollars was enough to make you forget your family history?"
Anger sparked.
"I was six when my father died. My mother never told me the Morettis were involved in anything."
His expression changed.
Not guilt.
Something close.
Before I could ask, the tunnel opened into a reinforced safe room.
Banks of monitors lined one wall.
Weapons cabinets occupied another.
The nurse settled our son into a bassinet.
Adrian immediately checked the screens.
Masked men moved through the rain outside.
"Who are they?" he demanded.
A guard enlarged a camera feed.
"I don't recognize them."
"I might."
Everyone turned.
"Look behind the left ear."
The image zoomed.
One attacker turned his head.
A serpent tattoo curved behind his ear.
My stomach dropped.
"Salazar."
Adrian looked at me.
"Victor?"
"His men used that mark."
Another guard typed rapidly.
"We have facial recognition on one."
A photograph appeared.
Javier Salazar.
Victor's son.
I felt cold.
"They found me."
Adrian looked toward our baby.
"No."
"What?"
"They found us."
The distinction landed heavily.
Our son started crying.
Adrian extended both arms.
"Give him here."
I hesitated.
Why?
I had trusted him with the baby a hundred times.
Yet tonight everything felt different.
My name.
My father.
His family.
Still, I placed our child in Adrian's arms.
He settled instantly.
Adrian looked down at him.
The tattooed fingers that had probably terrified countless men moved gently over the baby's blanket.
I stared.
Then another question surfaced.
"When I said my father's name..."
Adrian looked up.
"You knew him."
"No."
"You're lying."
His jaw tightened.
"I knew of him."
"That's not what I saw."
"Melissa."
"My father died protecting someone that night."
The safe room became still.
"My mother told me years later. He had almost escaped. Then he heard that a boy was still trapped near the courtyard."
Adrian's eyes lowered.
"A wounded boy."
My heartbeat changed.
"She hated that child for years."
His fingers stopped against the blanket.
"Why?"
"Because my father went back for him."
Adrian closed his eyes.
No.
The thought came before I could stop it.
"No."
He looked at me.
"I was eleven."
The room disappeared.
"What?"
"My father took me to the Romano estate that evening. It was supposed to be a business gathering."
"No."
"When the shooting started, I was hit."
His hand moved unconsciously toward his ribs.
"I crawled behind the courtyard wall."
"Stop."
"A man found me."
I shook my head.
"Adrian."
"He carried me."
Tears blurred my vision.
"He was already wounded. I remember blood on his shirt."
My knees weakened.
"He took me through part of this tunnel."
"No."
"He could have escaped."
His voice cracked.
"But he went back."
Our son whimpered softly between us.
"The boy," I whispered.
Adrian nodded.
"Was me."
I couldn't breathe.
For twenty-two years, my father's death had been a black hole in my life.
Now the man sitting ten feet away from me had been there.
Not as an enemy.
As a child.
A child my father had chosen to save.
"My father died for you."
"Yes."
The word broke something open inside him.
Adrian looked down.
"My entire life, I wondered why."
"Why what?"
"Why Gabriel Romano returned for a boy who wasn't his."
"Because he couldn't leave you."
"That simple?"
"To him, probably."
Adrian laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
"I've spent half my life building power because I thought being powerless was what killed people."
He looked toward the baby.
"Your father proved something different."
An alarm sounded.
A guard leaned toward one monitor.
"Vehicle approaching the west perimeter."
A black sedan stopped outside the gate.
The rear door opened.
An older man stepped out.
Gray hair.
Black coat.
Silver-headed cane.
I stopped breathing.
Age had altered his face.
Not his eyes.
My mother's nightmares had given those eyes to me so many times that I knew them instantly.
"Victor."
Adrian stared at the monitor.
"Victor Salazar?"
"Yes."
Victor walked into the rain without an umbrella.
He looked directly at the nearest camera.
Then smiled.
The safe-room speaker crackled.
"Melissa Romano."
My son moved against Adrian's chest.
Victor's voice hadn't changed as much as his face.
Smooth.
Confident.
Cruel.
"I know you're inside."
Adrian's expression became murderous.
Victor continued.
"Twenty-two years. Your mother hid you better than I expected."
My fingers dug into the edge of the table.
"What do you want?"
Victor smiled toward the camera.
"The same thing your father stole from me."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh, you do."
"No."
His smile widened.
"Bring me Gabriel Romano's grandson."
My entire body went cold.
Adrian pulled the baby tighter against his chest.
Victor raised one finger.
"And perhaps I'll let Evelyn live."
"Mom?"
I lunged toward the monitor.
The image changed.
My mother appeared on screen.
She sat in a hospital wheelchair.
A gun pressed against the side of her head.
"No."
Her face was pale.
Weak.
Terrified.
Alive.
"Mom!"
She looked toward the camera.
"Melissa!"
The man holding the weapon stepped into better light.
I recognized him.
So did Adrian.
Daniel Rusk.
One of Adrian's own security officers.
The man who had stood outside the nursery every night.
Adrian's voice dropped to something deadly.
"Daniel."
Victor chuckled through the speaker.
"You really should pay your employees better, Adrian."
Daniel smiled.
I felt sick.
Victor leaned closer to the camera.
"You have ten minutes."
The screen went black.
My mother was in Victor's hands.
Our son was being hunted.
And somewhere inside Adrian Moretti's mansion was at least one traitor who had been watching us sleep.
Then Adrian said the words that made the situation even worse.
May you like
"Daniel couldn't have done this alone."
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