Chapter 12 - Clare Vanishes
By morning Sebastian could distinguish pressure in both feet.
It should have been the happiest development of his adult life.
Instead, all he could think about was Vittorio’s last sentence.
You still think I was the one giving the orders.
Clare tried to keep him focused.
“You had major surgery yesterday.”
“And someone spent twenty years controlling my life.”
“You can investigate without destroying your recovery.”
“I can do both.”
“No, you can’t.”
He looked at her.
“Do you always argue with patients?”
“Only the stubborn ones.”
Owen appeared carrying a deck of cards.
“Mom says you’re not allowed to be angry because it raises your blood pressure.”
Sebastian stared at Clare.
She tried not to laugh.
Owen climbed into a chair.
“Want to play?”
Sebastian did.
For thirty minutes, Chicago’s feared mafia boss played Go Fish with an eight-year-old.
It was perhaps the strangest thing Clare had ever seen.
And unexpectedly, one of the sweetest.
Later that afternoon Clare left the mansion for the first time in days.
Owen needed clothing.
Sebastian sent security.
She complained.
He ignored her.
The car reached a shopping center.
Clare went inside with one guard.
Twenty minutes later, she disappeared.
Her phone remained in a dressing room.
Her security guard was found unconscious in a service corridor, alive but unable to remember more than being struck from behind.
Sebastian received the news during physical therapy.
He tried to stand from the treatment table.
His legs collapsed immediately.
Carlo caught him.
“Get off me.”
“You can’t stand yet.”
“Find her.”
“We are.”
“Find her!”
The entire mansion mobilized.
Traffic cameras.
Private surveillance.
Police contacts.
Every Lombardi connection.
Owen sat in Sebastian’s study, terrified but trying not to cry.
Sebastian rolled toward him.
“I’m bringing her back.”
Owen looked at him.
“Promise?”
Sebastian stopped.
He had learned long ago not to make promises.
But the boy needed one.
“Yes.”
Owen nodded.
“Okay.”
The abduction vehicle appeared on a toll camera heading toward Indiana.
Adrian traced it to an abandoned rehabilitation center owned through a shell company.
The company belonged to the Lombardi Foundation.
Sofia stared at the paperwork.
“Our mother created that foundation.”
Sebastian’s expression changed.
Their mother, Lucia Lombardi, had died five years earlier.
The revelation landed harder than Vittorio’s betrayal.
Could she have been involved?
Carlo said carefully, “Sebastian…”
“No.”
“You need to consider—”
“No.”
A message arrived.
A live video.
Clare sat in a chair inside a dark room.
Uninjured.
Frightened.
A voice behind the camera said:
“Stop searching the family records.”
Sebastian leaned toward the screen.
“Show your face.”
The speaker laughed.
“You have six hours.”
“For what?”
“To destroy Antonio’s ledger and every copy.”
Clare suddenly looked directly into the camera.
“Don’t.”
The screen went black.
Sebastian closed his eyes.
Then he turned to Adrian.
“Find the building plans.”
They discovered an old underground therapy pool connected to service tunnels.
Carlo knew the property.
“So did your mother,” he said.
Sebastian looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because she used it privately after your accident.”
“For what?”
Carlo hesitated.
“She was trying to find a doctor who could reverse what happened to you.”
Sebastian froze.
His mother had known too.
But instead of helping Vittorio, she had apparently spent years trying to undo the damage.
Adrian interrupted.
“We found a second entrance.”
Sebastian rolled toward the door.
Clare had saved his future.
Now he intended to save hers.
And for the first time in twenty years, Sebastian Lombardi hated his wheelchair not because it made him look weak—
May you like
but because it slowed him down.
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