Chapter 3 - Eight Years Ago
Abigail woke the next morning in a bed she did not recognize.
For three seconds, panic took over.
Then she saw the hospital monitor.
The IV.
Isabella asleep in a chair beside the window.
And Matteo standing outside the glass door speaking to a doctor.
Abigail groaned.
She had agreed to an examination.
Not admission.
The doctor had disagreed.
Her blood pressure had been elevated, and the contractions had continued. The baby appeared healthy, but she needed observation.
Abigail reached for her phone.
Twenty-seven missed calls.
Most were from her supervisor.
Three were from her landlord.
One was from an unknown number.
A text sat beneath it.
You should have stayed invisible.
Her stomach turned cold.
The door opened.
Matteo entered.
“You’re awake.”
Abigail locked the phone.
“Unfortunately.”
His eyebrow lifted.
“Most people are happier about that.”
“Most people aren’t imagining the hospital bill.”
“It’s covered.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“Matteo.”
He stopped.
It was the first time she had used his first name.
“Don’t.”
“I own the hotel where you were injured.”
“I had contractions.”
“After my guest assaulted you.”
“Vanessa didn’t cause my entire pregnancy.”
“No. Apparently she only tried to make the last trimester more interesting.”
Abigail almost smiled.
Almost.
Then Matteo noticed her phone.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re a terrible liar.”
“And you’re extremely nosy.”
“Yes.”
The answer came so easily that she looked at him.
Matteo held out his hand.
Abigail hesitated, then showed him the message.
His expression went still.
Not angry.
Still.
She suddenly understood why powerful men feared him.
“Who sent it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Has anyone threatened you before?”
“No.”
“Anyone following you?”
“No.”
“Any connection to Vanessa?”
“I met her yesterday.”
Matteo took out his phone.
Abigail grabbed his wrist.
“Please don’t turn this into something.”
His gaze dropped to her hand.
She released him.
“Someone threatened a pregnant woman less than twelve hours after her name became public,” he said. “It is already something.”
Isabella woke.
“What happened?”
Matteo showed her.
Her sleepiness vanished.
Within an hour, two security men were stationed outside Abigail’s room.
She hated it.
She hated being watched.
She hated feeling important enough to be endangered.
Most of all, she hated the memory the message had awakened.
Eight years earlier.
St. Catherine’s Hospital.
Rain.
Blood.
And a man in a gray suit.
Abigail had almost forgotten him.
Almost.
She had donated blood shortly after midnight.
At approximately two in the morning, while looking for a vending machine, she had taken the wrong hallway.
Two men were arguing near a service elevator.
One was younger.
Terrified.
The other wore an expensive gray suit.
“You were supposed to scare him,” the younger man whispered.
“He changed lanes.”
“There was a girl in the other car.”
“Collateral damage.”
Abigail had frozen around the corner.
The older man handed the younger one an envelope.
“You never saw me.”
Abigail backed away.
Her shoe squeaked.
The conversation stopped.
She ran.
At the time, she had believed the men were discussing some unrelated accident.
Now she remembered something else.
The older man’s voice.
She had heard it again last night.
Richard Sinclair.
Her pulse climbed.
The monitor beside her began beeping faster.
Matteo looked at it.
“What?”
Abigail stared at him.
“Your sister’s crash wasn’t an accident.”
Everything in Matteo’s face disappeared.
Isabella sat upright.
“What did you say?”
Abigail told them.
Every detail she remembered.
The gray suit.
The envelope.
The phrase he changed lanes.
The terrified younger man.
The service elevator.
Matteo did not interrupt once.
When she finished, Isabella looked sick.
“Our father was driving.”
Abigail frowned.
“What?”
Matteo moved toward the window.
“My father, Antonio, was driving Isabella home from a charity event. A truck crossed two lanes and forced their car into a barrier.”
“Your father died?”
“Three days later.”
Abigail covered her mouth.
“I didn’t know.”
“The police called it an accident.”
Matteo turned.
“For eight years.”
His phone rang.
His security chief, Luca.
Matteo answered.
Listened.
Then his gaze moved slowly toward Abigail.
“When?”
Another pause.
“Secure everything.”
He hung up.
“What happened?” Isabella asked.
Matteo looked at Abigail.
“Someone broke into your apartment last night.”
Her face drained.
“What did they take?”
“Nothing obvious.”
“Then why break in?”
“To find something.”
Abigail thought about her tiny apartment.
Secondhand furniture.
Baby clothes from thrift stores.
Bills.
Old photographs.
Then she remembered the shoebox.
After her mother died, Abigail had kept everything from those final months.
Receipts.
Hospital paperwork.
A cheap plastic bracelet from St. Catherine’s.
And something else.
The night of the accident, Abigail had found an object beside the service elevator after the men disappeared.
A silver cuff link.
She had tossed it into her purse without thinking.
Later, it went into the shoebox.
Eight years passed.
She had forgotten it existed.
Until now.
“There’s something in my apartment.”
Matteo stepped closer.
“What?”
“A cuff link.”
His expression sharpened.
“Describe it.”
“Silver. Black stone. Some kind of symbol.”
“What symbol?”
Abigail closed her eyes, searching her memory.
Then drew it with her finger on the blanket.
A circle.
Inside it, two intertwined letters.
R.
S.
Isabella looked at Matteo.
Matteo’s face hardened.
Abigail whispered, “What?”
He answered.
“Richard Sinclair.”
Across town, Richard stood inside Abigail’s ransacked apartment.
A man in gloves shook his head.
“It isn’t here.”
Richard stared at the empty shoebox on the bed.
“Then she moved it.”
“To where?”
Richard looked toward a framed ultrasound photograph sitting on the dresser.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he noticed the name printed on a medical appointment card.
Dr. Emily Carter — Maternal Fetal Medicine.
May you like
Richard smiled without warmth.
“Now we know where she’ll eventually have to go.”
