Chapter 1 - THE WRONG NUMBER
Elena Ward had always believed the worst messages were the ones nobody answered.
She was wrong.
Sometimes the worst message was the one answered by a stranger who knew exactly where you were standing.
Rain swept beneath the Bellavere Hotel awning as Elena stared at her phone.
Come to the top-floor lounge. Ask for Roman.
Behind the glass doors, Mason moved through the lobby searching for her.
Vanessa Hale followed several steps behind him.
Elena's first instinct was to leave.
She could order a rideshare, go home, lock the door, cry until morning, then begin figuring out how to separate five years of her life from Mason Carter.
But Mason saw her.
His expression changed.
“Elena!”
She heard him even through the glass.
He pushed through the revolving door.
“Elena, wait.”
She stepped backward.
Vanessa remained inside.
Of course she did.
Vanessa Hale never chased anyone.
People chased her.
“Elena.”
Mason reached her.
Rain darkened the shoulders of his tuxedo.
“Can you please stop acting like this?”
Elena almost laughed.
“Acting like what?”
“Like I murdered someone.”
“You were kissing another woman.”
“It was complicated.”
“It looked remarkably simple.”
“Elena—”
“No.”
That single word surprised both of them.
Mason had spent years training Elena to negotiate against her own feelings.
Whenever she was hurt, she explained.
Whenever he was cruel, she searched for context.
Whenever he forgot something important, she reminded herself how stressful his work was.
Not tonight.
“I left your ring upstairs.”
His face hardened.
“You're seriously ending our engagement over one kiss?”
“One?”
Silence.
There it was.
Elena stared at him.
Mason realized his mistake.
“That's not what I meant.”
“How many?”
“Don't do this here.”
“How many, Mason?”
He glanced toward the hotel doors.
Vanessa was watching.
That answered enough.
Elena turned.
Mason caught her wrist.
“Where are you going?”
Before Elena could respond, a man's voice came from behind them.
“Take your hand off her.”
Mason froze.
Elena turned.
A tall man stood beneath the awning.
Black overcoat.
Dark suit.
No umbrella.
Perhaps forty.
He wasn't particularly loud.
He didn't need to be.
Two other men stood several feet behind him.
Mason released Elena immediately.
That frightened her more than the stranger did.
“Mr. Valenti,” Mason said.
Elena looked between them.
“You know him?”
The stranger's attention remained on Mason.
“Apparently better than you know your fiancée.”
“Former fiancée,” Elena said.
The man's gaze shifted to her.
Something almost resembling amusement touched his expression.
“Roman?”
she asked.
“Yes.”
Her stomach tightened.
“You texted me?”
“You texted me first.”
“That was an accident.”
“Most interesting things are.”
Mason stepped forward.
“Mr. Valenti, this is personal.”
Roman looked at him.
“You put your hand on a woman who told you she was leaving.”
Mason's face reddened.
“I wasn't hurting her.”
Roman's voice remained calm.
“Then it should be very easy not to do it again.”
Elena should have been terrified.
Instead, for the first time that evening, she felt strangely safe.
That probably meant she had officially lost her mind.
“I should go home.”
Roman nodded toward the elevator lobby.
“You should come upstairs first.”
Mason laughed nervously.
“Elena, you don't know who you're talking to.”
Roman's eyes remained on Elena.
“No. She doesn't.”
At least he admitted it.
Mason lowered his voice.
“Roman Valenti isn't someone you follow into private rooms.”
Elena looked at Roman.
“Are you?”
“Usually not.”
That answer was ridiculous enough to almost make her smile.
Then Roman said:
“But tonight someone inside this hotel is waiting for you to leave through the front entrance.”
The humor disappeared.
“What?”
Roman took out his phone.
He showed her a photograph.
A black SUV.
Two men.
Time stamp: four minutes earlier.
“I don't understand.”
“You don't need to yet.”
Mason went pale.
Roman noticed.
So did Elena.
“Mason?”
“I don't know anything about that.”
She had not accused him.
Interesting.
Roman's gaze sharpened.
Then Vanessa finally stepped outside.
“Roman.”
Unlike Mason, she didn't sound frightened.
She sounded irritated.
Roman looked at her.
“Vanessa Hale.”
“Whatever performance you're putting on, Elena doesn't belong in it.”
Elena stared at her.
“I'm standing right here.”
Vanessa barely acknowledged her.
“You have no idea what you're interfering with.”
Roman's expression became almost pleasant.
“I usually do.”
Then his phone vibrated.
He read something.
Looked at Elena.
And asked:
“Was your father's name Daniel Ward?”
Elena stopped breathing.
Nobody had said her father's name tonight.
Daniel Ward had been dead for seventeen years.
“How do you know that?”
Roman didn't answer immediately.
Vanessa did.
“Don't.”
One word.
But fear had entered her voice.
Roman looked toward her.
And Elena suddenly understood that whatever was happening had nothing to do with Mason cheating.
Or perhaps the cheating was simply the smallest piece.
Roman returned his attention to Elena.
“Come upstairs.”
“Why?”
“Because seventeen years ago your father saved my life.”
May you like
Elena stared at him.
“And three days before Daniel Ward died, he gave me something with your name on it.”
