Chapter 6 - The RescueThe farmhouse stood beyond a long gravel road.
No neighbors.
No streetlights.
Only fields and trees.
Dominic watched from a distance.
"We go in quietly."
I nodded.
His men surrounded the property.
Then the lights inside went out.
A scream followed.
"Now."
We moved.
The door opened before we reached it.
A woman stumbled outside.
The nurse.
She was crying.
"They're gone."
Dominic grabbed her arm.
"Where?"
"Basement."
We ran.
The basement was empty.
Except for a small chair.
A child's blanket.
And a photograph.
Marco had expected us.
He had moved the girl.
But the nurse hadn't betrayed us.
She had been helping Sofia.
She explained everything.
Sofia had discovered that Marco was planning to use the children to control Dominic.
She had hidden the girl with the nurse.
Then Marco found them.
The nurse had managed to protect the girl temporarily.
But she had been forced to cooperate.
"Where is my daughter?"
"I don't know."
Dominic looked ready to explode.
Then I noticed something.
A child's drawing on the floor.
A house.
A tree.
A black car.
And a restaurant.
Bellavita.
I picked it up.
"Why would she draw this?"
The nurse stared.
"She told me Daddy would come from the place where he met the woman who saved Adrian."
Dominic looked at me.
The child had remembered me.
We returned to Bellavita.
The restaurant had been closed for days.
Inside, we found another clue.
The old kitchen manager had disappeared.
His apartment contained photographs.
Marco.
The nurse.
Vincent.
And my manager.
I stared.
"My manager?"
Dominic nodded.
"Everyone around us was connected."
The manager had known about the baby's condition.
He had been instructed not to let anyone interfere.
Including me.
That's why he had grabbed my arm that first night.
Not because he was protecting me.
Because he was protecting Marco's plan.
Then we heard a child's voice.
"Daddy?"
Dominic froze.
We followed it.
A storage room.
The door opened.
A little girl stood inside.
Three years old.
Dark hair.
Green eyes.
Silver bracelet.
Dominic dropped to his knees.
"Amelia."
She stared at him.
Then ran.
"Daddy!"
He caught her.
For several seconds, he couldn't speak.
He simply held her.
She touched his face.
"You're real."
Dominic cried.
I looked away.
The moment was too intimate.
Then Amelia pointed toward the hallway.
"Uncle Marco said the baby has to go."
Dominic's expression changed.
"Adrian?"
She nodded.
"He wants your little brother."
"Why?"
"Because he said Daddy will give him everything."
Dominic stood.
"He won't touch my son."
A gunshot cracked through the building.
Everyone froze.
Marco's men had arrived.
We escaped through the back.
Amelia stayed in Dominic's arms.
By the time we reached the car, police were arriving.
The farmhouse was surrounded.
Marco had escaped.
But now we had Amelia.
We had the nurse.
We had evidence.
And we had something Marco hadn't anticipated.
A child who knew where he'd been.
That night, Amelia slept in the safe house.
Dominic sat beside her.
I watched him from the doorway.
"You love her."
He looked at me.
"More than my life."
I smiled.
"Then she needs you alive."
He nodded.
For the first time, Dominic understood that winning wasn't about destroying Marco.
It was about keeping his children safe.
And I realized something too.
May you like
I was falling in love with him.
That terrified me more than any gun ever could.
