Chapter 1 - The Baby Nobody Was Allowed to See
The red wine soaked Clara Hayes's white uniform, spreading across her shoulder and dripping onto the marble floor.
She barely noticed.
The newborn in her arms had begun to cry, and Clara's entire body curved instinctively around the tiny girl, shielding her from the chaos.
“Get that child out of my house!” Vanessa Sterling screamed.
The guests at Sebastian Romano's engagement banquet fell silent.
Vanessa stood beside the head table in a glittering silver gown, her empty wineglass trembling in her hand. Diamonds glittered at her throat, but her face had twisted into something far uglier than anger.
Sebastian rose slowly from his chair.
“Vanessa.”
She turned toward him, immediately changing her expression.
“Darling, you should have seen what she did. She brought a filthy, unidentified baby into our engagement celebration!”
Clara swallowed hard.
“The baby isn't filthy, ma'am. She's only three weeks old.”
“I don't care if she's three hours old! This is a private event!”
The baby cried harder.
Sebastian's expression darkened.
“Enough.”
One word.
In the Romano family, that word could silence an entire room.
Vanessa lowered her glass.
Sebastian approached Clara and looked at the infant wrapped in a pale yellow blanket.
“Is she hurt?”
“No, sir. I kept the wine away from her.”
“Good.”
He hesitated before asking, “Whose child is she?”
Clara looked at him with red-rimmed eyes.
“Please look at her bracelet.”
Sebastian gently lifted the baby's tiny wrist.
A white hospital identification band circled it.
BABY GIRL ROMANO.
His surname.
His fingers suddenly went cold.
Beneath the child's name appeared another line.
MOTHER: ISABELLA MORETTI.
For several seconds, the world seemed to stop.
Isabella.
The woman he had loved before power, before bloodshed, before the Romano family name became both his crown and his prison.
The woman who had disappeared eight months earlier.
The woman Vanessa had told him was dead.
Sebastian stared at the bracelet.
“No.”
Clara's lips trembled.
“Sir—”
“Where did you get her?”
“Isabella gave birth three weeks ago.”
“That is impossible.”
“I wish it were.”
Sebastian looked up sharply.
“Isabella died eight months ago.”
“That is what they wanted you to believe.”
A chair scraped against the floor.
Vanessa rushed forward.
“It's a fake! Anyone can print a hospital bracelet!”
Sebastian stepped between her and Clara.
“Don't come closer.”
Vanessa stopped.
For the first time in their relationship, she looked genuinely afraid of him.
Sebastian carefully lifted the baby into his arms.
The little girl had dark hair, a small nose, and a tiny crease between her eyebrows. When he touched her cheek, her fingers curled around his thumb.
Something inside him broke.
He had imagined holding Isabella's child countless times during their brief, beautiful relationship.
He had never imagined doing it while standing in a ballroom full of strangers, with another woman wearing his engagement ring.
“Hello, sweetheart,” he whispered.
The baby's cries softened.
Sebastian's eyes filled with tears.
“She's mine?”
Clara nodded.
“She is your daughter.”
Vanessa shook her head furiously.
“No! You cannot believe this woman!”
Sebastian looked at her.
“Then explain the hospital bracelet.”
“I don't know!”
Clara reached into her apron and produced a folded letter.
“Isabella asked me to give you this if she couldn't come herself.”
Sebastian opened it.
Sebastian,
If Clara brings our daughter to you, it means I failed to return home.
I need you to know that I never abandoned you. I never chose another man. I never agreed to disappear.
Our daughter deserves to know her father.
And you deserve to know who signed the papers that erased me.
If you want the truth, find the person who authorized my transfer at 2:14 a.m.
Please don't trust the woman wearing your ring.
I still love you.
—Isabella
Sebastian read the last line twice.
Then he looked at Vanessa.
She had gone pale.
“Who authorized Isabella's transfer?” he asked.
Vanessa's eyes filled with tears.
“I was trying to protect you.”
“From what?”
She opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
Clara reached into her apron again and handed him a small photograph.
It showed Isabella in a hospital bed, holding the newborn against her chest.
On the back, in Isabella's handwriting, were seven words:
Ask who signed my death certificate.
Sebastian recognized the name immediately.
His own uncle.
Vincent Romano.
The man who had delivered Isabella's death certificate to him and promised that the family would never forget her.
Sebastian raised his eyes toward the banquet doors.
“Lock down the estate.”
His chief of security, Marco Bellini, immediately reached for his phone.
“No one leaves,” Sebastian continued. “Not until I know who lied to me.”
Vanessa grabbed his arm.
“Sebastian, please. Think about what you're doing!”
He gently removed her hand.
“For eight months, I buried the woman I loved.”
His voice became frighteningly quiet.
“And for three weeks, someone kept my daughter from me.”
He looked down at the baby.
“I'm going to find out why.”
Across the room, Clara noticed something Sebastian had missed.
The hospital bracelet bore a second handwritten notation beneath the transfer number.
TRANSFER AUTHORIZED — V. STERLING.
Vanessa saw Clara looking at it.
Her face drained of color.
May you like
And in that instant, Clara understood that bringing the baby home had not ended the danger.
It had only begun.
