Chapter 5 - SOPHIA'S PERFECT LITTLE LIE
Vincent had never been a man who tolerated uncertainty.
By the time his private jet landed back in Chicago, three investigators were searching for Emily, two attorneys were drafting emergency motions, and his security chief had traced the anonymous message to a disposable phone purchased in cash.
None of it mattered.
The only thing Vincent could think about was the photograph of the medical report.
Emily was pregnant.
His wife was pregnant, and he had learned about his own child from a stranger.
He replayed the last months in his mind. Emily leaving the dinner table early. Emily declining invitations. Emily standing by the window when he came home after midnight, asking only whether he wanted coffee. He had interpreted her silence as punishment, her distance as resentment, her exhaustion as an attempt to make him feel guilty.
He had never considered that she might be quietly preparing to leave.
At his penthouse office, Sophia waited beside the windows.
She wore a cream sweater and no jewelry, the image of a woman too fragile to endure another disappointment.
“Vincent,” she said softly. “I heard you went to the airport.”
He didn't answer.
“Did you find her?”
“No.”
Sophia reached for his hand.
“I'm sorry she's doing this to you.”
Vincent pulled away.
“Don't.”
Her expression faltered.
“Don't what?”
“Don't talk about Emily as if you know what she's thinking.”
Sophia stared at him. For the first time that morning, her eyes looked less wounded than calculating.
“I've known you longer than she has.”
“And yet you don't know what I'm thinking.”
He dropped the medical report on the table.
“Did you send this to me?”
Sophia looked down.
“What is it?”
“Don't lie to me.”
She read the page, then looked up with tears gathering in her eyes.
“I thought you deserved to know.”
“Who gave it to you?”
“I found it.”
“Where?”
“In the hospital system. I was trying to understand why Emily had been acting so strangely.”
Vincent's voice hardened.
“You accessed my wife's medical records?”
“I was worried about you!”
“You were worried about me?”
Sophia flinched.
“I've spent my entire life watching you give everything to people who don't appreciate you. Your father used you. Your men fear you. Emily—”
“Enough.”
He picked up the report.
“Did you know she was pregnant before I did?”
Sophia's silence answered him.
Vincent felt something inside him turn cold.
“How long?”
“I suspected it.”
“How long, Sophia?”
“Two weeks.”
He stared at her.
For five years, Sophia had been the person he answered first. He had told himself she needed him because the world had been cruel to her. He had excused every interruption, every canceled dinner, every night spent comforting her because he believed loyalty meant never abandoning someone who had once mattered to you.
Now he wondered whether she had ever needed him at all.
“You knew,” he said quietly. “And you let me keep believing Emily was simply angry.”
Sophia began to cry.
“She was going to leave you anyway.”
The words escaped before she could stop them.
Vincent's expression changed.
“What did you say?”
Sophia covered her mouth.
He stepped closer.
“What do you know about Emily's plans?”
“I only heard rumors.”
“From whom?”
She shook her head.
Vincent took out his phone and called his security chief.
“Get me every message Sophia has sent or received in the last thirty days. Every call. Every transfer. Everything.”
Sophia's tears stopped.
“You can't do that to me.”
“I can do whatever I need to do to protect my family.”
“Your family?” she repeated, her voice suddenly sharp. “You mean the woman who abandoned you and the baby she didn't even tell you about?”
Vincent looked at her for a long moment.
“No. I mean the family I failed to protect because I was too busy rescuing you.”
He walked out.
Two hours later, his security chief returned with a report. Sophia had made monthly payments to a private medical foundation for nearly nine years. The foundation's records were incomplete, but one name appeared repeatedly.
Noah Bell.
Vincent sat down slowly.
The name struck something deep in his memory.
Rachel.
A hospital room. His father's voice. A doctor refusing to meet his eyes. A tiny hand disappearing behind a curtain.
He had been twenty-two when his father told him Rachel and the baby were dead. He had spent months grieving in silence, then years burying the memory because every time he asked questions, his father threatened to destroy the people he loved.
Vincent had eventually convinced himself that the past was beyond his control.
Now Sophia's payments suggested otherwise.
He called his father.
Anthony Moretti answered on the second ring.
“Vincent.”
“What happened to Rachel's baby?”
Silence.
Then Anthony said, “Who has been talking to you?”
Vincent's blood chilled.
“You know the child survived.”
“Be careful what you accuse me of.”
“Where is Noah Bell?”
His father exhaled.
“Come to the house. We need to discuss your wife.”
Vincent stood.
“Why my wife?”
“Because Emily has just made a mistake that could cost all of us everything.”
The call ended.
A message arrived seconds later from an unknown number. It contained a photograph of Emily entering the Paris clinic with Julian Cross.
Beneath it were six words.
Your wife knows what you buried.
Vincent stared at the screen.
For the first time, he understood that Emily's departure wasn't merely an attempt to escape a failing marriage.
May you like
Someone had used his past to draw her into a dangerous investigation.
And whoever it was knew exactly how to make him chase her.
