Chapter 4 - The Price of Protection
By morning, Emma’s apartment had been broken into.
Nothing was stolen.
That was worse.
Her dishes remained stacked in the cupboard. Her old television remained on the stand. Her clothes were still hanging in the closet.
But every photograph had been turned facedown.
Every drawer had been opened.
And on the bedroom wall, written in black paint, were four words:
SING FOR HIM AGAIN.
Emma stood in the doorway with both hands over her mouth.
I watched her from behind.
The apartment was small and clean, with a faded yellow couch and a chipped dining table. A child’s drawing hung on the refrigerator. It showed a stick figure with dark hair beside another stick figure holding a flower.
“Your mother?” I asked.
Emma nodded.
“She loved flowers.”
Vincent checked the windows while my security team searched the building.
“This was a message,” he said.
“I know.”
“They could have taken her.”
“I know.”
I hated those words.
They made me sound calm.
I was not calm.
I was furious.
Morelli had not simply threatened my enemy’s family. He had entered the life of a woman who had done nothing except help my son find his voice.
Emma wiped her face and turned to me.
“I’m not staying at your estate.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No.” Her voice shook. “I know what happens around men like you.”
Vincent’s hand moved toward his weapon.
I stopped him with a glance.
Emma stepped closer.
“My mother spent her whole life afraid of powerful men. Serena spent hers trying to escape them. And now you want to lock me in a mansion with guards and tell me it is safety?”
The words hit harder because there was truth in them.
Oliver stood in the hall outside the apartment, holding the hand of one of my guards. He had insisted on coming when he heard Emma’s home was “hurt.”
He looked at her.
“Don’t go,” he whispered.
Emma froze.
Oliver rarely spoke. Every word still felt fragile, like a bird that might fly away if the room became too loud.
“You know Mommy’s song,” he said. “And I don’t want bad people to hurt you.”
Emma crouched in front of him.
“I don’t want bad people to hurt you either.”
“Then stay,” Oliver said.
Her eyes filled with tears.
I looked away, giving her the dignity of pretending I had not seen.
Finally, Emma nodded.
“Just until this is over.”
I should have told her nothing was ever truly over in my world.
Instead, I said, “As long as you need.”
Back at the estate, I gave Emma the guest suite across from Oliver’s room.
She refused the clothes my staff brought her.
She refused the chef’s elaborate lunch.
She refused a personal assistant.
But when Oliver silently left a toy dinosaur outside her door, she picked it up and held it against her chest for a long time.
That evening, I found her in the nursery wing.
She stood before Serena’s old bedroom door.
I had kept the room locked since Serena died.
No one entered.
Not the housekeepers.
Not Oliver.
Not even me.
“You should not be here,” I said.
Emma turned.
“I’m sorry.”
Her hand rested near the old brass doorknob.
“I used to wonder what happened to her,” she said. “My mother blamed herself for leaving. She believed Serena hated her.”
“She didn’t.”
Emma looked at me.
“How do you know?”
“Because Serena talked about wanting a sister when she was pregnant with Oliver.”
I had forgotten that until now.
One night, Serena had stood beside the nursery window, rubbing her stomach.
I hope he has someone, she had whispered. Someone who remembers where he came from.
At the time, I thought she meant cousins. Friends.
Maybe she meant Claire.
Emma stared at the locked door.
“May I see it?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Her face closed.
I heard Serena’s voice in my memory: You don’t have to control every room, Preston.
I reached into my pocket.
The key had been there for two years.
Heavy.
Unused.
I placed it in Emma’s palm.
“Five minutes,” I said.
She opened the door.
The room smelled faintly of lavender, though that was impossible. Everything was untouched: Serena’s books, her dresses, the framed photograph from our wedding, the silver hairbrush on the vanity.
Emma walked inside slowly.
Then she stopped at the dresser.
“There,” she said.
“What?”
She pointed to the bottom drawer.
I had never opened it.
Inside was a stack of letters tied with blue ribbon.
Each envelope carried a name.
Claire.
And beneath the letters was something else.
A sealed envelope addressed to me.
For Preston—if the past ever finds us.
My hands began to shake.
I opened it.
Inside, Serena had written only one sentence:
If someone named Dante Morelli comes near Oliver, trust no one who tells you he is your enemy.
Vincent read it over my shoulder.
His face went pale.
“Boss,” he said slowly, “that makes no sense.”
Dante Morelli had been my enemy for fifteen years.
But Serena had known something I did not.
And suddenly, the danger surrounding Emma and Oliver was no longer just a threat.
May you like
It was a secret buried inside my own organization.
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