Chapter 3 - DAVID CAME BACK FOR HIS SON
Silana Moretti transformed before Bella’s eyes.
The grieving man who had knelt beside Leo disappeared.
The mafia boss returned.
“Lock the estate.”
His voice sliced through the alarm.
Dominic already had his phone out.
“No vehicles leave. Search every employee. Sweep the east wall and service tunnel.”
Bella held Leo tighter.
“David is here?”
Silana looked at her.
“We don’t know.”
“But the message—”
“Was designed to frighten you.”
“It worked.”
“I can see that.”
Silana walked toward the door.
Bella followed.
“I’m coming.”
“No.”
“That is my room.”
“And this is my security breach.”
“My baby was supposed to be there.”
Silana stopped.
The words changed the atmosphere.
If Leo had remained in the servants’ quarters, whoever entered might have found him.
Silana’s jaw tightened.
“Dominic.”
“Yeah.”
“Bella stays with me.”
Bella almost laughed from panic.
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“You wanted to come.”
“I wanted answers.”
“So do I.”
They crossed the West Wing with four guards surrounding them.
Staff members stood against walls while security searched rooms. Beatatrice was crying silently near the stairs.
When she saw Leo in Bella’s arms, horror crossed her face.
“Bella.”
“I’m sorry.”
Beatatrice covered her mouth.
Silana heard.
“You knew?”
Beatatrice went white.
Bella stepped forward.
“She didn’t know at first. When she found out, she helped me.”
“Why?”
Beatatrice stared at Leo.
“Because a baby is not responsible for the sins of adults.”
Silana said nothing.
That sentence followed them downstairs.
Bella’s small servants’ room had been destroyed.
The mattress was sliced open.
Drawers overturned.
Baby clothes scattered across the floor.
Above Leo’s hidden bassinet, words had been written in red lipstick.
DAVID WANTS HIS SON.
Bella’s knees weakened.
Silana caught her elbow.
She pulled away automatically.
“I’m fine.”
“You’re shaking.”
“Someone came into the room where my baby sleeps. I’m allowed to shake.”
He accepted the rebuke.
Dominic crouched near the window.
“No forced entry.”
“Inside job?” Silana asked.
“Possibly.”
A guard approached holding an envelope.
“Found under the mattress.”
Bella stared at it.
“That isn’t mine.”
Silana took the envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
David.
Recent.
He stood in front of a Chicago newspaper kiosk.
The date printed on the newspaper was yesterday.
Bella’s vision blurred.
“He’s alive.”
“You thought otherwise?” Silana asked.
“I didn’t know.”
She stared at David’s face.
He looked older.
Harder.
But unmistakably alive.
There was writing on the back.
Silana read silently.
Bella demanded, “What does it say?”
He hesitated.
“Tell me.”
He handed her the photograph.
You chose the wrong family to hide with.
Bring Leo to the old apartment Friday at midnight.
Come alone.
Or Moretti learns what you did.
Bella read it twice.
“What I did?”
Silana watched her carefully.
“I don’t know what that means.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Yes.”
The answer came so quickly that Silana seemed surprised.
Bella’s eyes filled with angry tears.
“I have spent eight months working sixteen-hour days, hiding my baby inside laundry carts, sleeping with a chair under my doorknob, and wondering if the father of my child was dead. So yes, Mr. Moretti, I expect you to believe me when I say I don’t know what David is talking about.”
Silana studied her.
Then nodded once.
“I believe you.”
Dominic looked surprised.
Bella did too.
“Why?”
“Because fear is difficult to fake when someone threatens your child.”
Silana looked at the photograph again.
“And I know what a guilty person looks like.”
The words carried weight.
Bella realized he was thinking about Lorenzo.
Dominic’s phone buzzed.
“We found something else.”
They followed him to the security room.
Footage from the servants’ hallway appeared across six monitors.
At 9:14 that morning, a figure in maintenance coveralls entered Bella’s room.
The face was hidden beneath a baseball cap.
At 9:18, the figure emerged.
Bella leaned closer.
“Stop.”
Dominic froze the frame.
“What?”
“The hand.”
The intruder’s sleeve had ridden up.
A tattoo showed near the wrist.
A small black compass.
Bella’s stomach turned.
“David.”
Silana looked at her.
“You’re certain?”
“I watched him get that tattoo on his twenty-first birthday.”
Dominic replayed the footage.
David had walked into the Moretti estate during a high-level security lockdown.
Silana’s expression darkened.
“How did he get through the gate?”
Nobody answered.
That was the terrifying part.
Someone had helped him.
Dominic pulled the employee access logs.
A temporary maintenance badge had been activated at 8:57.
The authorization came from an internal executive account.
Silana’s.
Dominic slowly turned.
“Your credentials.”
Silana’s eyes went cold.
“Impossible.”
“Someone copied them.”
Bella whispered, “Someone close to you.”
Silana looked toward the ceiling camera.
“Yes.”
The search continued for hours.
Leo eventually fell asleep in Bella’s arms.
Silana ordered a bedroom prepared for them in the main house.
Not the servants’ wing.
Bella protested.
“You’re placing us closer to yourself?”
“That is where my security is strongest.”
“You’re the person David is hiding from.”
“Which means he’ll assume you’re afraid of me.”
“I am afraid of you.”
Silana paused.
“That makes two of us.”
Bella frowned.
He looked at Leo.
Silana did not explain.
That evening, Bella sat beside the enormous guest-room bed while Leo slept inside a borrowed crib.
Someone knocked.
Silana entered carrying a baby monitor.
Bella raised an eyebrow.
“I thought children were forbidden here.”
“They were.”
“Past tense?”
He placed the monitor down.
“This house has had more armed surveillance than some federal buildings, and somehow an eight-month-old escaped a linen closet, crossed thirty feet of hallway, and interrupted an execution.”
Bella stared.
“Was Lorenzo going to die?”
Silana’s face closed.
“He was going to answer questions.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“No.”
Bella understood the boundary.
Silana moved toward the door.
“Why did you hate children?”
The question stopped him.
Silana remained facing away.
“I didn’t.”
“Everyone says you do.”
“Everyone says many things.”
He turned slightly.
“After Isabella and Matteo died, I couldn’t listen to children laugh without remembering what I would never hear again.”
Bella’s anger softened.
“I’m sorry.”
This time, he let her say it.
Before he could leave, Leo stirred.
His eyes opened.
He saw Silana.
A sleepy smile appeared.
Leo lifted both arms.
Silana froze.
Bella nearly smiled.
“He wants you to pick him up.”
“I understood the gesture.”
“You look terrified.”
“I have negotiated with Colombian cartels.”
“And?”
“This is worse.”
Bella carefully lifted Leo and placed him against Silana’s chest.
Silana stood rigid.
“Support his neck.”
“He is eight months old.”
“Then support his ego.”
Bella laughed before she could stop herself.
Silana stared at her.
It might have been the first laugh the mansion had heard in years.
Then Leo grabbed Silana’s tie and drooled on it.
Silana looked down.
“My tie cost seven hundred dollars.”
“He doesn’t respect capitalism.”
For one moment, Silana smiled.
Then the lights died.
The entire mansion plunged into darkness.
Bella shot to her feet.
Silana immediately pulled Leo against his chest and reached inside his jacket.
Gunfire cracked somewhere outside.
Men shouted.
Emergency lights flashed red.
Dominic’s voice came through the hallway.
“Boss! We have a breach!”
Silana shoved Bella behind him.
A window shattered downstairs.
Then Bella’s phone illuminated on the nightstand.
An unknown number.
One message.
She opened it.
A photograph loaded.
It showed Bella standing in that very bedroom.
Taken from outside the window.
May you like
Beneath it were six words.
I CAN SEE MY SON, BELLA.
