Chapter 3 - THE DRIVE TO ST. CATHERINE'SThe black armored SUV cut through the rainy Chicago streets with terrifying speed, its siren-less escort clearing traffic effortlessly.
In the backseat, the interior was bathed in the soft amber glow of the dashboard. I sat rigid against the leather upholstery, staring out the window at the rain streaks blurring the neon city lights. My mind was spinning violently.
Three years ago.
St. Jude’s Hospital downtown.
The gray, sterile room where the doctor had told me my newborn baby girl had stopped breathing in the middle of the night—a sudden, unexplained crib death that had broken my marriage, shattered my soul, and left Daniel and me drowning in grief.
I had never told a soul at the Moretti estate about it. I was just Rachel Bennett, the quiet twenty-six-year-old maid who cleaned the library and polished silver.
“You're shaking,” Luca said softly from beside me. He hadn't spoken since we left the mansion. He sat with his elbows resting on his knees, his jaw clenched so tightly a muscle twitched near his temple.
“How could he know, Mr. Moretti?” I whispered, turning to look at him. In the dim light, the sharp angles of his face looked carved from stone. “Daniel and I never talked about it with anyone outside our family. We couldn't afford grief counseling. We just... we tried to survive. Why would my husband be chasing a car leaving your estate tonight, talking about our baby?”
Luca didn't answer immediately. He stared straight ahead at the driver’s partition, his fingers rhythmically tapping against his wedding band—a platinum band he had worn for years, though nobody in society knew who his late wife had been, or why he lived alone in that massive fortress.
“Because,” Luca said finally, his voice thick with a dark, suppressed fury, “three years ago, Vanessa’s family handled the private endowments and administrative restructuring for St. Jude’s Hospital.”
My breath caught in my throat. “What?”
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“And three years ago,” Luca continued, turning his dark eyes toward me, “my security detail intercepted a financial discrepancy involving infant care records at that exact hospital. But we never found the missing files. Until tonight.”
The SUV slowed to a halt outside the emergency entrance of St. Catherine’s Memorial. Before the vehicle had even fully stopped, Marcus yanked open the door.
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