Chapter 2 - The Name in the Watch
The silence in the study was absolute.
I sat frozen in the leather chair, clutching my freshly bandaged wrist. The throbbing pain in my arm was entirely eclipsed by the suffocating tension in the room. Luca Moretti stood behind his massive oak desk, perfectly still, his dark eyes locked onto the man in the gray suit.
"Say that again," Luca ordered. His voice didn't rise. It didn't need to. The quiet authority in his tone was far more terrifying than a shout.
The fake photographer, Wallace—whose real name, I had just learned, was Marcus—swallowed hard. A bead of sweat traced a jagged path down his temple.
"Vanessa didn't hire me to steal the watch, Mr. Moretti," Marcus repeated, his voice shaking. "She hired me to find out if the man named inside it was still breathing. Elias Thorne. When I did the legwork and found out he was alive, she panicked. She offered me fifty thousand dollars in cash to intercept the watch today so you would never find the paper inside."
Luca looked down at the tiny, yellowed square of paper resting on his blotter.
Elias Thorne.
Even as a housekeeper who tried to remain invisible, I knew that name. Every servant in the Moretti household knew not to mention it. Eleven years ago, Elias Thorne, the former underboss and closest confidant to Luca’s late father, had supposedly died in a catastrophic car bombing on the South Side. The same bombing that had taken the life of Luca’s older brother, Matteo.
"Where is he?" Luca asked, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.
"The address on the paper," Marcus said frantically, gesturing to the desk. "It’s an old, abandoned tailor shop in the West Loop. But Mr. Moretti, you have to understand, Miss Bellini warned me. She said if her father found out Elias was alive, the streets would run with blood."
Luca didn't flinch. He didn't look at his security chief, Daniel, who was standing rigidly by the door. Instead, Luca’s gaze shifted to me.
For the first time all night, I saw a fracture in his iron composure. It was a look of profound, isolating betrayal. His fiancée had lied to him. She had paid a stranger to bury the ghost of his family’s greatest tragedy.
"Daniel," Luca said softly, never taking his eyes off me. "Take Mr. Marcus to the holding room in the basement. Remove his phone. He speaks to no one."
"Yes, Boss," Daniel said, stepping forward and gripping Marcus by the collar.
As the heavy study doors clicked shut behind them, leaving us entirely alone, I finally allowed myself to exhale. I stood up, smoothing the front of my white housekeeping apron, terrified of overstepping.
"I should get back to the kitchen, sir," I whispered, my voice trembling. "Mrs. Carter will be looking for me to serve the dessert."
"You aren't serving dessert tonight, Hannah."
Luca rounded the desk. He didn't move like a wealthy heir preparing for a wedding. He moved like a soldier preparing for a war. He opened a lower drawer and pulled out a heavy, matte-black handgun, expertly checking the magazine before sliding it into a shoulder holster beneath his tailored jacket.
My breath caught in my throat. I took a step back, my spine hitting the mahogany bookshelf.
"Mr. Moretti, please," I stammered, thinking of my father sitting in his small, drafty apartment, waiting for me to bring home my paycheck for his heart medication. "I didn't see anything. I won't say a word. I just need this job."
Luca stopped. He looked at me, really looked at me, and his expression softened just a fraction. He noticed my trembling hands. He noticed the frayed cuffs of my uniform, mended too many times.
"You aren't losing your job, Hannah," he said quietly. "But I need you to come with me."
"Where?"
"To the West Loop. To the address on that paper."
I shook my head frantically. "Sir, I can't. I'm just a maid. I don't belong in whatever this is."
"My fiancée just lied to my face," Luca said, stepping closer. "My head of security stood by the door and let a stranger walk into my home to steal my family's legacy. Right now, the only person in this entire house I know I can trust is the woman who took physical bruises to protect a watch that didn't even belong to her."
He reached out and gently touched the edge of my white bandage.
"I need someone watching my back who isn't on my payroll for violence," he said. "Will you help me?"
I looked into his eyes. There was no intimidation there. Only a desperate, quiet plea from a man who had just realized he was completely surrounded by enemies.
I thought of my father. I thought of the courage he had always tried to instill in me.
"Let me get my coat," I whispered.
Twenty minutes later, we were entirely off the grid. Luca had bypassed his usual armored SUV and taken a nondescript black sedan from the overflow garage. He drove in complete silence, the neon lights of the Chicago skyline reflecting off the wet pavement.
The address Marcus had provided was deep in the industrial sector, a place where the streetlights were shattered and the buildings were hollowed-out husks of brick and rusted iron.
Luca parked the car three blocks away in a dark alley.
"Stay close to me," he murmured, killing the engine.
We walked through the freezing rain. My thin wool coat did little to stop the chill, but the adrenaline pumping through my veins kept me entirely numb. We stopped in front of a crumbling storefront. Faded gold lettering on the cracked glass read: Thorne & Sons Tailoring.
The front door was heavily padlocked.
Luca didn't hesitate. He guided us to the narrow alleyway beside the building. He bypassed the heavy iron gate and found a rusted service door. He withdrew a small set of lock picks from his pocket. Within seconds, the door clicked open.
We stepped into total darkness.
The air smelled of damp wool, dust, and something else. Something metallic and sharp.
Luca clicked on a small tactical flashlight. The beam cut through the gloom, revealing overturned tables, shattered mirrors, and ruined bolts of fabric.
But it wasn't abandoned.
There was a fresh footprint in the dust. A heavy boot.
"Someone was just here," Luca whispered, drawing his weapon.
We moved silently toward the back office. The door was hanging off its hinges. Luca stepped inside first, sweeping the room with his flashlight. It was empty. But draped over the back of a wooden chair was a heavy, dark velvet coat.
I stepped closer, my heart pounding. The coat was beautiful, expensive, and completely out of place in this ruin.
"Look," I whispered, pointing to the collar.
There was a fresh, dark smear of blood on the velvet.
Luca’s jaw tightened. He reached into the deep pocket of the coat and pulled out a heavy silver locket on a broken chain. He pressed the small latch on the side.
The locket sprang open.
I leaned in to look. Inside, there wasn't a picture of Elias Thorne. There was a photograph of a little boy, no older than seven, with dark, curly hair and striking green eyes.
But it was the inscription etched into the silver opposite the photo that made Luca stop breathing.
To my grandson, Leo. The true heir.
"Leo," Luca breathed, staring at the picture. "My brother's son. He didn't die in the blast. He's alive."
Before I could even process the revelation, a chilling sound echoed through the darkness of the tailor shop.
The unmistakable, heavy clack-clack of a pump-action shotgun being chambered.
I froze. Luca immediately pushed me behind his broad shoulders, raising his handgun toward the shadows in the corner of the room.
May you like
From the absolute darkness, a tiny, trembling voice called out.
"Grandpa," the little boy said, his voice echoing in the empty shop. "They found us."
