Chapter 3 - THE SILVER LOCKET
“That’s impossible.”
The words tasted like ash in my mouth. I backed away from the locket on the floor, shaking my head violently. “That’s a mistake. Emma is my daughter. I carried her. I gave birth to her.”
Dante bent down and retrieved the silver necklace, closing the clasp with a sharp, metallic click. His eyes were unreadable, calculating.
“I know you did, Anna,” Dante said, his voice a low rumble beneath the chaos of the security guards securing the ballroom. “My medical team checked your background before you were hired. You are her biological mother.”
“Then how is my husband in a picture with your fiancée, holding a baby with my daughter's exact birthmark?” I demanded, hysteria edging into my tone.
Dante didn’t answer immediately. He looked past me, signaling to his head of security.
“Get them to the bunker,” Dante ordered. “Sweep the house. Bring me Celeste alive.”
Two men flanked us, urging me forward. I grabbed Emma’s hand, holding it so tightly she squeaked. We were ushered through a hidden panel behind the grand staircase, descending deep into the bedrock beneath the Valenti estate.
The bunker was a fortified office, walls lined with steel and heavy mahogany. It smelled of gun oil, aged bourbon, and secrets.
Dante walked in moments later, shedding his suit jacket. His white shirt was stained with dust and a few drops of blood. Not his own.
He locked the heavy steel door, isolating us from the rest of the world.
He walked to a heavy oak desk, poured a glass of amber liquid, and drank it in one swallow. Then, he turned to face me.
“Michael Carter wasn’t just your husband,” Dante said bluntly. The absolute lack of emotion in his voice was terrifying. “He was an enforcer for my father. Twelve years ago, he was caught stealing from the family accounts. He supposedly died in a shootout trying to escape. I attended his closed-casket funeral myself.”
I slumped into a leather armchair, pulling Emma onto my lap.
“You’re lying,” I whispered. “Michael was an accountant. A normal man. We met at a coffee shop. We had a normal life.”
“You had a cover identity,” Dante corrected softly. “And from what I am looking at, it seems Celeste helped him build it.”
Dante tossed the silver locket onto the desk.
“Celeste was pregnant ten years ago,” Dante explained, pacing the room. “She lost the child. Complications. The doctors told her she could never have another one. She was desperate. Obsessed.”
My mind raced, connecting terrifying, impossible dots.
“Michael faked his death,” Dante continued, his dark eyes locking onto mine. “He went into hiding. But he stayed in contact with Celeste. He was her lover before I ever met her. She must have paid him to find a woman. A surrogate.”
The room began to spin.
“He didn’t just meet you, Anna,” Dante said, his voice softening, filled with a pity that cut deeper than a knife. “He targeted you. You were young, healthy, alone. He married you to get you pregnant. He was going to take the baby and give it to Celeste.”
Tears spilled down my cheeks. My entire life—the romance, the vows, the family we built—was a transaction. I was a vessel. A pawn in a sick game played by billionaires and ghosts.
“But he didn’t give her to Celeste,” I choked out, holding Emma tighter. “He stayed with us for three years.”
Dante stopped pacing. He looked at Emma.
“Yes,” Dante murmured. “He must have fallen in love with you. Or with the child. He couldn't go through with it. That’s why he disappeared four years ago. Not because he abandoned you. Because Celeste finally found out where he was hiding, and he had to run to lead her away from you.”
Before I could process the magnitude of the betrayal, a sharp knock hit the steel door.
Dante hit a button on his desk. The door slid open.
His security chief walked in, holding a bloodied, bruised man by the collar of his tactical vest. It was one of the snipers from the ballroom.
Dante’s demeanor shifted instantly. The gentle protector vanished, replaced by the apex predator of Boston.
He walked up to the bleeding man. He didn’t yell. He didn’t posture.
“Where did she go?” Dante asked, his voice barely a whisper.
The man spat blood onto the floor. “You’re dead, Valenti. She’s taking the entire trust. The transfer is happening tomorrow at noon.”
Dante grabbed the man by the throat, lifting him an inch off the ground with terrifying ease.
“The Valenti trust requires a biometric signature and a blood heir,” Dante hissed. “Celeste doesn’t have either.”
The man choked out a dark, broken laugh. “She doesn’t need you. She has the blood heir. She has the true Valenti.”
Dante dropped the man. He stepped back, his face turning pale.
He turned slowly to his desk. To a heavy iron safe embedded in the wall.
He spun the dial, opened the heavy door, and pulled out a velvet box. He tossed it onto the desk.
The box flipped open.
Inside rested a tarnished, vintage silver watch.
I let out a ragged breath.
“That’s Michael’s watch,” I whispered, standing up, my legs shaking. “I buried that watch in his empty casket. The police gave it to me.”
Dante looked at me, a profound sorrow in his dark eyes.
“You didn’t bury this, Anna,” Dante said heavily. “I took this off his wrist twelve years ago.”
“Why?” I asked, terror gripping my heart.
“Because Michael Carter wasn’t just my father’s enforcer,” Dante confessed, his voice breaking. “He was my father’s biological son. My brother.”
I stared at Emma.
Emma wasn’t just a maid’s daughter.
She was the true heir to the Valenti empire.
And now, I noticed something else in the safe. Sitting right beside the watch.
May you like
A train ticket.
Dated for tomorrow. Stamped with Michael Carter’s name.
