Chapter 4 - THE SECOND CRIB
The penthouse living room felt suddenly devoid of oxygen.
I stared at the crayon drawing of the little girl with the pink bow. The plastic hospital bracelet in my other hand felt like it was burning a hole through my palm.
Baby Girl Varelli.
“A sister?” Dominic’s voice was barely a whisper. He stepped closer to Leo, dropping to one knee to be at eye level with his son. “Leo, what are you talking about? You don’t have a sister.”
Leo frowned, his small brow furrowing in confusion. He pointed a chubby finger at the drawing. “Yes I do, Daddy. Mia. She used to sleep in the second crib. But the mean lady with the silver cane took her in the night. Mommy cried and cried.”
Dominic went completely rigid. He looked up at me, his gray eyes wide with a terror I had never seen in him before.
“Clara,” Dominic pleaded, his voice cracking. “Tell me he’s making this up. Tell me my mother didn’t steal a child I never knew existed.”
I closed my eyes. The blinding pain in my skull returned, sharper this time.
Another memory.
The safe house during the hurricane. The agonizing pain of labor. Dominic holding my hand, kissing my forehead. The cry of a baby boy. Leo.
But then… the pain didn’t stop. The midwife looking panicked.
“There’s another one,” she had shouted over the thunder.
Ten minutes later, a second cry. A tiny girl with a mop of dark curls.
Then, the door bursting open. Beatrice walking in, her silver cane tapping against the wooden floorboards. She looked at the two bundles in my arms with pure disgust.
“One heir is enough to secure the bloodline,” Beatrice had sneered. “The girl will only weaken him. Take her.”
Her guards ripping the screaming baby girl from my arms. Dominic wasn’t there. He had gone out into the storm to flag down the ambulance.
I opened my eyes, gasping for breath. Tears cascaded down my cheeks.
“She took her,” I sobbed, collapsing onto the sofa. “Oh my god, Dominic. I had twins. I had a little girl. Beatrice took her while you were outside.”
Dominic stood up slowly. The grief and shock vanished, replaced instantly by a cold, calculating, and utterly lethal rage. The mafia boss had returned.
“She stole my daughter,” Dominic said, his voice eerily calm. “She stole my daughter, and then she tried to murder you to keep the secret buried.”
He turned on his heel, pulling his phone from his pocket. “Marcus!” he bellowed toward the hallway.
Seconds later, the head of security rushed into the room, his gun drawn. “Boss?”
“Lock down the building,” Dominic ordered, his eyes dark and empty. “No one gets in or out. I want every man we have on the streets hunting my mother. I want her found alive. Do you understand me? Alive.”
“Understood,” Marcus said, though he looked confused. “What happened?”
“She has my daughter,” Dominic said.
Marcus blinked, his professional mask slipping for a fraction of a second. “Your… daughter, sir?”
“Just do it!” Dominic roared.
Marcus nodded sharply and rushed out, barking orders into his radio.
I looked down at the tiny gold compass pendant resting against my chest. The pendant Dominic had given me on our wedding day.
The key opens a safety deposit box at the First National, Dominic had said.
“Dominic,” I said, standing up, my legs shaking. “The safety deposit box. The one this key opens.”
Dominic turned to me, his chest heaving. “What about it?”
“When I woke up in the hospital in Portland, Dr. Vance told me I was found wandering near a highway,” I explained, my mind racing to connect the pieces of my fractured memory. “But the police gave me this necklace. They said it was clutched so tightly in my fist they had to pry my fingers open.”
Dominic stared at the tiny gold key.
“If Beatrice tried to kill me,” I continued, my voice gaining strength, “maybe I knew something. Maybe I put something in that box before she ran me off the road. Something to protect the babies.”
Dominic didn’t hesitate. He walked over to a secure wall safe, punched in a code, and pulled out two heavy, matte-black handguns. He tucked one into his shoulder holster and offered the other to me.
“Do you remember how to use this?” he asked.
I stared at the weapon. A terrifyingly clear memory of Dominic standing behind me at a firing range, his hands guiding mine, flashed in my mind.
I took the gun. It felt heavy, cold, and entirely familiar.
“Yes,” I said.
“Good,” Dominic said. He looked at Leo. “Leo, go with Aunt Rosa to the panic room. Lock the steel door. Do not open it for anyone but me or your mother.”
Leo nodded bravely, grabbing his drawing and running toward the nanny’s quarters.
Ten minutes later, we were in the back of a bulletproof SUV, tearing through the rain-slicked streets of Boston. The storm was worsening, lightning flashing across the sky, echoing the hurricane from six years ago.
We arrived at the First National Bank, a massive, brutalist stone building in the financial district. It was past midnight, but Dominic Varelli didn’t wait for business hours.
His men shattered the glass front doors and held the terrified night watchman at gunpoint while Dominic and I descended into the subterranean vault.
The air was cold and smelled of old paper and steel.
We found box number 814. My birthday. August 14th.
My hands were shaking as I inserted the tiny gold key from my compass pendant into the lock. Dominic inserted his master key into the secondary slot.
We turned them together.
The heavy metal drawer clicked open.
Dominic pulled it out and set it on the steel viewing table.
Inside the box rested a single, thick, leather-bound ledger.
I opened it. The pages were filled with my handwriting. Dates, times, offshore account numbers, and wire transfers.
“What is this?” Dominic asked, leaning over my shoulder.
“It’s a record,” I whispered, reading the entries. “Dominic… this is Beatrice’s private slush fund. The money she’s been stealing from the syndicate to pay off Dr. Vance. To pay the orphanage in Romania to forge Leo’s DNA test. To pay the hitmen who ran me off the bridge.”
“You found out,” Dominic realized, touching my shoulder. “You found out what she was doing, and you were gathering evidence to expose her.”
“Yes,” I said, tears filling my eyes. “But that’s not all.”
I turned to the final page of the ledger.
Taped to the paper was a photograph. A picture of a beautiful little girl with dark curls and piercing gray eyes. She was wearing a tiny pink coat.
Beneath the photo, in my handwriting, was an address.
St. Agnes Convent. Vermont.
“That’s where Mia is,” I gasped. “I found her, Dominic. Before the crash, I found where Beatrice was hiding our daughter.”
Dominic stared at the picture of the little girl, his hand trembling as he traced her face.
But as he reached into the box to pull the picture out, his fingers brushed against something else resting at the bottom of the steel drawer.
He pulled it out.
It was a broken silver pocket watch.
The glass face was shattered, frozen at exactly 11:42 PM.
Dominic’s breath hitched. He stared at the watch, the color completely draining from his face.
“Clara,” Dominic whispered, his voice laced with absolute horror. “Did you put this watch in here?”
“I don’t know,” I said, panic rising in my chest. “I don’t remember it.”
“I do,” Dominic said, stepping back from the table. “This watch belongs to my head of security. Marcus.”
Before I could process what that meant, the heavy steel door to the vault slammed shut behind us with a deafening clang.
The electronic lock engaged, sealing us inside.
May you like
And from the shadows of the vault, a voice echoed.
“I’m sorry, Boss,” Marcus said, stepping into the dim light, his gun pointed directly at Dominic’s chest. “But Beatrice pays a lot better than you do.”
