Chapter 2 – THE TICKET TO NOWHERE

“Miss Vanessa,” I said, my voice remarkably steady as I instinctively stepped in front of Mason. I slipped the plane ticket behind my back, crumpling it into my apron pocket. “Mr. Moretti asked me to prepare Mason for bed.”

Vanessa’s grip on the iron poker tightened. Her knuckles were white.

“I don’t take orders from a maid,” she hissed. “Give me the paper you just pulled from that frame.”

Mason grabbed the back of my uniform. I could feel his small frame shaking.

“It’s my mom’s picture,” he whispered.

“It’s trash,” Vanessa snapped. “Just like everything else in this house that belongs to a dead woman.”

“Why did you buy a plane ticket for Mason?” I asked.

Vanessa stopped. Her eyes darted toward the hallway door, ensuring it was closed.

“You think you’re so clever, Melissa. You think because Luca defended this brat downstairs, you’ve won?”

“I’m not trying to win anything. I’m doing my job.”

“Your job,” she mocked, taking a slow step forward. “Your job is scrubbing toilets to pay for your dying mother’s hospital bills. Did you really think I didn’t background-check the staff? I know about the clinic in Ohio. I know about the $4,000 you wire every month.”

My blood ran cold.

“Give me the ticket,” Vanessa demanded. “Or tomorrow morning, I make one phone call to the clinic’s director, who happens to be a close friend of my father, and your mother is discharged to the street.”

She was bluffing. She had to be.

But if she wasn’t, my mother would die.

I felt Mason’s small hand squeeze mine.

“Don’t give it to her, Miss Melissa,” he whispered. “She’s a bad lady.”

Vanessa raised the iron poker an inch higher. “I was going to send him to a beautiful boarding school in the Alps. He would have been out of the way. Luca would have eventually forgotten about him. We would have started a new family. A real family.”

“He’s ten years old,” I said in disbelief. “You were going to ship him away on your wedding day?”

“Luca’s business is dangerous. I was going to convince Luca it was for the boy’s safety. But you…” She glared at me. “You had to interfere with those pathetic wooden beads.”

She lunged forward, reaching for my apron.

I shoved Mason back onto the bed and grabbed her wrist with both hands. I wasn’t wealthy, and I didn’t wear silk, but I had spent my entire life working on my feet. I was stronger than her.

I twisted her wrist hard.

Vanessa shrieked, dropping the iron poker. It hit the hardwood floor with a deafening clang.

The bedroom door flew open.

Luca stood in the doorway.

He had taken off his suit jacket. His tie was loosened. But the look in his eyes was something I had never seen before. It was the look of a man who ruled the Chicago underworld.

He looked at the iron poker on the floor.

He looked at Vanessa clutching her wrist.

Then he looked at me, standing protectively over his son.

“Luca,” Vanessa gasped, immediately forcing tears into her eyes. “Thank God. She attacked me. The maid—she went crazy. I came to say goodnight to Mason, and she pushed me!”

Luca didn’t look at her.

He walked slowly into the room. He bypassed Vanessa entirely and crouched in front of his son.

“Are you hurt, buddy?”

Mason shook his head. “No, Daddy. Miss Melissa protected me.”

Luca stood up. He turned to me. “What happened, Melissa?”

I reached into my apron pocket and pulled out the crumpled piece of paper. My hands were shaking now, the adrenaline fading, leaving me terrified of the consequences.

“We found the photograph of your late wife hidden in Mason’s drawer. It was broken. And this was hidden inside the frame.”

I handed him the ticket.

Luca unfolded the paper. He read it once. Then he read it again.

The silence in the room was heavy, thick as smoke.

“A one-way ticket,” Luca said quietly. “To a boarding facility in Switzerland. For Saturday afternoon.”

Vanessa backed toward the door. “Luca, I can explain. The schools there are world-class. I was going to surprise you. It was a gift.”

“A gift,” Luca repeated. “To send my son away on the day of our wedding, without my knowledge.”

“He needs discipline!” Vanessa cried out. “You spoil him! You let him cling to the past! I was trying to help him move on!”

Luca carefully folded the ticket and placed it in his pocket.

“Get out of my house.”

“Luca, you can’t—”

“If you are not gone in five minutes,” Luca said, his voice dropping to a terrifying, gravelly whisper, “I will not ask you to leave. I will have my men remove you. And you will not like how they do it.”

Vanessa stared at him, realizing for the first time who she was actually dealing with. She wasn’t dealing with a businessman. She was dealing with a boss.

She turned and fled down the hallway.

Luca closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened them, the darkness was gone, replaced by profound exhaustion.

“Melissa,” he said softly.

“Yes, sir.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, sir.”

He walked over to the dresser and picked up the broken silver frame. He stared at the photograph of his late wife, tracing the crack in the glass.

“Elena loved this picture,” he whispered to himself.

“Mommy was wearing her watch in that picture,” Mason said suddenly.

Luca looked at him. “What watch, buddy?”

“The gold one,” Mason said, pointing to the photograph. “The one with the little blue stones on the dial.”

Luca frowned. “That watch was lost in the car accident when she passed away. The police never recovered it.”

Mason shook his head vigorously. “No, it wasn’t lost.”

“How do you know?” Luca asked gently.

Mason looked down at his shoes. “Because I saw Vanessa wearing it yesterday.”