Chapter 3

“What birth certificate?” Luca asked, his voice low and tight.

He didn’t sound angry, just deeply confused. He lowered the phone, his dark eyes searching my face for an answer I didn’t have.

“Grace’s birth certificate?” I asked, my heart hammering against my ribs. “It’s in my duffel bag in the servant’s quarters. It just has my name on it, Luca. I left the father blank because… because I thought you hated us.”

Luca winced at the words, but shook his head. “The text didn’t say Grace’s birth certificate. It just said ‘the birth certificate.’”

He looked at the number. “Marco!” he shouted toward the open door.

Seconds later, the head of security appeared.

“Trace this number,” Luca ordered, tossing the phone to him. “And lock down the estate. Nobody gets in or out.”

Marco nodded and vanished.

Grace was rubbing her eyes, exhausted by the emotional whiplash of the evening. The oversized suit jacket was slipping off her shoulders.

“She needs to sleep,” I said, my maternal instincts overriding my fear. “I need to take her down to my room—”

“No.” Luca’s voice left no room for argument. “You aren’t sleeping in the servant’s quarters ever again.”

He walked over to the massive king-sized bed in the center of the room, pulling back the silk sheets. “She sleeps here. With us.”

With us.

The words sent a shiver down my spine. We hadn’t shared a bed in five years. We were strangers bound by trauma and a beautiful little girl.

But as I looked at Luca, I saw the desperate pleading in his eyes. He had just gotten his family back; he was terrified we would vanish if he let us out of his sight.

I lifted Grace and laid her in the center of the massive bed. She was asleep almost before her head hit the pillow, her small hands clutching the gold angel bracelet Luca had given me.

Luca stood by the window, looking out at the darkened grounds of the estate.

“Emily,” he said without turning around. “When your father gave you the annulment papers… did you read them?”

I sat on the edge of the bed. “No. I was crying too hard. He told me you had signed them, that you were threatening to take the baby away from me if I didn’t leave and give up my parental rights.”

Luca turned, his face shadowed by the moonlight. “I never signed any papers. But my mother is a master forger.”

He walked over to a mahogany desk in the corner and pulled out a stack of documents.

“After you left, I went crazy,” Luca confessed, his voice ragged. “I hired every private investigator in the state. I tore Chicago apart. But it was like you vanished into thin air. A year later, my mother handed me these.”

He dropped the papers on the bed next to me.

I picked them up. They were divorce decrees.

And at the bottom, in my exact handwriting, was my signature.

“I didn’t sign these,” I whispered, dropping the papers as if they were on fire.

“I know,” Luca said. “But for four years, I thought you did. I thought you had moved on and wanted nothing to do with me.”

“Isabella forged my signature?” I asked, sickened.

“No,” Luca said quietly. “My mother’s good, but she’s not that good. Only one person knew your handwriting well enough to perfectly replicate the way you cross your T’s and loop your Y’s.”

I felt the blood drain from my face.

“My father,” I breathed.

Luca nodded. “He sold you out, Emily. But what I don’t understand is why. A two hundred thousand dollar gambling debt is nothing to my family. My mother could have paid it off without batting an eye. Why go to such extreme lengths to fake his death and ruin our marriage?”

Before I could answer, Marco rushed back into the room, holding Luca’s phone.

“Boss,” Marco said, breathless. “We traced the number.”

“Where did it come from?” Luca demanded.

Marco hesitated, looking at me with an expression of pure pity.

“It’s coming from inside the house, sir,” Marco said. “From the servant’s quarters. specifically… your wife’s room.”

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