Chapter 2 – A TICKET TO THE FORGOTTEN PAST

Marcus didn’t blink, but a muscle feathered in his jaw. “Your mother was giving away family heirlooms to strangers, Giovanni. I confiscated it to protect your estate.”

“You confiscated a locket containing a child’s hair?” Giovanni stepped closer to his second-in-command. The space between them crackled with tension.

“I was protecting you,” Marcus insisted. “That woman, Elena… she was a grifter. She came around claiming her sister had your child. It was an extortion attempt.”

“And you decided this without telling me?”

“You were grieving your father’s death at the time. I handled it.” Marcus adjusted his suit jacket. “I paid her off. She left.”

“She didn’t leave,” I blurted out.

Both men turned to me. Bianca glared at me with absolute venom. “Keep your mouth shut, maid.”

Giovanni raised a hand, silencing his fiancée. “What did you say, Claire?”

My heart hammered against my ribs, but I thought of Teresa’s kindness. I owed her this. “The woman in the photograph. Elena. I saw her three months after your mother’s funeral. She was visiting the family mausoleum. She had a little girl with her.”

Giovanni’s breath hitched. “Where?”

“St. Jude’s Cemetery. But when your security men arrived, she ran.”

Giovanni looked down at the locket, his thumb gently tracing the initial E. Then he turned his attention back to the locket’s hollow casing. With a swift motion, he used the edge of Bianca’s silver scissors to pry up the metal backing behind the hair.

A tiny, folded piece of thick paper fell onto the dining table.

Giovanni unfolded it. It was a blue train ticket.

“Union Station to South Bend,” Giovanni read aloud. He checked the date. “Issued for tomorrow morning.”

Bianca gasped. Marcus stepped back, his eyes darting toward the hallway.

“She’s running again,” Giovanni said softly. He looked at Marcus. “And someone told her I found out. Who tipped her off?”

Marcus raised his hands. “Giovanni, be reasonable. The woman is a ghost.”

“Not anymore.” Giovanni pulled his phone from his pocket. “Lock down the gates. Nobody leaves this estate. Not Marcus. And certainly not my fiancée.”

Bianca screamed indignantly. “You’re keeping me prisoner on our wedding weekend over a maid’s delusion?”

“I’m keeping you here until I find out if I have a daughter,” Giovanni corrected coldly. He turned to me. “Claire. Put your coat on. You’re the only one here who knows what she looks like.”

“Me?” I gripped my apron. “Sir, I’m just—”

“You’re the only one my mother trusted enough to hide these things with,” he interrupted. “We are going to Union Station.”

I nodded slowly, taking off my apron. But as I set it on the chair, Marcus lunged forward, grabbing my wrist with crushing force.

“She’s not going anywhere,” Marcus snarled, pulling a dark, heavy object from his coat.

I screamed as the cold barrel of a gun pressed against my temple.

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