Chapter 1 - The Face He Had Never Shown HerThe heart monitor screamed.
Luca Bellini ripped the sensors from his chest before the nurse could stop him.
“Sir!”
“Where are they?”
His voice was cold enough to freeze the room.
Marco stood in the doorway, pale.
“Second floor parking garage. Rachel and Emma were being moved to a second vehicle. We lost contact thirty-eight seconds after the call.”
“Thirty-eight seconds?”
“Yes.”
Luca grabbed his jacket.
Pain tore through his shoulder.
He ignored it.
The room tilted for half a second.
Dr. Mara Bennett stepped into his path.
“You are not going anywhere.”
Luca stared at her.
“My daughter is missing.”
“And your heart is unstable.”
“My daughter.”
“You could collapse before you reach the elevator.”
“Then put me in one.”
Mara’s expression hardened.
“Luca, listen to me. You were nearly killed tonight, and your heart was already under enormous strain. If you run into another adrenaline surge, you may trigger ventricular fibrillation.”
Luca looked at the monitor.
The rhythm was irregular.
Violent.
Unpredictable.
A machine was measuring the weakness inside the body of a man who had spent his entire life pretending he had none.
“I don’t need a lecture.”
“No,” Mara said quietly. “You need to understand something.”
She stepped closer.
“Your daughter may need a father who is alive.”
The words hit harder than any bullet.
Luca said nothing.
Then Marco's phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed.
“What?”
A pause.
“Where?”
Another pause.
Marco looked at Luca.
“Southbound tunnel.”
Luca moved immediately.
“Give me the keys.”
“You can't drive.”
“Then you drive.”
They rushed down the corridor.
Halfway to the elevator, Luca stopped.
A little girl's voice echoed in his head.
Mommy!
He had never heard Emma say his name.
He hadn't even heard her speak.
For three years, he had watched her life from encrypted reports and photographs.
Her first haircut.
Her first day of preschool.
Her obsession with strawberries.
The stuffed rabbit she carried everywhere.
He had protected her by becoming a ghost.
Now that ghost was being dragged toward her.
The elevator doors opened.
Suddenly, Mara stepped inside.
Luca frowned.
“What are you doing?”
“Saving your life.”
“I don't need saving.”
“I've treated enough stubborn men to know that's exactly what they say before they collapse.”
The elevator dropped.
Marco's phone buzzed again.
He looked down.
“One of our cameras picked something up.”
“What?”
“A black SUV.”
“License plate?”
“Covered.”
“Driver?”
“Can't see him.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed.
“Then what did the camera capture?”
Marco swallowed.
“Someone got out.”
“Who?”
“A woman.”
Luca stared at him.
“What woman?”
Marco turned the screen around.
The image was blurry.
But it showed a woman standing beneath a streetlight.
Dark coat.
Long hair.
One hand holding a phone.
And in the other…
A photograph.
Luca leaned closer.
The photograph was unmistakable.
It was him.
Older.
Uninjured.
Taken years earlier.
Before Emma was born.
Luca's blood ran cold.
“That's impossible.”
Marco looked at him.
“You know her?”
Luca didn't answer.
Because he did.
He had seen that face before.
Twenty years ago.
In a photograph beside his father.
A woman everyone had claimed was dead.
Mara noticed the change in his expression.
“Who is she?”
Luca whispered the name.
“Isabella Moretti.”
Marco's face drained of color.
“She died fifteen years ago.”
Luca stared at the image.
“No.”
He looked at the woman again.
“She was supposed to.”
The elevator opened.
A phone rang in the empty hallway.
Not Marco's.
Not Luca's.
Mara's.
She looked at the screen.
Unknown number.
She answered.
Silence.
Then a child's voice whispered:
“Daddy?”
Mara froze.
Luca's heart stopped.
“Emma?”
A man's voice replaced the child.
“Come alone, Luca.”
The line went dead.
Then a second message arrived.
A photograph.
Emma was sitting on the floor of a dark room.
Her eyes were wet.
Her stuffed rabbit was clutched against her chest.
Behind her stood a masked man.
And written across the wall in red:
YOUR HEART ISN'T THE ONLY THING WE CAN BREAK.
Luca stared at the screen.
For the first time in his life, fear became visible on his face.
May you like
Because whoever had taken Emma knew exactly where to hurt him.
And they had just promised to do it slowly.
