Chapter 2 - THE COLLAR WITHOUT A TAGLuca stared at the photograph for several seconds before handing the phone to me.
I wished he hadn't.
The image made my stomach twist.
Bruno’s blue collar was lying in mud beneath a streetlamp, its leather soaked dark with rain.
The metal ring where the identification tag should have hung was bent.
Someone had ripped it away.
I zoomed in.
There was something else.
A faint red smear beneath the leather.
“That's blood,” I whispered.
Daniel nodded.
“The lab will confirm whose.”
Luca looked toward the clinic.
“Tell the police.”
Daniel hesitated.
Luca's eyes hardened.
“Now.”
As Daniel stepped outside, I noticed the veterinarian staring at me.
He looked frightened.
“What?” I asked.
He glanced at Luca.
Then back at me.
“You were with the dog?”
“Yes.”
“Before he left?”
“Yes.”
The doctor lowered his voice.
“There was something strange.”
Luca turned.
“What?”
“When the woman brought him in, the dog was heavily sedated.”
“That isn't strange,” Luca said.
“She insisted we scan his microchip immediately.”
Luca stared at him.
“Why?”
“She said it was a new procedure.”
Daniel stopped walking.
Luca slowly frowned.
“Bruno has had a chip for years.”
“I know.”
The doctor pulled up the record.
“But when we scanned it, the ownership information was different.”
I stared.
“Different how?”
“It listed Mr. Moretti.”
Luca blinked.
“It should.”
The doctor shook his head.
“No. It listed another person under the emergency contact.”
“Who?”
He turned the monitor.
A name appeared.
Vivian Moretti.
Luca's mother.
My skin prickled.
“That’s impossible,” Luca said.
“Your mother died fourteen years ago.”
“I know.”
“Yet the database says she updated Bruno's emergency contact two weeks ago.”
Silence.
Luca stepped closer.
“Show me.”
The doctor pointed to the digital record.
The update date was indeed fourteen days earlier.
The name.
The signature.
The registered phone number.
Everything appeared legitimate.
Except for one thing.
The phone number belonged to a line disconnected thirteen years ago.
Luca stepped back.
“Print it.”
The doctor did.
I watched him carefully.
“Mr. Moretti?”
“Yes?”
“You said your mother died fourteen years ago.”
“She did.”
The doctor hesitated.
“So who updated Bruno's file?”
Nobody answered.
Outside, thunder rolled across the city.
Daniel returned.
“The police are on their way.”
Luca folded the document.
“Cancel that.”
Daniel frowned.
“Boss?”
“This stays inside our security team for now.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever did this had access to private information about my mother.”
His gaze shifted toward me.
“And I don't know who I can trust.”
My chest tightened.
Vanessa.
The thought came instantly.
Luca seemed to see it on my face.
“Don't say her name yet.”
“Why?”
“Because I need proof.”
That was when the clinic's back door opened.
A nurse rushed inside.
“Doctor!”
“What happened?”
“She left something.”
The nurse was holding a small plastic bag.
Inside was a strip of black fabric.
My fabric.
A piece torn from my uniform.
I stepped closer.
“That came from my shoulder.”
Luca took it.
“No.”
I frowned.
He turned the fabric over.
Something had been sewn into the inside.
A tiny metal disk.
Daniel's expression changed.
“What is that?”
Luca removed it carefully.
The disk was smaller than a coin.
It had one tiny blue light.
A tracker.
My heart began racing.
“Why would someone put a tracker in my uniform?”
Luca looked at me.
“Did anyone touch your clothes before dinner?”
“Vanessa.”
“When?”
“This afternoon.”
“Where?”
“At the kennel.”
Luca exchanged a glance with Daniel.
Then the blue light blinked.
Once.
Twice.
And a phone inside Daniel's pocket suddenly vibrated.
He pulled it out.
A location-sharing alert had appeared.
Someone was still tracking the tiny metal disk.
Daniel looked at the coordinates.
His face went pale.
“Boss.”
“Where?”
Daniel turned the screen toward him.
The signal was coming from a single location.
Luca’s mansion.
Not the study.
Not the kennel.
Not the garage.
A room on the second floor.
The bridal suite.
Vanessa's bedroom.
Luca stared at the map.
“She left the tracker behind,” Daniel said.
“No.”
Luca's voice was cold.
“She wanted us to find it.”
I looked at him.
“Why?”
He stared toward the windows.
“Because she wants us looking upstairs.”
He turned to Daniel.
“Search the bridal suite.”
Daniel nodded.
Before he could leave, the lights in the clinic went out.
Every bulb died at once.
The room plunged into darkness.
Someone screamed in the hallway.
Then came a sound from the parking lot.
A car engine.
Luca grabbed my wrist.
“Stay behind me.”
We rushed outside.
The rain had intensified.
The empty transport van stood under a flickering streetlight.
Its rear doors were open.
Something was lying on the pavement.
Luca approached.
I saw it first.
A photograph.
He bent down.
It was old.
The edges were burned.
The picture showed Vivian Moretti standing in the mansion's kennel beside a much younger Bruno.
Beside her stood a little boy.
Luca.
And someone else had been cut out of the photograph.
Only part of the person's hand remained.
On that hand was a silver ring.
The exact ring Vanessa had been wearing at dinner.
Luca's fingers tightened around the photograph.
Then he noticed writing on the back.
His mother's handwriting.
May you like
Only six words.
Luca, never let her marry you.
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