Chapter 1 - The Man I Knew as Adrian
“You really don’t remember me?”
The words seemed to remove every sound from the room.
I stared at Stellan Cross across the enormous black desk while my daughter slept against his chest.
Fern’s tiny fist was still wrapped around his collar.
Stellan’s bloody knuckles rested carefully against her blanket.
And suddenly I was no longer looking at Chicago’s most feared crime boss.
I was looking at a stormy night almost two years earlier.
A hotel balcony.
A black mask.
A stranger wiping blood from the corner of his mouth.
A man who had looked at me as though he was already saying goodbye.
“Adrian,” I whispered.
Stellan closed his eyes.
That was all the confirmation I needed.
I stood so quickly that the chair scraped backward.
“You’re Adrian?”
“My middle name is Adrian.”
“You lied to me.”
“Yes.”
The answer came without excuse.
That somehow made it worse.
I crossed the office before I realized where I was going.
Toward him.
Toward a man whose employees were afraid to breathe incorrectly around him.
“Give me my daughter.”
His eyes hardened.
“Selene—”
“Give. Me. My. Daughter.”
For three terrible seconds, neither of us moved.
Then Stellan stood.
He brought Fern toward me carefully.
The moment I reached for her, Fern made a sleepy sound and tightened her arms around his neck.
My heart cracked in a place I had spent eleven months pretending did not exist.
Stellan noticed.
Of course he noticed.
Men like him survived because they noticed everything.
“Fern,” I whispered. “Come to Mommy.”
She opened her eyes.
Looked at me.
Then looked at him.
And smiled again.
Stellan’s face went completely still.
I pulled her into my arms.
“Why?”
His gaze rose to mine.
“Why what?”
“Why disappear?”
A muscle moved in his jaw.
“Because the men hunting me that night would have killed you to reach me.”
I laughed bitterly.
“And leaving me pregnant and alone was supposed to protect me?”
His expression changed.
“Pregnant?”
I stopped.
Something about the way he said it frightened me.
Not disbelief.
Shock.
Real shock.
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
My anger faltered.
Stellan came around the desk.
“When did you find out?”
“Six weeks later.”
“And you never tried to find Adrian?”
“I did.”
“How?”
“The hotel. The charity foundation. The phone number you gave me. Everything was fake.”
“It had to be.”
“Convenient.”
His eyes flashed.
“You think I wanted that?”
“I don’t know what you wanted. I never knew who you were.”
Fern began rubbing her eyes.
I shifted her against my shoulder.
Stellan stared at her.
“When was she born?”
“January fourteenth.”
His face lost color.
“Her due date?”
“March second.”
He looked at me sharply.
“She was seven weeks early?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I developed complications.”
“What complications?”
I hesitated.
It was strange being interrogated about the most painful night of my life by the man who might have caused everything that came after it.
“Placental abruption. Severe bleeding. Emergency C-section. Fern spent almost two months in intensive care.”
Stellan looked down at his hands.
For the first time since I had met him, the terrifying Stellan Cross looked helpless.
Then his eyes moved to Fern’s face.
“What blood type?”
I frowned.
“O negative.”
His head snapped up.
“What?”
“Fern is O negative.”
Stellan went utterly motionless.
I felt it immediately.
Something was wrong.
“What?”
He walked back toward the desk.
“Nothing.”
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Ask me something and then act like the answer doesn’t matter.”
His silence told me it mattered very much.
“Stellan.”
He opened a drawer and removed his phone.
I stepped closer.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling a doctor.”
“No.”
His eyes met mine.
“I’m not asking.”
“And I’m not one of your soldiers.”
That stopped him.
Good.
I was terrified, but fear had spent eleven months sharing an apartment with me.
Fear had watched Fern struggle to breathe.
Fear had opened medical bills.
Fear had counted formula scoops at two in the morning.
A scarred man in an expensive suit no longer ranked first on my list.
“You don’t get to appear after two years and start making decisions about her.”
“If she is mine—”
“If?”
The word sliced through me.
Stellan immediately understood his mistake.
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“It sounded exactly like what you meant.”
“My blood type is AB negative.”
I stared at him.
“So?”
His expression was grim.
“You’re what?”
“A positive.”
He looked away.
I knew enough biology to feel afraid without understanding why.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying we need to confirm something.”
The office door opened.
A silver-haired woman entered without knocking.
Mrs. Thornbury.
The housekeeper who had hired me three weeks earlier.
She saw Stellan.
Saw me.
Saw Fern.
And dropped the tray she was carrying.
Porcelain shattered across the floor.
Nobody moved.
Mrs. Thornbury stared at Fern as though she had seen the dead rise.
Then she whispered one word.
“Impossible.”
Stellan’s voice became ice.
“What did you say?”
The older woman immediately recovered.
“Nothing, sir.”
“You looked at the child.”
“I was surprised.”
“Why?”
Mrs. Thornbury lowered her eyes.
I had never seen her frightened before.
Not even when armed men walked through the mansion at midnight.
Now her hands were shaking.
Stellan stepped closer.
“You hired Selene.”
“Yes.”
“Out of more than eighty applicants.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Mrs. Thornbury swallowed.
“She needed employment.”
“That is not an answer.”
Her eyes flicked toward Fern.
Only for a second.
But Stellan saw it.
So did I.
My stomach turned.
“You knew,” I whispered.
Mrs. Thornbury looked at me.
“I’m sorry.”
Two words.
They changed everything.
Stellan reached her before I could react.
He did not touch her.
He didn’t need to.
“What did you know?”
Mrs. Thornbury’s face crumpled.
“I was told only to bring her into the house.”
“By whom?”
She remained silent.
Stellan’s voice lowered.
“Evelyn.”
The use of her first name seemed to hurt more than shouting would have.
Mrs. Thornbury had apparently known him a long time.
She looked almost maternal standing before him.
“I was trying to protect you.”
“From whom?”
“From your family.”
Stellan’s eyes darkened.
“My family is dead.”
Mrs. Thornbury looked at Fern again.
“No,” she whispered.
“Not all of it.”
Fern suddenly coughed.
Once.
Twice.
Then she made the awful wheezing sound I knew too well.
I forgot every secret in the room.
“Fern?”
Her body stiffened.
Her lips began losing color.
I reached into the diaper bag.
The medicine.
Where was it?
My hands shook.
“Fern, baby, breathe.”
Stellan was beside me instantly.
“What does she need?”
“Her nebulizer. It’s at home. I only have the rescue medicine—”
I found the bottle.
Empty.
My blood froze.
“No.”
I had counted four doses.
I knew I had.
Stellan grabbed his phone.
“Bring Dr. Hale upstairs. Now.”
Fern gasped.
My whole world narrowed to that sound.
Stellan lifted her from me.
“Look at me, Selene.”
“I need a hospital.”
“Hale has an emergency unit downstairs.”
“What?”
“Trust me.”
I almost laughed.
Trust him?
But Fern wheezed again.
So I followed.
We ran through a mansion I suddenly realized had far more doors than any normal house required.
Down a private elevator.
Into a hidden medical room.
A doctor was waiting.
Within minutes, oxygen covered Fern’s tiny face.
I stood against the wall shaking.
Stellan remained beside the bed.
His hand never left her foot.
Dr. Hale listened to Fern’s chest.
Then he looked at the empty medication bottle.
“Who handled this?”
“Only me,” I said.
He smelled the bottle.
His expression changed.
“This wasn’t empty because it was used.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
He held it toward the light.
“It’s been rinsed.”
The room became silent.
Stellan slowly turned toward Mrs. Thornbury, who had followed us downstairs.
She went pale.
“No,” she said.
Stellan’s voice was barely audible.
“Lock the house.”
Mrs. Thornbury nodded.
“Stellan—”
“Everyone stays inside.”
He looked at the bottle.
Then at Fern.
Then at me.
“Someone knew she was here.”
My knees weakened.
“And someone emptied her medicine.”
Dr. Hale removed his gloves.
“There’s something else.”
We all looked at him.
He hesitated.
“You mentioned her blood type.”
Stellan’s expression hardened.
“Yes.”
Hale looked between us.
“If the blood types you gave me are correct, there’s a problem.”
My heart began pounding.
“What problem?”
He spoke carefully.
“An AB parent and an A parent cannot naturally produce a child with type O blood.”
The floor seemed to disappear beneath me.
I stared at Fern.
Then at Stellan.
“No.”
Hale continued.
“Either one of the blood types is recorded incorrectly…”
He paused.
“…or one of you is not Fern’s biological parent.”
Stellan did not look at me.
He looked at my daughter.
And for the first time that night, I saw fear in the eyes of Chicago’s most feared man.
“Run the test,” he said.
Hale nodded.
“How fast?”
“Several hours.”
“Make it faster.”
I grabbed Stellan’s arm.
“You think I lied?”
He turned toward me.
“No.”
“Then what do you think?”
His answer terrified me more.
“I think someone else did.”
Outside the medical room, heavy locks engaged throughout the mansion.
May you like
One after another.
And somewhere upstairs, someone trapped inside Stellan Cross’s house realized we were about to uncover a secret they had already tried to kill my daughter to protect.
