Chapter 1 - THE MAN WHO KNEW MY NAME
Luka Moretti had just signed his name on my daughter’s birth certificate when the nurse finally found her voice.
“Sir, you can’t just do that.”
Luka handed the clipboard back to her as calmly as if he had signed for a package.
“Then have legal come explain it to me.”
The nurse stared at him.
She clearly knew who he was.
That frightened me more than the tattoos.
I tightened my arms around my newborn daughter.
“My name is Elena Reed.”
Luka’s eyes returned to mine.
“I know.”
My stomach dropped.
I had never told him my name.
Before I could ask how he knew it, he reached inside his black coat and placed an old photograph on the windowsill beside me.
The edges were worn.
The picture showed two men standing beside a black motorcycle.
One of them was Luka, younger and without the scars near his eyebrow.
The other man was my father.
I almost dropped the photograph.
My father, Michael Hart, had died when I was twelve.
At least that was what I had always been told.
“What is this?”
Luka’s jaw tightened.
“Your father saved my life twenty years ago.”
I stared at him.
“My father was an accountant.”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
“He became an accountant after he disappeared.”
A chill moved through me.
Luka looked toward the elevator where my husband Daniel had vanished with his mistress.
Then his attention shifted to the baby in my arms.
“What did Daniel tell you about the tests they ran during your pregnancy?”
“Tests?”
“The genetic screening.”
I shook my head.
“They said everything was normal.”
Luka’s expression hardened.
“That wasn’t what the original report said.”
The hallway suddenly felt colder.
“What original report?”
He pulled a folded sheet of paper from his coat.
Most of it was covered in black redaction bars.
Only one line remained visible.
MATERNAL FILE LINK: M-17.
My heart began pounding.
“That number again.”
Luka nodded.
“You’ve seen it?”
“On a hospital billing statement three months ago.”
His eyes sharpened.
“Where is that statement?”
“At home.”
Luka went completely still.
Then he looked toward the elevators.
“We’re not going to your home.”
“Why?”
“Because Daniel already knows what M-17 means.”
I felt my knees weaken.
“That’s impossible.”
Luka stepped closer.
“Elena, your husband did not walk out today because he stopped loving you.”
May you like
His next words turned the blood in my veins to ice.
“He walked out because the baby survived.”
