Chapter 2 - The Photograph in the Rain
The rain hit us like cold needles as Luca’s security guard pushed open the diner’s side door.
A massive, armor-plated black SUV waited at the curb, its engine idling with a deep, muffled rumble. Dante opened the rear door, and Luca slid into the back seat, holding me firmly against his chest until we were both inside the warm, leather-scented interior.
The door slammed shut, cutting off the sound of the rain and the diner.
The SUV pulled smoothly into the Seattle traffic. Inside, the dark leather smelled of new luxury and expensive cologne. My wet uniform stuck to my back, cold and miserable, while Luca sat beside me, composed, dry, and terrifyingly calm.
“I can’t afford a private doctor,” I said, pressing myself into the corner of the leather seat, trying to put distance between us.
“You aren’t paying,” Luca said, pulling a sleek tablet from his leather coat pocket.
“I’m not taking charity from a stranger.”
“It isn’t charity.”
“What is it, then?”
His dark eyes shifted from the screen to my face. “An investment.”
My pulse stuttered. “In what?”
He didn’t answer.
Instead, he looked down at his screen and asked quietly, “Your daughter is with Mrs. Chen?”
I stopped breathing.
The air inside the vehicle felt as if it had been sucked out in an instant. Slowly, I turned my head to face him, my hands trembling violently in my lap.
“How do you know I have a daughter?” I whispered.
Silence filled the cabin.
Luca’s face became a completely impenetrable mask.
I reached blindly for the door handle, tugging on the cold chrome lever. Locked.
“Let me out,” I demanded, my voice cracking with panic. “Let me out of this car right now!”
“Ava—”
“You never asked my name.”
He said nothing. He didn't move a muscle.
My fear sharpened into a cold, lethal reality. “At the diner. I never told you my name. Marco didn't say it. How do you know who I am?”
The quiet inside the SUV became enormous, heavy enough to crush me.
“You knew it already,” I gasped, staring at him as if he were a ghost. “You came to the diner specifically for me.”
Luca looked away, staring out the tinted window at the rain running down the glass. When he faced me again, the cool, charming persona was gone. Only calculation remained—and behind it, something that looked terrifyingly like regret.
“Yes,” he said softly.
My skin went ice cold. “Why?”
He reached inside his heavy charcoal jacket.
I flinched, pulling back into the seat, expecting a weapon.
He stopped his motion, eyes softening briefly, then slowly removed a thick manila envelope. He pulled out a high-resolution photograph and handed it to me.
It showed a man standing under a streetlamp. He had light brown hair, a sharp nose, and a weak chin—Jake Martinez.
My ex-fiancé. The man who had abandoned me eighteen months ago when I was seven months pregnant, taking every penny of my late mother’s life insurance inheritance—over ninety thousand dollars—and vanishing into thin air.
Except the photograph had been taken three days ago.
In Seattle.
Standing across the street from Marino’s Diner.
My fingers began shaking so violently I nearly dropped the photo. “That’s... that’s impossible. He left the state. The police said he fled to Mexico.”
“The police lied to you, or they were too incompetent to look past the waterfront,” Luca said quietly.
Another photograph landed in my lap.
This one was clearer. Jake was shaking hands with a tall, thin man in a grey trench coat beside a black sedan parked in an underground garage. On the back of the print, written in dark black ink, were two words:
EMMA CARTER.
I stared at my daughter's name written on the back of a mob photograph. The world spun around me.
“What is this?” I choked out, looking up at Luca. “What does Jake have to do with my daughter? What does he have to do with you?”
May you like
Luca’s jaw hardened into iron.
“Jake Martinez owes sixteen million dollars to the Moretti family in Chicago,” Luca said, his voice dropping an octave. “And three days ago, he offered them your daughter to clear his debt.”
