"The mafia boss held my baby like he had done it a thousand times—then he looked at me and asked why I didn’t remember him. "

I woke up at sunrise to the soft, rhythmic hum of coffee brewing down the hall.

Lily was sleeping peacefully beside me on the massive bed, her tiny thumb tucked securely into her mouth. I carefully slid out from under the covers, adjusted her blanket, and stepped out of the bedroom in my socks.

The main living room of the estate was flooded with pale morning light.

Adrian sat at a long island counter in the kitchen, dressed in a simple black t-shirt and dark trousers, reviewing a series of holographic security maps projected from a laptop screen.

A mug of steaming dark coffee sat beside his right hand. Beside it was a second mug, poured just the way I liked it—two splashes of oat milk, no sugar.

I stopped near the entrance of the kitchen. "How did you know how I take my coffee?"

Adrian didn't look up from his laptop, but a faint smile touched his lips. "You've taken it the exact same way since you were sixteen years old. You used to steal my mug every morning at the lake house."

I walked over, pulling out a stool across from him, and took a sip from the warm mug. The taste hit my tongue, and another sharp, vivid burst of sensation echoed through my mind—mornings on a wooden porch, crisp mountain air, and broad shoulders wrapped around me from behind.

I set the cup down, my fingers trembling slightly. "It's coming back," I whispered.

Adrian froze. He slowly closed his laptop screen and looked up at me. "What did you say?"

"The memories," I said, meeting his intense gaze. "Since I stopped taking those pills yesterday, the fog in my head is clearing. I remembered the porch at the lake house just now. I remembered you carving that wooden rattle."

Adrian's breath hitched in his throat. For a second, the formidable mafia boss vanished, replaced entirely by the heartbroken boy from the silver pendant.

"Emma..." he breathed, reaching across the counter. His fingers touched mine gently, as if testing whether I was real. "Do you remember... us?"

"Bits and pieces," I admitted honestly. "Like torn photographs floating in water. I remember your voice. I remember the scar on your eyebrow—you got it jumping off the high rocks into the river, didn't you?"

Adrian let out a breathless, emotional laugh, a tear glinting in the corner of his eye. "You called me an idiot for three days straight after that jump."

"You were an idiot," I said softly, a genuine smile breaking across my face for the first time since yesterday.

The warmth between us was interrupted by the sharp, harsh red flash of the security console on the wall.

An alarm didn't sound—Adrian had silenced the audio—but the perimeter cameras displayed three black luxury sedans tearing through the outer pine woods, smashing straight through the wrought-iron gates.

Adrian was on his feet in a fraction of a second, his playful demeanor instantly replaced by lethal focus.

"They bypassed the outer radar grid," he said grimly, pulling a tactical belt from beneath the counter and strapping it on. "Someone gave them the override codes."

My heart plummeted. "Julian?"

"Julian," Adrian confirmed. He pulled a compact 9mm pistol from a drawer and handed it to me, handle first. "Do you remember how to use this?"

I looked at the weapon. To my utter shock, my hands instinctively moved—checking the magazine release, ensuring the safety was engaged, racking the slide to chamber a round. Muscle memory from a life I had completely forgotten.

"Yes," I whispered, terrified by how natural it felt.