“You Never Chose Me.”—The Mafia Boss Saved Another Woman During the Ambush While His Pregnant Wife Escaped Alone… Two Years Later, He Found Her Alive With His Son...

While St. Andrews remained a quiet haven, the storm that Adrian had left behind in the south was far from over.

In a high-rise office building in Manhattan, Frank Hart—head of the Hart Crime Family and father of Vanessa—sat behind a massive glass desk. On the table before him was a intelligence dossier containing high-resolution photographs of St. Andrews, Maine.

Photographs of The Salted Crumb.

Photographs of Claire carrying a baby.

Photographs of Adrian Mercer sitting in his black sedan across the street.

Standing across from Frank was Vanessa. She wore an exquisite crimson designer dress, but her face was twisted into a mask of bitter, venomous fury.

"He abandoned the alliance for her?" Vanessa spat, slamming her manicured nails onto the glass desk. "He threatened to throw me off a bridge! He destroyed our family's shipping contracts! And he's sitting in some white-trash fishing village staring at a baker?!"

Frank Hart slowly puffed on a cigar, his cold grey eyes scanning the picture of little Leo.

"It's not just a baker, Vanessa," Frank said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble. "That's his son. The Mercer heir."

"He doesn't deserve an heir!" Vanessa shrieked. "We had an agreement! Adrian was supposed to marry me after the estate burned! We paid his head of security five hundred thousand dollars to clear out that second floor so she would die in the blast!"

Frank raised a hand, silencing his daughter with a single look. "And your impatience ruined the execution. The woman survived. The child survived. And now Adrian Mercer has pulled ninety percent of his military assets up to the Maine border to protect them."

"Then finish it!" Vanessa demanded, leaning across the desk. "Send a team to that pathetic little town! Kill the girl! Kill the baby! Once they're gone, Adrian will have nowhere left to turn! He'll have to come back to New York!"

Frank looked at his daughter, shaking his head at her short-sighted foolishness. "You think killing his child will bring him to your bed, Vanessa? If someone touches that boy, Adrian Mercer will burn New York to the ground until there isn't a brick standing."

"Then what are you going to do?!" she demanded.

Frank leaned back in his leather chair, a slow, predatory smile spreading across his face.

"We don't kill the child," Frank said softly. "We take him. A father who spent six months searching for a ghost will trade every dollar, every dock, and every piece of territory he owns to get his son back. And once he signs over the East Coast... then we eliminate all three of them."

Three days later, a storm hit the coast of Maine.

Gale-force winds whipped the sea into a frenzy of white foam, driving torrential rain against the wooden houses of St. Andrews. Power lines were down across three counties, plunging the town into dark, howling isolation.

Inside The Salted Crumb, the air was warm, lit by the glowing fire in the brick oven and three oil lamps set on the counter.

Claire was closing up the shop. Leo was asleep in his crib upstairs in her private apartment.

The bell above the door chimed, rattling violently as the wind blew the heavy wooden door open.

Claire turned, expecting to see Sam or perhaps Adrian coming in from the rain.

Instead, three men stepped into the shop.

They did not look like locals. They wore heavy dark raincoats, tactical boots, and silencers screwed onto the barrels of their handguns.

The lead man, a tall, scarred mercenary named Knox, stepped inside, closing the door behind him and turning the lock.

"Claire Mercer," Knox said, his voice flat and professional. "Or should I say Claire Vance?"

Claire’s hand slipped slowly behind her back toward the counter, where a heavy bread knife lay near the cutting board. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a sledgehammer, but her voice remained dead calm.

"Who sent you?" Claire asked.