Chapter 2 - Six Months of Beautiful Lies
"Don't answer it," Sloan whispered.
Caspian stared at his mother's name flashing across his phone.
Then he noticed something else.
A photograph had arrived from an unknown number.
It showed Sloan leaving her apartment that morning.
Someone had been following her before he arrived.
"Who sent you that?" Sloan demanded.
Caspian didn't answer immediately.
He turned the screen away from her.
That was his first mistake.
His second was saying, "You need to trust me."
Sloan stepped backward.
Those were the exact words he had spoken the night before she disappeared.
"Trust you?"
Her voice was barely audible.
Caspian looked at her, and for a moment, she could see the man she remembered. The man who used to kiss her forehead while she slept. The man who once drove forty minutes in the middle of the night because she mentioned wanting strawberry ice cream.
But the memory vanished when she looked at the photograph on his phone.
"Someone followed me from my apartment. Someone knows where I live. And you're telling me to trust you?"
"Sloan, listen—"
"No. You listen."
She placed a protective hand over her stomach.
"I gave up everything to get away from your world. I changed my name. I left my friends. I worked double shifts while pregnant because I couldn't afford to stop. Do you have any idea what that was like?"
His expression changed.
"You were working double shifts?"
She laughed bitterly.
"That's what you heard?"
"Sloan, you shouldn't have had to—"
"Don't."
The single word stopped him.
"You don't get to tell me what I should have done. You weren't there."
Caspian lowered his eyes.
For once, he had nothing to say.
Dr. Morrison quietly approached them.
"I think we should move this conversation somewhere private."
Sloan shook her head.
"I want to go home."
"Then I'll arrange transportation," Caspian said.
"No."
"Sloan—"
"I said no."
The silence between them became unbearable.
Finally, Caspian stepped aside.
"All right."
But when Sloan walked toward the clinic entrance, she noticed his security men exchanging worried looks.
Something was wrong.
Something beyond the unexpected reunion.
And Caspian knew more than he was telling her.
Twenty minutes later, Sloan sat in Dr. Morrison's office while the clinic administrator reviewed the suspicious document.
Caspian remained outside.
Sloan had insisted.
She needed space to think.
Unfortunately, thinking only made everything worse.
Her mother's signature.
Her original name.
The photograph.
The message about Caspian's mother.
She had spent three years grieving Evelyn Bennett. Her mother had died after a sudden illness, leaving Sloan with a small life insurance payment and a collection of handwritten recipes.
There was no possible reason for Evelyn's signature to appear on a document requesting her unborn grandson's medical records.
Unless someone had stolen it.
Or someone had been planning this long before Sloan became pregnant.
The thought made her nauseous.
Dr. Morrison sat opposite her.
"The signature could have been copied from an old document."
Sloan nodded.
"That's what I'm thinking."
"But whoever submitted this knew information that should have been confidential."
"Like my pregnancy?"
"Yes."
Sloan stared at her hands.
"Could someone have accessed my medical records?"
"We're investigating that possibility."
"How long will it take?"
"I don't know."
Sloan closed her eyes.
She wanted to go back to that morning.
Before Caspian.
Before the messages.
Before her carefully constructed life began falling apart.
She wanted to sit in the examination room again and hear only three words.
It's a boy.
Instead, she was wondering whether someone had been watching her for months.
Her phone vibrated.
Another message.
Ask him about the night you left Boston.
Sloan felt her stomach tighten.
A second message appeared.
Ask him who was waiting outside your apartment.
She stared at the screen.
The night she disappeared, she had noticed a black SUV parked across the street.
She remembered it because its headlights had remained on while she loaded her bags into a taxi.
At the time, she assumed it belonged to one of Caspian's security men.
Now she wasn't sure.
She stood.
"I need to speak with him."
Caspian was waiting beside the clinic's rear entrance.
He had removed his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves. The tattoos covering his forearms looked painfully familiar.
He was speaking quietly into his phone.
"I don't care what she says. I want the truth."
He noticed Sloan and ended the call.
"Are you all right?"
She held up her phone.
"Who was outside my apartment the night I left?"
Caspian went completely still.
Sloan watched his expression.
"You know."
He didn't deny it.
"Answer me."
He looked toward the empty hallway.
"Let's sit down."
"No."
"Sloan—"
"Was someone watching me?"
He exhaled.
"Yes."
The answer struck harder than she expected.
For six months, she had wondered whether Caspian noticed her disappearance immediately.
Whether he searched for her.
Whether he hated her.
She had never considered that someone might have been watching her before she left.
"Who?"
"My security team."
"Why?"
"Because I received a warning."
Sloan felt the floor shift beneath her.
"What warning?"
"Someone contacted my office that afternoon. They knew where you worked. They knew your schedule."
"And?"
"They said you would disappear before morning."
She stared at him.
"That's impossible."
"I thought so too."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I couldn't reach you."
She shook her head.
"We were together that night."
"Until I received the call."
The memory returned.
Caspian leaving the bedroom.
The study door closing.
His voice growing cold.
Make an example of him.
Sloan covered her mouth.
"The man you were talking about..."
Caspian nodded.
"His name was Victor Hale."
"Who was he?"
"A former employee."
"What did he do?"
Caspian hesitated.
Sloan immediately noticed.
"Tell me."
"He had access to information about my business. My properties. My employees."
"And me?"
"Yes."
Her heart began pounding.
"Why would he care about me?"
"Because he knew I loved you."
The words hung between them.
Sloan looked away.
Six months ago, hearing Caspian say he loved her would have made everything feel possible.
Now it only reminded her how much she had lost.
"What happened to Victor?"
"He disappeared."
Sloan looked back at him.
"Disappeared?"
"Before I could question him."
"Did you have something to do with that?"
"No."
She studied his face.
"Then what did you mean when you said to make an example of him?"
Caspian rubbed his forehead.
"I was speaking to my attorney. Victor had been using confidential information to threaten people connected to my companies. I wanted his access revoked, his contracts terminated, and the evidence handed to investigators."
Sloan remained silent.
"Those were the orders you heard."
"And his family?"
Caspian frowned.
"What?"
"I heard someone ask about his family."
Understanding crossed his face.
"Victor had been using relatives' names to conceal financial transactions. My attorney wanted to know whether those accounts should be included in the investigation."
Sloan felt tears gathering.
She wanted to believe him.
More than anything.
But believing him meant confronting the possibility that she had abandoned the man she loved because she misunderstood a conversation.
And that possibility was almost as frightening as the alternative.
"Why didn't you tell me any of this?"
"Because I didn't know you'd heard it."
He moved closer, then stopped when she stiffened.
"Sloan, I came home that night and found you asleep. I kissed your forehead. The next morning, you were gone."
Her eyes filled.
"I was terrified."
"I know."
"No, you don't."
His voice softened.
"Then tell me."
She looked at him.
For the first time in six months, she considered doing exactly that.
Caspian had never told Sloan much about his childhood.
She knew his father had built the Reed family businesses. She knew his mother, Victoria Reed, was a wealthy socialite with expensive taste and an unsettling ability to make people uncomfortable without raising her voice.
And she knew Victoria disliked her.
The first time they met, Victoria had looked Sloan up and down before asking whether nurses earned enough money to afford appropriate clothing for formal dinners.
Sloan had smiled.
"Usually, we're too busy keeping people alive to worry about dinner parties."
Caspian had nearly choked on his drink.
Victoria had not smiled.
Afterward, she repeatedly suggested that Sloan was interested in Caspian's wealth.
She criticized Sloan's job.
Her apartment.
Her clothes.
Even her figure.
Caspian always defended her.
At least when Sloan was present.
But now, standing in the clinic hallway, Sloan remembered something she had tried very hard to forget.
Three days before she disappeared, Victoria had invited her to lunch.
Alone.
At an expensive restaurant overlooking Boston Harbor, Victoria placed an envelope beside Sloan's plate.
Inside was a check.
Five hundred thousand dollars.
Sloan had stared at it.
"What's this?"
"An opportunity."
"For what?"
"To begin again somewhere else."
Sloan had pushed the envelope back.
"I'm not interested."
Victoria's expression hadn't changed.
"My son has responsibilities you cannot possibly understand."
"I love him."
"Love is rarely enough."
Sloan had stood.
Victoria's final words followed her out of the restaurant.
"One day, you'll understand that leaving him is the kindest thing you could do."
At the time, Sloan dismissed the encounter as another example of Victoria's cruelty.
But now...
She looked at Caspian.
"Your mother offered me money to leave you."
His expression darkened.
"How much?"
"Five hundred thousand dollars."
"When?"
"Three days before I disappeared."
Caspian stared at her.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I didn't want to come between you and your mother."
He let out a humorless laugh.
"Sloan, you were the woman I wanted to marry."
Her heart stopped.
"What?"
Caspian looked away.
Then he reached into his trouser pocket.
For one ridiculous second, Sloan thought he might produce a ring.
Instead, he withdrew a small folded receipt.
A jewelry store.
Boston.
Dated six months earlier.
"I ordered your engagement ring the week before you disappeared."
Sloan stared at the receipt.
She remembered that week.
Caspian had been unusually distracted.
He kept checking his phone.
He canceled dinner twice.
She had convinced herself he was hiding something terrible.
And perhaps he had been hiding something.
Just not what she imagined.
"You were going to propose?"
He nodded.
"On your birthday."
Sloan pressed her lips together.
Her birthday had passed four months earlier.
She spent it alone in her tiny Providence apartment, eating supermarket cake while trying not to cry.
Caspian carefully folded the receipt.
"I kept thinking you would call."
A tear slipped down Sloan's cheek.
"I thought you were dangerous."
His expression tightened.
"I know."
"I thought our baby would grow up surrounded by things I couldn't protect him from."
Caspian looked toward her stomach.
"And now?"
Sloan didn't answer.
Because she genuinely didn't know.
An hour later, Sloan agreed to let Caspian drive her home.
Not because she trusted him completely.
Not because she had forgiven him.
And certainly not because she was ready to return to Boston.
She agreed because someone had been following her, and the mysterious messages suggested that her mother's identity had somehow become part of the situation.
Caspian promised to remain outside her apartment.
He also agreed not to contact her employer, interfere with her finances, or make decisions about their son without discussing them with her.
It was the first real conversation they had managed since he arrived.
During the drive, Sloan sat beside him in silence.
Every familiar detail hurt.
The way he held the steering wheel.
The expensive scent of his cologne.
The way he glanced at her whenever they stopped at a traffic light.
Finally, he spoke.
"Does he have a name?"
Sloan looked out the window.
"Not yet."
"Have you thought about one?"
"Several."
"Can I hear them?"
She hesitated.
Then she whispered, "Oliver."
Caspian smiled.
A small, genuine smile.
"Oliver Reed."
Sloan immediately looked at him.
"I didn't say he'd have your surname."
His smile faded.
"You're right."
She expected an argument.
Instead, he nodded.
"Oliver is a beautiful name."
Something inside her softened.
She hated how easily it happened.
When they reached her apartment building, Caspian looked up at the narrow brick structure.
"You live here?"
Sloan crossed her arms.
"Don't."
"I wasn't going to say anything."
"Your face already did."
He almost smiled.
Then he noticed the entrance.
The lock had been damaged.
He immediately became serious.
"Stay in the car."
Sloan looked toward the building.
"What?"
Caspian pointed.
"The door."
She followed his gaze.
The front entrance stood slightly open.
That wasn't unusual.
The lock had been unreliable for weeks.
But something else caught her attention.
A black SUV was parked across the street.
Its headlights were on.
Sloan felt cold.
"Caspian."
He followed her gaze.
The smile disappeared from his face.
"Is that the vehicle you saw in Boston?"
She nodded slowly.
"I think so."
Caspian took out his phone.
"Stay here."
But Sloan was already reaching for her seat belt.
"My apartment."
"Sloan—"
"My things are inside."
He looked at her.
Then he nodded.
"All right. We go together."
The apartment door was closed.
Sloan unlocked it with trembling hands.
Everything looked normal.
Her tiny kitchen.
The secondhand couch.
The stack of baby clothes folded neatly beside the window.
She exhaled.
"See? Nothing happened."
Caspian didn't answer.
He was staring at the kitchen table.
Sloan followed his gaze.
A white envelope lay beside her fruit bowl.
She hadn't left it there.
Her name was written across the front.
Not Bennett.
Her original surname.
Caspian stepped closer.
"Don't touch it."
But Sloan had already recognized the handwriting.
Her mother's handwriting.
She picked up the envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
It showed Victoria Reed standing outside Sloan's Boston apartment.
The date printed in the corner was the night Sloan disappeared.
Beside Victoria stood a man Sloan had never seen before.
Caspian took one look at the photograph.
His face changed.
"That's impossible."
Sloan stared at him.
"Who is he?"
Caspian didn't answer.
She grabbed his arm.
"Who is that man?"
He swallowed.
"Victor Hale."
Sloan looked back at the photograph.
The man who had supposedly disappeared.
The man whose actions had frightened Caspian.
The man who might have known she was pregnant.
Her phone vibrated.
Another message.
Now ask Caspian what his mother did with the original pregnancy test.
Sloan slowly turned toward him.
"What original pregnancy test?"
Caspian looked genuinely confused.
Before he could answer, someone knocked on the apartment door.
Three slow knocks.
Then a woman's voice spoke from the hallway.
"Sloan, sweetheart. Open the door."
Caspian went pale.
Sloan recognized the voice immediately.
May you like
Victoria Reed.
And she wasn't alone.
