Chapter 2 - The Doctor Who Signed Our Death Certificates
Dante did not react to the name.
That was how I knew he remembered it.
Dr. Samuel Mercer had been the obstetrician listed on my medical records six years earlier.
He was also the physician whose signature appeared beneath two lies.
ELENA ROSSI MORETTI — DECEASED.
UNNAMED MALE INFANT — DECEASED.
Dante’s men surrounded the stranger who had stepped from the elevator.
He was perhaps fifty, thin, nervous, wearing a raincoat despite the clear night.
His hands were raised.
“I came alone.”
Dante glanced at his security chief.
“Search him.”
The man didn’t resist.
No weapon.
No phone.
Only the photograph.
Dante took it.
I moved beside him.
The picture had been taken inside St. Vincent’s private maternity wing.
I was unconscious in a hospital bed.
My face was pale.
A breathing tube covered my mouth.
Three infant bassinets stood near the bed.
My knees weakened.
I had never seen the picture.
Dante stared at the babies.
“Three.”
“Yes.”
My voice cracked.
“They were premature, but healthy.”
He touched the edge of the photograph.
For the first time since learning he was a father, the enormity seemed to become real.
Three bassinets.
Three sons.
Three lives he had missed.
“Who are you?” Dante asked the stranger.
“Peter Hale. I worked hospital security.”
“Worked?”
“They fired me two days after she disappeared.”
Dante looked at him.
“Why come now?”
Peter glanced toward the boys.
“Because whoever paid to erase that night started cleaning up witnesses this week.”
I felt cold.
“Why this week?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who contacted you?”
“Nobody. My former supervisor died Tuesday. Supposed heart attack. He was fifty-three.”
Dante said, “And you think it wasn’t natural.”
“I know it wasn’t.”
Peter reached slowly inside his coat.
Three guns moved toward him.
He froze.
“Envelope.”
Dante nodded.
Peter removed it carefully.
Inside were photocopied security logs.
Most of the entries meant nothing to me.
Then I saw one name.
VITTORIO MORETTI.
My stomach dropped.
Dante did not move.
Vittorio was Dante’s uncle.
His father’s younger brother.
The man who had raised Dante after his parents were murdered.
The man who stood beside Dante at my funeral.
The man who had put one hand on my coffin and told Dante, “She’s with God now.”
“No,” Dante said.
Peter looked uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry.”
“This proves he entered the hospital.”
“Yes.”
“It proves nothing else.”
Peter nodded.
“There’s more.”
Dante’s gaze sharpened.
“Where?”
“Original surveillance footage.”
My heartbeat changed.
Dante looked at me.
I understood instantly.
The flash drive.
The nurse.
The bracelet.
Peter continued.
“The hospital’s official footage from that night was erased. But someone made a backup before the servers were wiped.”
“A nurse named Anna?” I asked.
Peter’s eyes widened.
“You knew her?”
“She helped me escape.”
Peter exhaled.
“Then she gave you the copy.”
I glanced at Luca.
Dante followed my eyes.
He understood.
“No.”
I whispered, “I didn’t know where else to keep it.”
He crouched beside Luca.
“Can I see your bracelet?”
Luca looked at me.
I nodded.
Dante removed it carefully.
His fingers were surprisingly gentle.
He examined the clasp.
Nothing.
I pressed a tiny notch inside the crest.
The face popped open.
Beneath it sat a micro-drive no larger than a fingernail.
Dante stared at me.
“You’ve carried this around on our son?”
“No one knew.”
“Someone knows now.”
Peter said, “Then you need to copy it immediately.”
Dante turned to his security chief.
“Private room. Offline computer.”
We moved into a locked office above the restaurant.
The boys were taken into an adjacent lounge with food, movies, and two guards I personally approved after checking their faces against every Moretti employee I remembered.
Dante noticed.
“You don’t trust anyone.”
“I learned from your family.”
His jaw tightened.
The computer was disconnected from the network.
Peter inserted the drive.
Folders appeared.
Security cameras.
Medical scans.
Audio recordings.
Documents.
There were hundreds of files.
I stared.
“I never opened it.”
Dante looked at me.
“Never?”
“Anna told me if anyone discovered I had seen what was inside, the boys would die.”
He leaned back.
“And you believed her.”
“I had just been told you ordered my death.”
That silenced him.
His face changed.
“Who told you that?”
“Your uncle.”
Dante stopped breathing.
I had carried that truth alone for six years.
Now it was between us.
“Vittorio came into my hospital room after the delivery. You were supposed to be there.”
“I was in Boston.”
“I know that now.”
His eyes darkened.
“He told me you had discovered the babies might not be yours.”
Dante stared at me.
“He said you wanted the problem handled before the board learned you had an illegitimate family.”
“Elena.”
“I was drugged. Terrified. The boys had been taken away. He showed me a message from your phone.”
“What message?”
My throat tightened.
“‘Finish it before I return.’”
Dante stood so suddenly the chair rolled backward.
“I never sent that.”
“I know.”
“You know now.”
“Yes.”
He turned away.
For a moment I could see the man he had been six years ago, buried beneath anger.
Then he asked, “Why didn’t you contact me later?”
“Because people kept dying.”
I told him everything.
Anna moved me through a service elevator.
A car waited behind the hospital.
My mother was already inside.
Someone had told her Dante’s organization intended to kill us.
We drove to Pennsylvania.
Then Ohio.
Then Oregon.
Different names.
Different apartments.
For eighteen months, we never stayed anywhere longer than six weeks.
Every time I considered contacting Dante, something happened.
A former nurse vanished.
My old attorney died in a car crash.
A package arrived containing a photograph of the boys asleep.
Dante turned slowly.
“They photographed them?”
“When they were nine months old.”
His eyes became black.
“Why didn’t you go to the police?”
“I did.”
“What?”
“I met an FBI agent in Philadelphia.”
Dante stared.
“What happened?”
“He asked me where the drive was.”
“And?”
“Three days later, he disappeared.”
Peter whispered, “Agent Holloway.”
I looked at him.
“You know that name?”
“He was investigating the hospital.”
Dante sat again.
“Play the footage.”
Peter opened the oldest video file.
A hospital corridor appeared.
Timestamp:
JUNE 14, 2020 — 2:11 A.M.
A nurse rolled a bassinet through the hallway.
Another followed.
Then a third.
My sons.
Dante leaned closer.
The camera switched.
Vittorio entered.
He was younger but unmistakable.
Beside him walked Dr. Mercer.
They entered a private conference room.
No audio.
Peter opened another file.
This one had sound.
Static.
Then Vittorio’s voice.
“Moretti believes there is one child.”
Mercer replied, “There are three.”
Silence in the room around us.
Vittorio spoke again.
“Then there are three problems.”
Dante’s hand closed into a fist.
Mercer asked, “What about the mother?”
“She dies too.”
My stomach turned.
I had known.
But hearing it was different.
Peter looked away.
The recording continued.
Mercer sounded nervous.
“You said Dante approved this.”
Vittorio laughed.
“If Dante knew what I was doing, I wouldn’t live through sunrise.”
Dante went completely still.
I stared at the screen.
The sentence destroyed the last piece of the lie.
Dante had never wanted us dead.
Vittorio had known that.
He had acted alone.
Or almost alone.
Mercer asked, “Why?”
Vittorio stepped closer to the camera.
His voice became quieter.
“Because children change men. And men who become fathers stop being useful.”
The footage ended.
I covered my mouth.
Dante stared at the black screen.
He had lost six years because his uncle feared fatherhood would make him weak.
Dante finally spoke.
“Where is Mercer?”
Peter hesitated.
“I don’t know.”
“You came here saying he was alive.”
“He contacted me yesterday.”
Dante turned.
“What did he say?”
“He wants protection.”
“From whom?”
Peter swallowed.
“Vittorio.”
A phone rang.
Everyone looked at Peter.
“I thought you didn’t have a phone,” Dante said.
Peter’s face drained of color.
The ringing came from inside his coat lining.
One of Dante’s men found a tiny device sewn into the fabric.
A tracker.
Peter looked horrified.
“I didn’t know.”
Dante ripped it free.
The screen showed one incoming message.
YOU SHOULD HAVE RUN.
Then the lights went out.
Total darkness.
I heard glass break downstairs.
Dante grabbed me and pulled me behind the desk.
Gunfire erupted from the restaurant.
The boys.
I tried to stand.
Dante held me.
“My sons are down there!”
“So are twelve armed men protecting them.”
“They need me!”
“They need you alive.”
Another burst of gunfire.
Then silence.
Too much silence.
Dante touched his earpiece.
“Marco?”
Nothing.
Again.
“Marco.”
Static.
My heart stopped.
Then a child screamed from the hallway.
“Mom!”
I ran.
Dante followed.
The lounge door stood open.
Two guards were unconscious.
Matteo and Nico were huddled beside the couch.
Luca was gone.
On the carpet lay his silver bracelet.
The hidden drive had been removed.
And beside it was a note.
Dante picked it up.
May you like
Three words were written across the paper.
BRING ME ELENA.
