CHAPTER 2 The Son He Never Knew
Dante Moretti had been shot twice, stabbed once, betrayed by men he had trusted, and forced to bury people whose names he still remembered in the dark.
None of it had prepared him for the sight of his own son holding a plastic blue car.
He sat in the rear seat of the armored SUV with Matteo asleep against Sofia’s chest and watched the city disappear behind them.
Six hours.
That was how far she had lived from him.
Six fucking hours.
For three years, he had torn apart airports, hotels, border records, medical systems, financial networks, and private databases across half the world while Sofia had been hiding in a coastal town close enough that he could have reached her before midnight.
He should have been furious.
He was furious.
But anger was no longer the clean emotion it had been that morning.
Now it had become tangled with something unfamiliar.
Grief.
Dante did not like grief.
Grief made men weak. It made them hesitate. It made them look backward when they should be preparing for the next threat.
Yet every time his eyes moved toward Matteo, he felt the weight of everything he had missed.
The boy was asleep with his cheek pressed against Sofia’s shoulder, one small hand curled around the fabric of her sweater. His dark lashes rested against his skin.
Dante stared longer than he intended.
His son.
Even thinking the words felt strange.
His.
Matteo had his eyes.
His hair.
His expression.
Christ, even the way the boy had stared suspiciously at him felt familiar.
Dante remembered being shown photographs of himself at three years old. His mother used to laugh about how serious he had looked even as a child.
“You were born judging everyone,” she had once told him.
He wondered what she would have said about Matteo.
The thought hit harder than expected.
His mother had been dead for seven years.
She would never meet her grandson.
Another thing stolen by time.
Dante looked out the window.
The highway stretched beneath a gray afternoon sky.
Two security vehicles traveled ahead. Another followed behind. Luca had arranged everything within twenty minutes of receiving Dante’s call.
The town was already being searched.
The café.
The bakery.
The street where Sofia had lived.
Every camera within three blocks.
Every recent vehicle registration.
Every mobile device that had connected to nearby towers.
Someone had photographed Sofia and Matteo.
Someone had then sent that photograph directly to one of Dante’s private numbers.
That meant the threat was not random.
Someone wanted him to know.
Someone wanted him angry.
That was usually a mistake.
Across from him, Sofia shifted.
Dante looked at her.
She had changed into jeans and a dark sweater before they left, packing one suitcase for herself and another small bag for Matteo. She had insisted on carrying both until Dante took the larger suitcase from her without asking.
She had glared at him.
He had almost smiled.
Three years and she still hated being helped.
Her hair was shorter now, ending just below her shoulders. He preferred it long.
That should not have been the first thing he noticed when he saw her again.
But it had been.
He remembered burying his hands in that hair.
Remembered wrapping it around his fist while her mouth opened beneath his.
His body reacted before his mind could stop it.
Dante looked away.
Bad idea.
Sofia was no longer the woman who had been waiting to marry him.
She was the woman who had fled.
The woman who had hidden his son.
That should have killed whatever desire remained.
It had not.
That made him angrier.
“You’re staring.”
Her voice was quiet.
Dante turned his eyes toward her.
“You noticed.”
“I notice when someone has been looking at me for ten minutes.”
“I wasn’t looking at you.”
Sofia raised one eyebrow.
He glanced at Matteo.
“I was looking at him.”
Her expression softened despite herself.
That softness irritated him almost as much as it fascinated him.
She had always been different around children.
Gentler.
When they had attended family events years ago, she had spent more time talking to nieces and nephews than pretending to care about business negotiations.
He should have noticed.
Should have wondered what she would look like with a child of her own.
His child.
Instead, he had assumed they had years.
That assumption now felt like arrogance.
“How long has he been asleep?” Dante asked.
“Twenty minutes.”
“Does he normally sleep in the car?”
“If he’s tired.”
“What time does he nap?”
Sofia looked at him.
“What?”
“What time does he nap?”
“Usually after lunch.”
“What does he eat?”
She frowned.
“Dante.”
“What food does he like?”
“Why are you asking?”
“Because I don’t know.”
The words came sharper than he intended.
Silence filled the vehicle.
Sofia looked down at Matteo.
Dante immediately regretted his tone.
Not the question.
The tone.
That happened rarely enough to annoy him further.
He leaned back.
“I don’t know anything about him.”
Sofia said nothing.
“What does he eat?”
She exhaled.
“Pasta. Strawberries. Toast with too much butter. He hates peas.”
Dante stored each detail automatically.
“Milk?”
“Yes.”
“Any allergies?”
“No.”
“Medication?”
“No.”
“Does he get sick often?”
“Not really.”
“Doctor?”
She looked at him again.
“There’s a pediatric clinic in Port Azure.”
“I want the records transferred.”
“Why?”
“Because he’ll have a doctor in the city.”
Sofia’s face hardened.
“We are not staying in the city permanently.”
Dante did not answer immediately.
He had expected the argument.
He simply had not decided how much of the truth to give her.
The truth was that Sofia was not returning to Port Azure until he knew who had found her.
And Matteo certainly was not.
“No,” she said, reading his silence. “Absolutely not.”
“You’re not going back while someone is watching that apartment.”
“We can move somewhere else.”
“They found you after three years.”
“They found me because you came.”
Dante went still.
“What?”
“You arrive in town after three years, and suddenly someone takes a photo of me.”
His eyes narrowed.
“You think they followed me?”
“I think it’s possible.”
“It is.”
She blinked.
That was not the argument she expected.
Dante continued.
“Which is why you’re coming with me.”
“Your logic is unbelievable.”
“My logic keeps people alive.”
“Your life creates the danger in the first place.”
That landed.
He let it.
Because she was not entirely wrong.
His enemies were many.
His family name carried power, but power attracted men who wanted to take it.
Dante had spent most of his adult life accepting that danger as part of the position.
But Matteo had never chosen it.
Neither had Sofia.
The thought sat badly in his chest.
“You were already in danger three years ago,” he said.
Her gaze sharpened.
“That’s what you said.”
“I said marrying you would have caused it.”
“Then someone was threatening you before you disappeared.”
Sofia looked away.
Dante watched her face.
He had interrogated men who thought themselves incapable of breaking.
He knew how people reacted when they lied.
Sofia had always been easier.
Not because she was weak.
Because every emotion passed through her eyes before she could hide it.
Fear.
Anger.
Guilt.
Love.
He remembered love in those eyes.
Or what he had believed was love.
Perhaps that had been another mistake.
“Who threatened you?” he asked.
“No one.”
“You’re still lying.”
“Then stop asking.”
“I won’t.”
“I noticed.”
“Good.”
She glared at him.
Dante almost smiled again.
He hated how much he had missed that look.
“You’ve become even more impossible.”
“You’ve become worse at lying.”
“I survived three years without you.”
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“It proves I can take care of myself.”
Dante’s gaze dropped to Matteo.
“And him?”
Sofia’s eyes flashed.
“Don’t.”
“I’m asking a question.”
“No, you’re trying to insult me.”
“I’m trying to understand what kind of danger you believed was serious enough to run from.”
“I told you I can’t explain.”
“And I told you that answer is no longer acceptable.”
Matteo stirred.
Both of them stopped immediately.
Sofia adjusted him against her chest and kissed the top of his head.
Dante watched.
Something painful tightened under his ribs.
He had never pictured Sofia as a mother.
Now he could not understand how he had ever seen her any other way.
Matteo settled again.
Sofia lowered her voice.
“You need to stop speaking like he belongs to you.”
Dante stared at her.
“He is my son.”
“That doesn’t make him property.”
“I didn’t say property.”
“You say ‘mine’ like it does.”
He leaned forward.
“He is mine.”
Sofia’s expression hardened.
“And mine.”
“Yes.”
The simple agreement surprised her.
Dante continued.
“That is the problem.”
“What problem?”
“For three years, you behaved as though he was only yours.”
She flinched.
He saw it.
He did not enjoy it.
That bothered him.
Years ago, he would have used any weakness offered during an argument. That was how he survived rooms full of predators.
Sofia was different.
She had always been different.
“You don’t know what it was like,” she whispered.
“No.”
His voice became quieter.
“I don’t.”
She looked at him.
Dante held her gaze.
“I don’t know what it was like because you didn’t give me the chance.”
Pain moved across her face.
Then anger replaced it.
“I was terrified.”
“Of me?”
She hesitated.
“Partly.”
The answer cut deeper than he expected.
Dante leaned back.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Finally, he asked, “Did you believe I would hurt you?”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
Something inside him loosened.
“Matteo?”
“No.”
“Then what exactly were you afraid of?”
Sofia looked out the window.
“Everything around you.”
There it was.
Not him.
His world.
Perhaps that should have felt better.
It did not.
Dante had known since childhood what the Moretti name meant.
He had watched his father survive assassination attempts before breakfast and host senators at dinner.
He had learned early that family was both power and weakness.
What he had never considered was that Sofia might see marriage to him not as protection, but as a sentence.
“You agreed to marry me,” he said.
“Our families agreed.”