Chapter 11 - The Envelope Beneath My Door
Three weeks after Adrian Voss put an emerald ring on my finger, someone slid a photograph beneath my apartment door.
My mother found it first.
“Sophie?”
There was something in Clara’s voice that made me abandon the grocery bags in the hallway.
She stood beside the kitchen counter wearing her blue robe, the healthy color finally returning to her cheeks after months of treatment. In her trembling hand was a glossy black-and-white photograph.
It showed Adrian and me leaving Northwestern Memorial Hospital two nights earlier.
A red circle had been drawn around my face.
Across the bottom, someone had written:
THE ROSSI DEBT DIDN’T DIE WITH GIANCARLO.
My stomach dropped.
“Where did you get this?”
“Under the door.”
I immediately touched the sapphire pendant Adrian had insisted I keep wearing.
Security arrived in ninety seconds.
Adrian arrived in seven minutes.
He walked into our Lincoln Park brownstone without a coat despite the freezing rain outside. Marcus followed with two men carrying electronic scanners.
Adrian took one look at the photograph and became terrifyingly still.
“Pack a bag.”
I crossed my arms.
“No.”
“Sophie.”
“I’m not disappearing into your penthouse every time someone sends a creepy picture.”
“Someone photographed you outside your mother's oncology appointment.”
“And if I hide, what happens next? We stop leaving the building? Cancel the wedding? Live behind bulletproof glass?”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes, if necessary.”
“No.”
Clara wisely left the room.
Adrian moved closer.
“This isn't about controlling you.”
“Then stop giving orders.”
His expression cracked.
Fear.
Real fear.
“I buried Giancarlo Rossi,” he whispered. “I dismantled most of his organization. I took his ports, his money routes, his political protections. But organizations don't disappear because one man dies.”
“Who is left?”
He hesitated.
Wrong move.
“Adrian.”
“His daughter.”
I blinked.
“Giancarlo had a daughter?”
“Lucia Rossi.”
“How old?”
“Thirty-four.”
“What does she do?”
“Officially? International logistics.”
“And unofficially?”
“She rebuilt parts of her father's network in Montreal and New York.”
I stared at him.
“You knew she existed.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn't tell me.”
“I believed she wanted distance from her father’s war.”
“Clearly she changed her mind.”
Adrian looked at the photograph again.
Marcus returned from the hallway.
“No forced entry. Camera across the street caught a courier in a motorcycle helmet. Plate was stolen.”
Adrian turned.
“Find Lucia.”
“We’re already working it.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone froze.
I answered before Adrian could stop me.
“Sophie Carter.”
A woman laughed softly.
Her voice was smooth, educated, almost warm.
“Future Mrs. Voss.”
“Lucia?”
Adrian’s eyes darkened.
“Smart girl.”
“What do you want?”
“To correct a misunderstanding.”
“What misunderstanding?”
“My father was a monster.”
That answer surprised me.
“I’m not mourning him,” Lucia continued. “He beat my mother, murdered my uncle, and treated me like property.”
“Then why threaten me?”
“I didn't.”
I looked at the photograph.
“You circled my face.”
“To get Adrian’s attention.”
Adrian took the phone from my hand.
“You have it.”
Lucia laughed.
“Adrian. Still dramatic.”
“What do you want?”
“One meeting.”
“No.”
“Then Sophie learns the truth from strangers.”
I grabbed the phone back.
“What truth?”
Silence.
Then Lucia said, “Ask your fiancé what happened to your father.”
My body went cold.
My father, Michael Carter, died when I was fourteen.
A construction accident.
A collapsed scaffolding platform near the Chicago River.
At least that was what my mother told me.
I turned toward Adrian.
His face had changed.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
“Adrian?”
He said nothing.
That silence hurt more than any answer.
Lucia whispered through the phone.
“He knows.”
The call ended.
I stared at Adrian.
“You knew my father?”
“No.”
“You knew something.”
“Yes.”
My throat tightened.
“What?”
Adrian looked toward Clara’s bedroom.
Then back at me.
“Your father’s death wasn't an accident.”
The room seemed to tilt.
I stepped backward.
“What are you talking about?”
“He worked for a company owned by my father.”
I stopped breathing.
Adrian continued carefully.
“Your father discovered financial records connected to the old Voss organization.”
“And?”
“He threatened to expose them.”
I could hear my heartbeat.
“What happened?”
Adrian's voice broke.
“He died forty-eight hours later.”
I stared at the man I loved.
The man I was supposed to marry.
The man who had rescued me from Giancarlo Rossi.
May you like
And suddenly I did not know whether I had fallen in love with my salvation—
or the heir to the family that destroyed mine.
