Chapter 1 - THE DISAPPEARANCE
The digital clock on Lena's nightstand glowed 4:15 AM, casting a harsh red light across the small, packed suitcase resting at the foot of her bed. Her hands were still trembling as she zipped it shut. The coffee she had brewed three hours ago sat cold and untouched on the kitchen counter, mirroring the heavy knot of ice settling deep in her chest.
She had spent the midnight hours meticulously burning bridges to her former life. She closed her bank accounts, withdrawing every single dollar of her meager savings in crisp, untraceable cash. She unlinked her email accounts, smashed her old smartphone into the kitchen sink with a heavy hammer, and tossed the plastic pieces into separate outdoor trash bins three blocks apart.
Dominic Moretti was not an ordinary man; he was a phantom with tentacles reaching into every corner of the city. If she wanted to stay hidden—if she wanted to keep her unborn child safe from the underworld executioner she had accidentally unmasked—she couldn't just move across town. She had to vanish entirely.
A soft tap at her apartment door froze the breath in her lungs.
"Lena?"
Dominic’s voice, low and muffled through the solid wood, sent a shockwave of terror straight down her spine.
"Lena, I know you’re in there. Please, open the door. Let me explain what you saw last night."
She pressed her back against the kitchen wall, holding her breath, her hand resting protectively over her flat stomach. The memory of the parking garage flashed behind her eyes—the kneeling man, the cold calculations, the terrifying click of the gun, and the absolute void in Dominic's eyes when he pulled the trigger.
"Lena, don't do this," his voice lowered, carrying a desperate, dangerous edge. "If you run from me, you won't survive the week. Not because of me—because you saw things you shouldn't have, and others will hunt you if they think you talk. Only I can keep you safe."
May you like
That was his ultimate manipulation. Even wrapped in a threat, he made it sound like devotion.
Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She gripped her duffel bag, crept silently toward the back service exit of her apartment building, and stepped out into the freezing November dawn, leaving her old world behind forever.
