Chapter 8 - THE DEAD DOCTORDamian heard Vance’s shout and stopped running.
That was the first time Elena understood how dangerous he truly was.
Most men froze because of fear.
Damian froze because something inside him had chosen violence and was waiting for permission.
Marco grabbed his arm.
“Boss, not here.”
Damian did not move.
Vance stood in the motel doorway under the flickering yellow light, rain blowing past him into the room. He did not look like a doctor anymore. He looked like a ghost that had learned to enjoy haunting the living.
“Elena Moretti,” Vance called. “You look better than the last time I saw you awake.”
Luciana made a wounded sound.
Elena’s hand went to her stomach, to the scar beneath her uniform, to the place where Vance had taken her child from her body and handed her to another woman.
Damian stepped forward.
Vance’s smile faded slightly.
“I wouldn’t,” Vance said. “Carmela has people everywhere tonight. Police scanners. Hospital contacts. Judges. You start a street war over a waitress, Damian, and by morning the city will know you lost control because a toddler said one word.”
Damian’s voice was calm.
“You signed the papers.”
“I signed many papers.”
“You stole a baby.”
Vance shrugged.
“I moved a child from a collapsing life into a protected one.”
Elena surged forward, but Marco held her back.
“Protected?” she screamed. “You told me she was dead!”
Vance looked at her with mild irritation.
“You were poor, unmarried, unstable after delivery, and heavily medicated. Carmela offered the child a future.”
“She offered you money,” Elena spat.
His smile returned.
“She offered me survival.”
Sirens wailed in the distance.
Marco’s head turned.
“Boss, we need to move.”
Vance heard it too and smiled wider.
“I called them myself. Reported a kidnapping. A dangerous man fleeing with a child and a mentally unstable woman.”
Damian’s eyes darkened.
“What child?”
Vance’s smile faltered.
Elena understood at the same time Damian did.
Sofia was not with them.
Sofia was at Miriam Shaw’s house.
Vance did not know.
Damian stepped closer.
For the first time, Vance looked afraid.
“You were always too sentimental,” Vance said. “Your mother said it would ruin you.”
“My mother says many things.”
“She built you.”
“No,” Damian said. “She used me.”
The first police cruiser turned into the motel lot.
Damian did not touch Vance.
He did something more terrifying.
He smiled.
“Run, doctor.”
Vance blinked.
Damian leaned in just enough that only the people closest could hear.
“Because when the law finds you, you will beg for prison. When Carmela finds out you failed, you will beg for the law. And when I find you after both, you will beg for your mother.”
Vance stepped back.
The sirens grew louder.
Damian turned away.
“Move.”
They reached the SUV as police lights washed the alley blue and red. Marco drove hard, but not recklessly. Damian made one phone call.
“Miriam. Status.”
Elena leaned forward, heart pounding.
Damian listened.
His face changed.
“What do you mean, gone?”
Elena could not breathe.
Damian’s voice dropped.
“Miriam.”
The SUV seemed to shrink around Elena.
Luciana began praying under her breath.
Damian closed his eyes for half a second.
Then he put the call on speaker.
Miriam’s voice came through strained but alive.
“I’m sorry. I did everything right. Your men were outside. Sofia was asleep upstairs. The power went out for maybe ninety seconds. Backup came on. One guard down in the garden. No blood. Just unconscious. Window open. Sofia gone.”
Elena made a sound no mother should ever make twice in one lifetime.
Damian gripped the phone so hard his knuckles whitened.
Miriam continued.
“There’s a note.”
Damian’s voice was empty.
“Read it.”
Miriam inhaled shakily.
“Blood can be corrected. Obedience can be taught. Bring Elena to the house by sunrise, or Sofia disappears properly this time.”
Elena snatched the phone.
“Where is she? Where did they take my daughter?”
Miriam’s voice softened with heartbreak.
“I don’t know.”
Elena turned on Damian.
“You promised.”
The words hit him harder than a weapon.
He did not defend himself.
He did not say it wasn’t his fault.
He did not remind her that Carmela had planned this for years.
He only said, “I will get her back.”
“You promised,” Elena repeated, sobbing. “You said no one would take her.”
Damian looked at her with eyes so bleak she almost looked away.
“I know.”
The SUV cut through Brooklyn toward Miriam’s house.
When they arrived, the street was crawling with Damian’s men, private security, and two unmarked cars Miriam had called through legal channels. Elena barely waited for the vehicle to stop before jumping out.
She ran upstairs.
Sofia’s borrowed blanket lay on the bed.
The wooden rabbit sat on the floor.
The window was open, rain blowing onto the curtains.
Elena picked up the rabbit and pressed it against her face.
Orange blossom.
Sofia had smelled like Elena now.
Carmela had taken her again.
Damian entered the room behind her.
Elena turned.
“You brought this into her life.”
His face tightened.
“My mother brought it.”
“And you brought your mother.”
That struck him silent.
Marco appeared at the doorway.
“Boss. We found something outside.”
In the garden, beneath the broken security light, there was a footprint in the mud. Small. A woman’s heel.
Beside it lay a gold earring shaped like a serpent.
Damian picked it up.
His expression changed.
Elena noticed.
“You know who wore that.”
“My mother.”
“Then she came herself?”
Damian stared at the earring.
“No.”
Marco looked confused.
Damian’s voice dropped.
“My mother has not worn these since Bianca died.”
Elena’s heart pounded.
“Why?”
Damian looked toward the dark street.
“Because they belonged to Bianca.”
Luciana gasped.
Elena slowly turned.
“What are you saying?”
Damian’s face was pale now.
“I buried my wife two years ago.”
Marco whispered, “Boss…”
Damian closed his fist around the earring.
“But if Carmela is using Bianca’s jewelry tonight, either she wants me to think of my dead wife…”
May you like
He looked at Elena.
“Or Bianca never died.”
