Chapter 2 - The Confrontation in the FoyerI grabbed Maya’s pink jacket and Leo’s small backpack, pulling both children gently out of the booth.
Leo reached for my hand, his dark eyes never leaving Luca’s face. "Mom, why is he looking at us like that?"
"It’s okay, Leo," I murmured, pressing a soft kiss to his forehead. "Put your arms through your sleeves, baby."
Luca reached out his broad hand—the hand that had held mine through five years of marriage, the hand that had signed the divorce papers without a second thought—and placed his palm flat against the wood of the booth, trapping me against the table.
"You don't get to walk away from this, Nia," Luca growled softly, his baritone trembling with an uncontrollable mix of rage and desperate plea. "They have my eyes. They have my jaw. You knew I wanted a family more than anything in the world!"
"You wanted a family, Luca?" I asked, leaning in close enough so only he could hear my whisper. "No. You wanted an heir to Moretti Global. And when you convinced yourself I was broken, you threw me out like trash."
Evelyn stepped in between us, her face flushed with humiliation as patrons at nearby tables began whispering and pointing their phones.
"Luca, stop this right now!" Evelyn hissed, her fingers digging into his arm. "People are watching! We have a meeting with the governor's committee in twenty minutes! Let her go!"
Luca turned his dark, terrifying glare onto Evelyn.
The look was so cold, so utterly devoid of warmth or respect, that Evelyn instinctively backed away two paces, her jaw dropping in shock.
"Cancel the governor," Luca commanded cleanly, his voice echoing off the glass walls of the foyer.
"What?!" Evelyn gasped.
"Cancel the meeting, Evelyn," Luca repeated, every word dropped like stone. "And take the car back to the penthouse."
"Luca, you can't be serious!" Evelyn shrieked softly. "She's your ex-wife! You don't even know if those kids are—"
"If you finish that sentence," Luca interrupted, his voice dropping into a register so dark it sent a chill through the entire foyer, "you will never step foot inside Moretti Global again."
Evelyn froze. The color completely drained from her face as she realized that the polished, perfect life she had built with the most powerful man in Chicago had just fractured into a million pieces.
I didn't wait to watch her break. I hoisted Leo into my left arm, took Maya’s hand in my right, and walked straight past Luca toward the private elevator bank.
As the heavy brass doors began to slide shut, I looked up.
May you like
Luca stood in the center of the foyer, his dark suit rumpled, his gray eyes burning with an unholy, possessive fire as he watched the doors close on his children.
"I will find you, Nia," he promised softly before the brass doors sealed us away. "I will find all three of you."
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