Chapter 3 - The Sanctuary and the Photograph
Mercy Lakes Medical Center’s underground garage loomed ahead like a sanctuary. Frank whipped the Mercedes into the ambulance bay just as the black Tahoe slowed to a halt outside the gate, watching before turning away.
A medical team rushed forward as the door opened. When Natalie stood, a warm rush of fluid soaked through her clothes, turning her face pale.
"My water broke," she whispered.
Nurses swarmed around her, lifting her onto a gurney and wheeling her toward the emergency maternity ward. Before rushing inside, Frank picked up Natalie’s abandoned phone from the floor mat. Michael was still on the line.
"Your wife is in premature labor," Frank said, his voice shaking with anger.
A heavy silence stretched across the line. Then, Michael coldly replied, "Call me when you know something," and hung up.
Frank stared at the dead screen in sheer disbelief. He had served the DeLuca family for decades, but the absolute cruelty in Michael’s voice crossed a line he never thought possible. As he lowered the phone, a scrap of paper tucked under the Mercedes's windshield wiper caught his eye.
Frowning, Frank pulled it out. It was a photograph printed just an hour earlier. It showed Natalie standing at the gala, one hand protecting her swollen belly. The lens had zoomed in sharply on a vintage silver falcon bracelet around her wrist—an heirloom she wore every day.
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Engraved on the back were five words: WE FOUND LUCIA BELLINI.
Frank stopped breathing. The name echoed in his mind like a death knell. He knew who Lucia Bellini was, and if that photograph had reached the right hands, Michael DeLuca had just signed his own destruction.
