Chapter 3 - The Shadow of Guilt
“He’s insane, Sophia. The man is clearly having a psychological break.”
Julian Vance’s voice was dry, dripping with disdain as he signaled two private security guards who flanking them.
“Vincent, please!” Sophia rushed forward, grabbing Vincent’s arm again, her voice high and trembling with calculated fragility. “Everyone is watching. Look at her—she doesn't even know you. Anna is gone. You’re humiliating us!”
Vincent didn't feel Sophia’s touch. He couldn't hear the murmurs of the elite crowd circling them like vultures. His entire universe had narrowed down to the little boy clinging to Diana Sterling’s neck.
Three years old.
The timeline slammed into Vincent’s gut with the force of a freight train.
When the jet went down, Anna was five months pregnant.
*“I’m taking Sophia out first,”* his own voice echoed in his mind, sickeningly clear. *“I promise I’ll come back for you.”*
He had lied. The fire had taken her before he could fulfill the promise. Or so he had believed.
“Diana,” Julian Vance said softly, placing a protective hand on the small of Diana’s back. “Let’s take Leo to the suite. We’ve accomplished what we came here to do tonight anyway.”
“A wonderful idea, darling,” Diana replied, offering Julian a warm, breathtaking smile that ripped through Vincent’s chest like shrapnel. She never smiled at Vincent like that anymore. In the old days, her smiles had been tender, shy, full of reverence. This smile was intimate. Practiced. Shared with another man.
She turned and began walking toward the private elevators, her emerald dress trailing gracefully across the polished stone.
“Anna! Stop!” Vincent lunged forward, but Julian stepped directly into his path, his jaw set in stone.
“One more step toward her, Moretti,” Julian whispered, loud enough only for Vincent to hear, “and I won't just ruin your night. I will dismantle Moretti Industries brick by bloody brick. Back off.”
Vincent’s hands clenched into fists, his knuckles turning white. “She is Anna Bennett Moretti. That boy is my blood.”
Julian smiled thinly, a cold, mocking smirk that made Vincent want to tear the man’s throat out. “She doesn't belong to you. And neither does the boy. Move on, Moretti. Before you lose what little dignity you have left.”
Julian turned on his heel and followed Diana, leaving Vincent standing in the middle of the crowded gala, breathing heavily, his chest heaving as if he had just run a marathon through hell.
“Vincent, let’s go home,” Sophia pleaded, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “Please. You’re scaring me.”
Vincent slowly turned his head to look at Sophia.
For the first time in three years, the veil dropped from his eyes. He looked at the flawless blond hair, the delicate face, the woman he had chosen to pull out of that smoke-filled cabin while his pregnant wife sat alone in the dark.
Sophia had spent three years consoling him. Sophia had spent three years slowly moving her things into his home, warming his bed, whispering that it wasn't his fault, that he had made the only choice he could.
*I’m taking Sophia out first.*
A sudden wave of absolute revulsion washed over him—not just toward Sophia, but toward himself.
Vincent pulled his arm roughly away from her grasp.
“Call Marcus,” Vincent ordered, his voice dead, devoid of all emotion.
“What?” Sophia blinked, startled. “Marcus? Your head of intelligence? Why?”
“Call him,” Vincent rasped, staring at the elevator doors that had just closed behind Diana and the boy. “Tell him to bring every surveillance feed, every passenger manifest, every hospital record from the last three years in North America and Europe. I want Diana Sterling’s entire life on my desk by midnight.”
“Vincent, she said her name is Diana!” Sophia cried out, her voice cracking with suppressed terror. “Why can’t you just let the dead rest?!”
Vincent didn't answer. He turned and walked out of the ballroom, his mind consumed by a singular, burning fire.
Anna wasn't dead.
May you like
And she had taken his son with her.
***
