Chapter 2 - THE CHILD ANNA HID
I had faced bullets with steadier hands than the ones I had when Emily Carter told me Anna had a child.
My first thought was that she was lying.
My second was that I wanted her to be lying.
The third never arrived.
Because Lily was standing beside the mattress, staring at me with the same gray-blue eyes I had seen every morning in the mirror.
Not exactly mine.
Not exactly Anna's.
Something between us.
Something impossible.
I looked at Emily.
"Start talking."
She tried to sit up.
Lily pushed a pillow behind her.
"Mommy, don't."
Emily coughed.
I saw the tremor move through her shoulders.
"You're sick."
"I know."
"What did you mean?"
Emily looked at Lily.
Then at me.
"Anna had a daughter."
My jaw tightened.
"When?"
"Seven years ago."
I did the math.
Lily was six.
The room seemed to shrink.
"You're saying Lily is Anna's daughter?"
Emily nodded.
"Then who is the father?"
She looked directly at me.
"You."
I heard one of my guards inhale sharply.
I turned toward him.
"Leave."
"But—"
"All of you."
The men hesitated.
I didn't raise my voice.
I didn't need to.
Within seconds, the apartment was silent except for Lily's breathing.
I sat in the only chair.
"Emily."
She looked exhausted.
"Anna and I were friends before you met her."
"I know every friend Anna had."
"No, you know every friend she allowed you to know."
The words landed hard.
I leaned forward.
"Tell me everything."
Emily looked at Lily.
"She was pregnant when she met you."
My hands closed into fists.
"That's impossible."
"Why?"
"Because Anna told me she couldn't have children."
Emily's expression softened with something that looked almost like pity.
"She lied."
I stood so quickly the chair scraped the floor.
"Why?"
"Because she was afraid."
"Of me?"
"Of what would happen if you knew."
I laughed once, but there was no humor in it.
"She was my wife."
"Exactly."
I stared at her.
Emily continued.
"Anna found out she was pregnant shortly before she met you. The father was a man she had been involved with before your relationship became serious. He disappeared when he learned about the pregnancy."
"Who?"
"Daniel."
I froze.
Daniel Mercer.
A name I had not heard in years.
A man who had once tried to enter my territory through the back door.
A man who had died in what the police called a robbery.
I had known he was involved with Anna before me.
I had never known he was Lily's biological father.
"Daniel Mercer is dead."
"Yes."
"How?"
Emily looked away.
"I don't know."
But she did.
I could see it.
"You know more than you're saying."
Emily's lips trembled.
"Anna believed Daniel would come back."
"He didn't."
"No."
"Then why did she hide Lily?"
"Because Daniel wasn't the only person who knew."
I waited.
"Who else?"
"The Mercer family."
My stomach hardened.
Of course.
Everything came back to the same name.
The Mercers had been trying to reclaim territory from me for years. They had lost three major operations to my organization and blamed me for the collapse of their old network.
If they knew Anna had a child connected to Daniel, Lily wasn't simply a secret.
She was leverage.
"Why didn't Anna tell me?"
Emily wiped her eyes.
"Because she thought you would see Lily as a weakness."
I stared at the child.
Lily was sitting on the floor with the rose in her lap.
She was humming softly.
She had no idea her entire life had just become a battlefield.
"Where have you been all these years?"
"Protecting her."
"From whom?"
"Anyone who might ask questions."
I looked around the apartment.
"You call this protection?"
Emily lowered her head.
"I ran out of money."
"Why didn't you come to me?"
"Anna made me promise."
That sentence hurt more than anything else.
"What exactly did she make you promise?"
Emily looked at me.
"If anything happened to her, I was supposed to keep Lily hidden until she was old enough to understand."
"How old?"
"Eighteen."
I shook my head.
"She would have spent twelve years believing she had no father."
Emily's eyes filled again.
"Anna believed that was safer."
I walked to the window.
Chicago stretched beyond the glass.
Millions of people.
Thousands of secrets.
And somewhere in that city, someone knew my wife's secret.
"Why did Lily come to my garden today?"
"She recognized the house."
"How?"
"Anna showed her a photograph."
I turned.
"What photograph?"
"Your wedding."
My chest tightened.
"Anna told her about me?"
"She told her everything except your name."
"Why?"
"She wanted Lily to know that her father was not a monster."
I looked at the child.
"What did she tell you?"
Lily looked up.
"Mommy said Daddy was brave."
I couldn't answer.
She continued.
"She said he was scary to bad people but nice to people he loved."
My throat tightened.
"Did she say anything else?"
Lily nodded.
"She said if I ever met you, I should give you something."
She reached beneath her dress.
Her fingers closed around the pendant.
"What?"
"This."
She removed it.
I took it from her.
The silver was warm from her skin.
I recognized the engraving on the back.
A.
M.
Forever.
My initials.
Anna had given me the pendant on our wedding night.
Or so I had thought.
I turned it over.
There was a seam along the edge.
I had never noticed it.
I pressed my thumb against the metal.
The pendant opened.
Inside was a tiny photograph.
Anna.
Holding a newborn baby.
And written beneath the photograph in her handwriting were five words:
IF JACK EVER FINDS YOU, TRUST HIM.
I sat down.
For the first time in twenty years, I felt genuinely afraid.
Not for myself.
For Lily.
Because if Anna had prepared a message for me, she must have believed something terrible would happen.
I looked at Emily.
"Who is looking for Lily?"
She hesitated.
Then someone knocked on the apartment door.
Three slow knocks.
Emily went white.
Lily ran toward me.
"Mommy?"
I pulled her behind my body.
Another knock.
Then a man's voice came through the door.
"Emily Carter."
My hand moved toward the gun beneath my jacket.
The voice continued.
"We know the girl is inside."
I looked at Emily.
She whispered one word.
"Mercer."
The door handle began to turn.
I stayed at the apartment until Emily fell asleep.
Lily sat beside me on the floor.
She had found an old box of crayons and was drawing flowers on the back of an electricity bill.
"Are these for Mommy?"
"Some."
"What about the rest?"
"For you."
She drew a large red circle.
"That's Daddy."
I raised an eyebrow.
"Why am I a circle?"
"Because you're big."
I laughed.
It surprised me.
The sound felt unfamiliar.
Lily grinned.
Then she asked the question I had been dreading.
"Did you know I was born?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because your mother was trying to keep you safe."
"From you?"
"No."
"From bad people?"
"Yes."
She considered that.
"Are you a bad person?"
The apartment seemed to hold its breath.
I could have lied.
Instead, I said, "I've done bad things."
Lily looked at me seriously.
"Are you sorry?"
I thought about every man whose blood had stained my hands.
Every family that had lost someone because of decisions I had made.
"Sometimes."
She frowned.
"Only sometimes?"
I almost smiled.
"You ask difficult questions."
"Mommy says questions are how you find the truth."
I looked at Emily sleeping.
"Your mother was right."
Lily went back to drawing.
After several minutes, she pushed the paper toward me.
"That's you."
The circle had become a stick figure wearing a crown.
"Do I have to wear a crown?"
"You're a daddy."
I looked at the drawing.
"I think I prefer this crown."
She smiled.
My phone vibrated.
A message from my security chief.
THREE VEHICLES OBSERVED NEAR THE BUILDING.
I stood.
"Lily."
She looked up.
"Time to go home."
"With Mommy?"
"Yes."
Emily woke immediately.
"What happened?"
"We're leaving."
She saw my expression and didn't argue.
My men arrived within minutes.
We moved through the rear stairwell.
Outside, rain had begun.
Lily slipped her hand into mine.
She didn't ask where we were going.
She trusted me.
That trust felt heavier than any weapon I had ever carried.
When we reached the cars, I looked back at the apartment.
The place was poor.
Cramped.
Cold.
But it had kept my daughter alive for six years.
I would never forget that.
Before leaving, I looked at Emily.
"You protected her."
"I tried."
"You succeeded."
She looked surprised.
"Thank you."
It was the first time I had thanked anyone in years without expecting something in return.
As the convoy moved toward the mansion, Lily fell asleep against my shoulder.
I watched the city pass outside.
Chicago had always been a battlefield to me.
Tonight it looked like something else.
A place where an ordinary little girl could steal a flower from a dangerous man's garden and accidentally return his entire heart to him.
I looked down at her.
"Welcome home, Lily."
May you like
She didn't wake.
But her fingers tightened around mine.
