Chapter 5
918 Words
Emilia hardly slept that night. The shock of seeing Alexander at the gala had her mind in chaos.
She kept picturing his face and playing his words repeatedly in her head. I never chose to leave you. I was forced.
The moment replayed repeatedly again and again—Alex's shock when he learned he had a son, the note of urgency in his voice, and how he vanished so quickly into that car like a fugitive.
The past three years had left her with questions, and now she had more questions than answers. Daniel's blocks, which were strewn all over the carpeting, glinted in the early light that slanted across her flat. He sat in his pyjamas cross-legged, humming to himself as he built towers with his Lego blocks.
Emilia watched him with fear, her chest tightening as she remembered what Alexander had said. Protect him. That’s what he had said.
What was she protecting Daniel from?
Her phone vibrated on the counter. She saw it was a text from Sofia:
We need to talk. Call me as soon as you can.
Emilia called her immediately. “Sof? What’s wrong?”
Sofia’s voice was tense. “Who was the man you ran after outside the gala last night? He looked so much like Alexander. That was him, wasn’t it?”
Emilia swallowed. “Sof. It was him. I’m still in shock. He’s alive.”
There was a long pause as Sofia absorbed the shocking news. She exhaled sharply. “Oh my, Emi. After all this time, was it really him? What did he say?”
Emilia sighed. “That it wasn’t his choice to leave. That he was coerced. And then he vanished again into a black car.” Emilia’s voice cracked. “I didn’t know when I blurted out about Daniel. He knows now.”
Sofia cursed softly under her breath. “This is going to escalate, you realise that, right? If the press catches even the faintest news that he is back…”
“I don’t give a damn about the press,” Emilia cut in, her gaze fixed on Daniel, who was now making funny airplane sounds with his blocks. “I care only about my son. And what Alex really meant by saying I had to protect him.”
The line went quiet, except for Sofia’s shaky breathing. Finally, she said, “Then we will do this together. Whatever he is hiding, we will find out”
That night, after Daniel was asleep, Emilia sat at her desk and went to work on her laptop. She typed Alexander’s name into the search bar with her fingers trembling.
The headlines were the same as usual —expansions of his business, charity events from years ago, and speculations about his strange disappearance. Some articles painted him as a runaway groom; others hinted at darker theories: debts, mafia ties, and betrayal within his family’s empire.
But then a recent headline caught her eye:
“Cross Family Linked to International Investigation—FBI Silent on Allegations.”
Her stomach flipped. She clicked on it. The article was thin on facts and heavy on speculation. But one line stood out:
Unnamed sources suggest the Cross family may be entangled in organised crime networks from San Francisco to Eastern Europe.
Emilia gasped and slammed the laptop shut, her pulse racing. Organised crime. FBI investigations. No wonder Alex had said he was forced to leave.
What was Alex entangled in? What terrified her the most was the thought of Daniel being connected to that world, even unknowingly.
A scrappy sound startled her. She turned towards the window where it came from, it was dark, and she couldn’t see clearly.
Her eyes darted toward the curtains, and her body felt frozen in fear. Slowly, she forced herself to rise; her bare feet moved silently on the hardwood floor. She reached for the reading lamp, but before she could switch it on, the curtain shifted.
A dark shadow loomed outside the glass.
Her heart leapt to her throat, she snatched the nearest object her hand could find, a heavy vase from the table, and held it tight.
Then the shadow moved away swiftly.
The scrape of shoes against the fire escape faded into the night.
Emilia stood immobile for a long moment, every muscle trembling.
When she finally dared to look, a small white envelope was wedged against the window frame.
Her hands shook badly as she slid the glass open and picked it up. There was no name and no return address. Just one folded sheet of paper inside.
Her stomach dropped as she read the warning, scrawled in blocky handwriting:
“Stay silent about Cross. Or your son won’t live to see his fourth birthday.”
The vase crashed to the ground, shattering across the floor, as it slipped from her hand.
Daniel stirred in his sleep down the hall, his small whimper carrying through the silence.
Emilia pressed the paper to her chest, her body shaking with terror and fury.
For three years, she’d tried to move on from Alex. For three years, she’d built a safe world for her son.
And now it was unravelling for reasons she knew nothing of.
She had two choices: run, as she once wanted to, or fight, with everything she had.
Emilia lifted her chin in defiance, tears dried on her cheeks. Whoever had sent that note underestimated her.
Because she would never allow anyone to threaten her child and walk away unscathed.
- Writer
