Chapter 6 - Vanishing in the Fog
The ink was barely dry when I snatched the documents off the desk, slid them back into my folder, and walked straight toward the master bedroom.
"Elena, wait!" Dante followed me, his footsteps heavy, frantic. "Where are you going? It's midnight! You can't just leave in the middle of a storm!"
I didn't answer. I pulled out a single duffel bag from the closet—pre-packed with my passport, my birth certificate, and the original ultrasound images Miriam had slipped into an unmarked envelope.
I didn't take the diamond necklaces. I didn't take the Birkin bags he had bought to compensate for late nights at the office. I didn't take the furs or the couture dresses. I took three sweaters, a pair of jeans, and my mother’s silver locket.
When I reached the front door, Dante blocked the frame with his body. He was crying openly now—the ruthless, untouchable titan of Chicago finance reduced to a shattered shell.
"Don't do this," he begged, dropping to his knees and wrapping his arms around my waist, pressing his forehead against my stomach.
The irony was suffocating. His head was resting millimeters away from his twin children—the heirs he had delayed for a corporate seat, the children he would never know existed.
"Please, Elena," he sobbed against my coat. "I'll step down as CEO tomorrow. I'll give it all to my uncle. I don't care about the board. I don't care about Sofia. I only care about you. Don't leave me alone in this place."
For half a second, the phantom of the boy I had fallen in love with flashed before my eyes. The charming, brilliant man who had promised to protect me from the world.
*He didn't protect me from the world,* I reminded myself coldly. *He protected his money from me.*
I reached down, grabbed his wrists, and pried his fingers off my coat with cold, deliberate precision.
"You chose your empire, Dante," I said softly. "Now you have to live in it."
I stepped around him, entered the private elevator, and pressed the button for the garage.
As the polished brass doors slid shut, the last image I had of my husband was Dante Moretti kneeling on the cold marble floor of his multi-million-dollar penthouse, completely and utterly broken.
Downstairs, a different car was waiting for me. Not a town car. A discreet, rented Honda Civic driven by Miriam’s younger brother.
"Airport?" he asked, glancing back.
"No," I said, fastening my seatbelt and resting both hands over my lower belly. "Take me to the train station. Amtrak to Seattle."
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Let Dante search every private jet manifest and commercial airline database in North America. By sunrise, Elena Moretti would be dead. And Elena Vance would be starting a new life.
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