Chapter 5 - The Sanctuary
My apartment in Lincoln Park was small compared to the sprawling penthouse Luca and I had shared, but it was warm, filled with the scent of cinnamon tea, fresh-cut flowers, and crayon wax.
Leo and Maya were currently sprawled across the living room rug, building an elaborate, towering castle out of magnetic blocks while a children's movie played softly on the television.
I stood at the kitchen sink, washing a mug, but my hands were shaking so badly I almost dropped it.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Luca’s face at the restaurant. The shock. The realization. The desperate, hungry look in his eyes that told me he wasn't going to walk away quietly. Luca Moretti didn't know how to lose. When he wanted something—whether it was a corporate acquisition or a multi-million-dollar real estate plot—he pursued it with ruthless, unrelenting force.
And now, he knew he had heirs.
*Knock. Knock. Knock.*
The soft sound at the apartment door made my heart leap into my throat.
Leo looked up from his blocks. “Mom? Are we expecting someone?”
“No, sweetie,” I said, wiping my hands on a dish towel, my stomach twisting into a painful knot. “Stay right here. Don't open the door.”
I walked down the small hallway, my bare feet padding silently against the hardwood. I reached the door, didn't bother looking through the peephole, and pulled it open just an inch, keeping the safety chain latched.
It wasn't Luca.
Standing in the hallway, wearing a tailored cashmere trench coat and holding a leather briefcase, was Marcus Vance.
I stared at him through the narrow gap. I remembered Marcus from the early days—before Luca shut him out of our personal lives, back when Marcus used to help us incorporate our very first LLC over takeout pizza.
“Nia,” Marcus said, his voice low and respectful. He didn't try to push the door open. He kept his hands visible, holding up an empty palm. “Can we talk?”
“There’s nothing to talk about, Marcus,” I answered coldly, my fingers tightening around the edge of the door. “If Luca sent you with legal papers, you can slide them under the door and let his attorneys deal with my lawyer.”
“He didn't send me as his lawyer, Nia,” Marcus sighed, running a hand through his thinning hair. He looked genuinely exhausted. “He sent me as a friend. A friend who remembers what you two were like before the money and the press got their hooks into him.”
“People change when they get billions, Marcus,” I said bitterly. “Luca proved that five years ago.”
“He’s drowning, Nia,” Marcus said quietly. “Evelyn’s family is already mobilizing their legal team to freeze his personal assets and initiate a hostile smear campaign to discredit you and the kids before you can even file for paternity recognition. They want to paint you as an extortionist who hid his children to trap him.”
A cold anger flared in my chest. “They want to what?”
“They’re terrified,” Marcus said, leaning closer to the door. “Luca told the board this morning that he’s restructuring Moretti Global to place half his personal holdings into a blind trust for Leo and Maya. Evelyn’s father is threatening to call an emergency shareholder vote to oust him as CEO by Friday.”
I stared at Marcus, processing the sheer magnitude of the war zone Luca had just stepped into. By acknowledging my twins publicly, Luca had just declared war on the high-society elite who had welcomed him into their inner circle.
“Why are you telling me this, Marcus?” I asked suspiciously.
“Because Luca is too blind with guilt and obsession to see the trap they’re setting for him,” Marcus said earnestly. “And because you and those kids are standing right in the crosshairs. If you want to protect them, you need to know that Luca isn't coming at you as an enemy. He’s coming as a desperate man who just realized he threw away his entire life for a lie.”
Before I could answer, a heavy shadow fell across the hallway behind Marcus.
A familiar voice, thick with raw emotion, cut through the silence.
“Marcus is right, Nia. I didn't come here to fight you. I came to beg.”
May you like
Luca stepped into the light. He had discarded his suit jacket, his tie was loose around his collar, and his eyes held a vulnerability I had never, in all our years together, thought possible to see on the face of Luca Moretti.
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