Chapter 2 - The Underground Vault
The descent down the burning stone facade was a blur of scraping boots, heat, and cold wind. Lorenzo moved with impossible strength, negotiating the iron pipe with one hand while holding me and his son securely with the other.
When his boots finally struck the stone pavers of the courtyard, he didn't stop to rest. He sprinted toward the dense treeline bordering the estate’s manicured gardens.
Behind us, sirens began to wail in the distance, cutting through the quiet night.
Lorenzo pushed through a thick hedge of hydrangeas, reaching a hidden cellar door concealed beneath a heavy slab of concrete. He punched a six-digit code into a concealed keypad. The stone ground away with a heavy hydraulic hiss, revealing a metal staircase descending into the dark.
He guided me down, sealing the heavy blast door behind us.
The underground vault was brightly lit with cool white LED strip lighting. It was a tactical safe room, fitted with leather sofas, banks of security monitors, supply crates, and a full medical station.
Lorenzo turned around, his chest heaving slightly as he looked at me. His pristine tailor-made suit jacket was torn at the shoulder, covered in ash and soot.
“Give him to me,” he said, extending his hands.
I hesitated for a fraction of a second—an instinct I couldn't suppress after losing my own daughter—before carefully transferring the sleeping baby into his arms.
Lorenzo held his son with surprising gentleness. He looked down at Leo’s pale face. For the first time in weeks, the baby’s cheeks had a faint flush of color. The sunken, desperate look in his eyes was replaced by the deep, peaceful sleep of a satisfied infant.
Lorenzo looked up from his son, his intense gaze locking onto mine.
“You said someone was starving him on purpose,” Lorenzo stated, his voice quiet, almost terrifyingly focused. “Explain.”
I took a shaky breath, sitting down on the edge of a leather cot as my knees finally gave out.
“I worked in a pediatrics clinic before... before my life collapsed,” I began, my voice trembling. “When a baby rejects every formula, every donor milk, but latches instantly to a mother’s natural milk and swallows without pain, it isn't an allergy. It means whatever he was being fed in those bottles was laced with something that burned his throat or made him sick.”
Lorenzo’s expression turned into pure stone. “A slow poison.”
“Or a chemical irritant,” I nodded. “Something odorless that caused him enough pain to make him refuse to drink. The more he refused, the weaker he got. Everyone thought he was dying of a rare metabolic disease. But he was just being systematically starved to death.”
Lorenzo set Leo down carefully in a padded travel bassinet nearby. He stepped over to a steel table, picking up his phone to pull up the mansion’s live security feeds.
Half the screen was covered in static—the fire had cut power to the east wing.
“Who had access to his feeding bottles?” Lorenzo asked softly.
“Only three people,” I replied, remembering the strict nursery rules. “Nurse Evelyn, your personal doctor—Dr. Vance—and your house manager, Julian.”
Lorenzo stared at the monitors, his knuckles turning white as he clenched his fists.
“Vance has been my family’s physician for twenty years,” Lorenzo muttered. “And Julian was my father’s right hand.”
“Then you need to check who stands to gain if your son dies,” I whispered.
May you like
Lorenzo turned his head slowly toward me, his dark eyes reflecting the harsh LED lights.
“If Leo dies,” Lorenzo said softly, “the Rossi bloodline ends with me. And according to my father’s syndicate charter, without a direct male heir, leadership of the syndicate passes to my cousin... Dante.”
