CHAPTER 2: THE WOMAN WHO SHOULD HAVE BEEN DEAD
The rain hammered against the windshield as Dominic Moretti's convoy raced through the streets of Boston.
Beside him, Lily sat trembling in the leather seat, clutching the edge of her soaked dress.
"She's going to be okay, right?" she whispered.
Dominic looked at the child.
For thirty years he had buried men without losing sleep.
Yet one frightened little girl had managed to make him feel fear again.
"I won't let anything happen to her."
The promise sounded stronger than he felt.
When the convoy finally screeched to a halt outside Hart Flowers, the storefront looked like a war zone.
The front window had been shattered.
Flower pots lay overturned across the sidewalk.
Blood stained the floor inside.
Dominic was already moving before the car fully stopped.
His men rushed in behind him.
The smell hit first.
Blood.
Broken wood.
Crushed roses.
Near the counter lay a woman.
Motionless.
Her dark hair covered most of her face.
A trail of blood stretched beneath her shoulder.
"Grace!" Lily screamed.
The little girl tried to run forward, but Dominic caught her before she slipped on the blood.
Doctor Wallace dropped to his knees beside the woman.
For several agonizing seconds nobody spoke.
Then—
"She's alive."
The room exhaled.
Lily burst into tears.
Dominic stood frozen.
The doctor gently pushed Grace's hair away from her face.
And Dominic's entire world stopped.
Rose.
Older.
Worn by years of hardship.
But Rose.
The same eyes.
The same lips.
The same tiny scar beneath her chin from the day she fell off a bicycle at seventeen.
The woman he had mourned for three decades slowly opened her eyes.
She stared at Dominic.
At first there was confusion.
Then disbelief.
Then terror.
"No..." she whispered.
Dominic dropped to one knee.
"Rose."
The flower shop disappeared around them.
For thirty years he had dreamed of this moment.
Yet neither of them smiled.
Because both understood the same thing.
Someone had stolen thirty years of their lives.
And someone very powerful had made sure they never found each other.
Rose's eyes filled with tears.
"They told me you were dead."
Dominic's heart shattered.
"They told me the same thing."
Before either could speak again, Rose grabbed his jacket.
"Anthony."
Dominic stiffened.
May you like
Her voice shook violently.
"It was Anthony."
