Chapter 3 - The Marriage That Was ChosenThe alarm on the yacht was almost silent.
No siren screamed.
No red lights flashed.
Instead, a low tone sounded twice through hidden speakers while the crew moved with terrifying efficiency.
That frightened Serena more than chaos would have.
Chaos meant surprise.
This looked practiced.
Damiano guided her through a private stairwell while Alessia followed with two security officers.
“What about the boats?” Serena demanded.
“Handled.”
“By whom?”
“People whose job is to make sure you don't need to know.”
“I am done not knowing.”
Damiano stopped so abruptly that Serena nearly walked into him.
He turned.
“You want the truth? Then stay alive long enough to hear it.”
His voice contained no anger.
Only urgency.
Serena hated that he was right.
They reached a reinforced room located near the center of the yacht. Alessia locked the door behind them and activated a wall monitor showing exterior cameras.
The approaching boats split apart.
One continued toward the yacht.
Two moved wider.
“They're trying to box us,” Alessia said.
Damiano picked up a secure phone.
“Captain. Course seventeen north. Do not enter international waters yet.”
Serena stared at him.
“You're not running?”
“No.”
“What are you doing?”
“Finding out who they are.”
The nearest boat accelerated.
Serena watched it grow larger on the monitor.
There were four men aboard.
None wore uniforms.
One raised something.
The screen went black.
Serena flinched.
“What happened?”
“They disabled the camera,” Alessia said.
A second feed appeared.
The yacht altered course.
Moments later, one of Damiano's escort vessels intercepted the first speedboat.
There was shouting.
No gunfire.
The boat slowed.
Then stopped.
The second vessel changed direction immediately.
The third followed.
Damiano watched without expression.
“They wanted us frightened,” he said.
“Why?”
“To test our response.”
Serena looked at him.
“So this wasn't an attack?”
“It may have become one if we responded poorly.”
The idea that people could test a seventy-two-meter yacht guarded by trained security merely to study how Damiano reacted made Serena understand exactly how far outside her old life she had traveled.
Her phone vibrated.
She looked down.
Elias.
She almost ignored it.
Then remembered the name on Alessia's screen.
Jonathan Mercer.
She answered.
“Serena.”
Elias sounded breathless.
“Where are you?”
“On the yacht.”
“Come back.”
“No.”
“Listen to me. Something is wrong.”
She almost laughed.
“You think?”
“My father's accounts are active.”
Silence.
Serena glanced at Damiano.
He understood immediately.
She put the call on speaker.
Elias continued.
“I had my CFO check after what happened at the pier. Jonathan Mercer Holdings transferred eighty million dollars forty-eight hours ago.”
“Your father is dead,” Serena said.
“I know what the death certificate says.”
“What do you know?”
“Not enough.”
Damiano stepped closer.
“Mercer.”
Elias's breathing changed.
“Moretti.”
“Where are you?”
“My office.”
“Leave.”
A pause.
“Why?”
“Because if the accounts are active, someone knows you've started looking.”
“I have security.”
Damiano's expression turned almost pitying.
“Your security attacked Serena.”
Elias went quiet.
Then said, “That wasn't me.”
“I know.”
Serena watched the monitor.
The intercepted boat was being searched.
Alessia suddenly leaned closer to another screen.
Her fingers moved rapidly over the controls.
“Damiano.”
He looked over.
“What?”
“They had no weapons.”
“What did they have?”
“A transmitter.”
Her face tightened.
“They weren't tracking the yacht.”
She looked at Serena.
“They were tracking her phone.”
Everyone became still.
Serena stared at the device in her hand.
Elias was still connected.
Damiano took the phone carefully.
“Mercer, use a landline. Destroy this number. Do not contact her again.”
“What happened?”
“Your call just confirmed her location.”
Damiano ended it.
Serena stared at him.
“You can't just—”
He snapped the phone in half.
For several seconds she could only look at the ruined pieces.
“That had photographs.”
“You're alive to take more.”
Her anger disappeared as quickly as it had risen.
Because he was right.
Again.
She hated this new world.
Alessia placed the broken phone inside a signal-proof container.
“We should move Serena to the secondary vessel.”
“No,” Damiano said.
“Sir—”
“They expect that.”
He looked at Serena.
“We continue to Savannah.”
“Why Savannah?”
“Because your grandfather left something there.”
“What?”
“A house.”
Serena frowned.
“I've never owned a house in Savannah.”
“Not under Serena Mercer.”
Four hours later, the black yacht docked at a private marina outside Savannah under heavy security.
A convoy drove Serena through streets lined with old trees and Spanish moss until they reached an iron gate hidden beyond a stone wall.
The property behind it was enormous.
Not modern.
Not ostentatious.
A nineteenth-century mansion sat beneath live oaks, its white columns glowing in the late afternoon.
Serena stepped out of the SUV.
“I've been here.”
Damiano looked at her.
“When?”
“I don't know.”
Her heart began beating faster.
She walked toward the front steps.
Orange blossoms.
The smell came from trees along the courtyard.
The same scent she had remembered on the yacht.
She touched the railing.
A flash passed through her mind.
Small hands.
A woman laughing.
Music.
A blue room.
Serena pulled her hand back.
“What was that?”
Damiano watched her carefully.
“You lived here for three months after Bellacorte.”
“I was a baby.”
“You were almost one.”
“How could I remember?”
“Memory is strange.”
The front door opened.
An elderly woman stepped outside.
Her hair was white, her body fragile, but her eyes were sharp.
The moment she saw Serena, she began to cry.
“Madonna.”
Serena stopped.
The woman descended one step.
“Lucia.”
Damiano gently corrected her.
“Bianca. This is Serena.”
The old woman pressed both hands to her mouth.
“No.”
She shook her head.
“I know Lucia's eyes.”
Serena could not speak.
Bianca reached her.
Her fingers hovered beside Serena's face but did not touch without permission.
“You have her eyes.”
“Who are you?”
“I took care of you.”
“When?”
“Before they took you away.”
“Who took me?”
Bianca's expression changed.
She looked at Damiano.
He gave a slight nod.
“Jonathan Mercer,” she whispered.
Serena stepped backward.
“No.”
Bianca's eyes filled with fear.
“He came here with Vittorio.”
Damiano looked startled.
“With Vittorio?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To move the child.”
Serena felt dizzy.
“Move me where?”
“To Charleston.”
Her entire life cracked open.
She had grown up believing Vittorio relocated her family to South Carolina because he wanted distance from Europe.
But Charleston had not been an escape.
It had been a destination.
“Why Charleston?”
Bianca walked inside without answering.
They followed.
The mansion smelled of polished wood and dust.
Bianca led them upstairs.
At the end of a corridor, she opened a room painted pale blue.
Serena stopped in the doorway.
The room from her flash of memory.
A faded mobile hung above an antique crib.
Tiny stars.
A moon.
A silver bird.
Her chest tightened.
Bianca crossed to a cabinet and removed a wooden box.
“Vittorio told me this day might come.”
Inside were photographs.
Lucia holding Serena.
Damiano standing beside them.
Vittorio.
And Jonathan Mercer.
Serena picked up one image.
Jonathan was smiling.
He held baby Serena against his chest.
On the back, someone had written:
Jonathan promises Charleston will be safe.
Serena stared at it.
“He helped save me.”
“Yes,” Bianca said.
“Then why is he trying to kill me now?”
Bianca looked suddenly terrified.
“Because saving you was never the plan.”
Damiano's expression hardened.
“What are you saying?”
Bianca sat down slowly.
“Jonathan told Vittorio that Meridian had infiltrated the Laurent trustees. He said he could hide Serena within his own network until the danger passed.”
“And Vittorio believed him?”
“For a while.”
“For a while?”
Bianca nodded.
“Then Lucia found the ledger.”
“What ledger?” Serena asked.
“A record of everyone who had received money from Meridian.”
“Was Jonathan on it?”
Bianca closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
The room went silent.
Serena looked again at the photograph of Jonathan holding her.
A man who had participated in hiding her.
A man who had later become her father-in-law.
A man who had apparently arranged for his own son to meet her.
“The marriage,” Serena whispered.
Damiano's face darkened.
“We don't know that yet.”
“Yes, we do.”
She remembered her first meeting with Elias.
A charity dinner.
He had approached her after Jonathan introduced them.
Jonathan had smiled and told his son, You two should talk. Serena knows more about architecture than anyone in this room.
At the time she thought he was being kind.
Now the memory felt contaminated.
“Jonathan introduced us.”
Damiano stared at her.
Serena's voice became hollow.
“He arranged our first date.”
She began walking quickly through the room.
“Elias said his father wouldn't stop talking about me. He kept telling Elias I was exactly the kind of woman he needed.”
Damiano said nothing.
Serena turned toward him.
“He didn't place me inside Mercer Group.”
“No.”
“He placed Mercer Group around me.”
A vibration sounded from Alessia's tablet.
She glanced down.
Then her face drained of color.
“What?”
Alessia looked at Serena.
“Elias Mercer has disappeared.”
Serena's heart lurched despite everything.
“What do you mean disappeared?”
“His office was found empty.”
“Security cameras?”
“Disabled.”
“His car?”
“Still underground.”
Serena moved toward the door.
Damiano blocked her.
“No.”
“They took him because of me.”
“Possibly.”
“I have to—”
“You have to think.”
“He could die.”
Damiano lowered his voice.
“And so could you.”
Before Serena could answer, Bianca made a small sound behind them.
She was staring at another photograph.
Her hand shook.
“What?” Damiano asked.
Bianca turned the image around.
There were four men standing beside Lucia.
Vittorio.
Jonathan.
Alexander Laurent.
And one more.
Serena recognized him.
Not from childhood.
From her marriage.
Claudia Voss's father.
Sebastian Voss.
A man Elias had described as a retired European financier.
On the back of the photograph were six words.
The four guardians of Serena Laurent.
Bianca whispered, “One of them betrayed Lucia.”
Serena looked from Jonathan to Sebastian.
Then to the dead father she had never known.
And finally to Vittorio.
“How many?”
Her voice trembled.
“How many people who raised me were lying?”
Damiano stared at the photograph.
May you like
When he answered, his voice was darker than she had ever heard it.
“Enough that we can no longer assume your grandfather was one of the good ones.”
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