Chapter 4

Once the door was locked from the outside, I spent the entire day confined to my room.

Jonathan was genuinely furious this time. Two guards stood outside my door, my phone had been taken away, and he had even stationed men beneath the windows to make sure I had no way out.

Late that night, a sudden commotion broke out in the hallway, followed by the sound of someone hurrying down the corridor.

“Sir, Anthony has a high fever!”

Jonathan’s voice came immediately afterward.

“Where’s the doctor?”

“Already on the way.”

The footsteps quickly faded into the distance, and before long, one of the two guards outside my room was called away as well.

I waited another ten minutes until a faint vibration came from the bottom drawer of my bedside table. Pulling it open, I reached into the hidden compartment and took out a spare phone small enough to fit in my palm.

There was only one message on the screen:

Back gate. Twenty minutes.

I immediately changed my clothes. My documents and cash had already been moved out in advance, so I took nothing with me except the wedding ring still tucked inside my pocket.

When I made it downstairs, the remaining guard stepped in front of me.

“Mrs. Alberti, Mr. Alberti ordered that you are not to leave.”

“How is Anthony?”

He instinctively glanced back toward the main house.

“He still has a fever.”

That moment of distraction was all I needed. I grabbed a vase from the table and hurled it against the wall, and the crash immediately drew attention from the far end of the corridor.

As the guard turned toward the noise, I pushed open the side door and ran.

A black sedan was already waiting beneath the trees. The rear door opened, revealing a man in a baseball cap who studied me briefly.

“Adele?”

“Yes.”

“Get in.”

The car pulled away from the estate at once, and once we were safely on the road, the man handed me a document envelope containing a new passport, bank cards, and identification under a name I had never seen before.

“Starting tonight, this name belongs to you.”

After checking the time, he added, “In one hour, Adele Vitale will be dead.”

By one in the morning, we had reached the southern coast, where another car registered to me was waiting.

The man smeared the blood he had prepared across the driver’s seat, then placed my wedding ring and a strip of bloodstained fabric inside. I stood nearby and watched him arrange everything.

“Will that be enough?”

“More than enough to make them believe it.”

After pulling on a pair of gloves, he started the engine, aimed the car toward the cliff, and rigged the accelerator before stepping clear.

“There are no cameras along this stretch of road, and the cliff is just ahead.”

A few minutes later, the car smashed through the guardrail and plunged into the dark Mediterranean below.

The muffled impact rose from somewhere beneath the cliff as I stood in the wind, watching the last glimmer of the taillights disappear into the sea.

The man handed me a different coat.

“We need to go. You have to be out of Sicily before sunrise.”

I gave the water one final look before turning away.

“All right.”

Back at the estate, Anthony’s fever had finally begun to subside.

Leonora sat beside the bed, her eyes red as she wiped the sweat from her son’s forehead. Jonathan rose from his chair and glanced at the sleeping boy.

“Let him rest.”

Leonora reached out and caught his sleeve.

“Thank you for tonight.”

Jonathan gave no response.

He glanced at the time. It was already one thirty in the morning.

Only then did he remember me.

“Where is Adele?”

The guard outside the room went pale.

“Mrs. Alberti... she got away.”

Jonathan’s head snapped toward him.

“Got away?”

He seized the man by the collar.

“I told you to watch her. How the hell did she get away?”

Within moments, the entire estate was thrown into chaos. Every exit was sealed, while Jonathan’s men began searching the ports, airports, and major roads leading out of the area.

Ten minutes later, one of his men received a call, and the color drained from his face.

He remained several steps away without speaking until Jonathan turned sharply toward him.

“Say it.”

“Sir, there’s been an accident on the coastal road. A car registered to Mrs. Alberti went over the cliff.”

Jonathan went completely still.

“Where is she?”

The man swallowed.

“The car sank into the sea. The search-and-rescue team has only recovered this so far...”

With a trembling hand, he held out his phone. On the screen was a photograph of a bloodstained piece of fabric.

It came from the clothes I had been wearing that day.

Jonathan’s expression froze.

“Where is she?”

No one answered.

His voice rose sharply.

“I asked you where she is!”

The man’s face had gone white.

“The Coast Guard is still searching, but the cliff is extremely high, and it happened in the middle of the night...”

He hesitated before forcing out the rest.

“They said Mrs. Alberti has almost no chance of survival.”