FAZER LOGIN“I was running from your father.”Ava's words settled between them.Ethan didn't move.For several seconds, the only sound was the quiet hum of the lights overhead.Olivia stood behind Ava, watching both of them.Ethan looked at the woman he had spent five years blaming.“Why?”Ava's fingers curled against the sleeve of her nightgown.“Because he found out about the babies.”Ethan's expression hardened.“When?”“Before they were born.”“You knew he knew?”“Yes.”“And you still stayed in my house?”“I didn't know what he was planning.”“Then why didn't you tell me?”Ava laughed softly.There was no humor in it.“Tell you?”Her eyes lifted to his.“You mean the night I tried to tell you I was pregnant?”Ethan went still.The memory returned with brutal clarity.Ava standing outside his study.The trembling in her hands.The question she had asked him.Would you choose me if you had the choice?He had answered badly.He had believed she was being emotional.He had never known she was car
Ethan stared at the document until the letters blurred.Mother requested immediate release.Beneath it was Ava's signature.He knew that handwriting.He had watched her sign birthday cards, hotel documents, checks, wedding papers.He had once watched her sign his name beside hers on their marriage certificate.There was no mistaking it.Ava had signed this.But why?Why would a woman who had just given birth to triplets request the immediate release of one child?And why had she never told him?Ethan closed the file.“Marcus.”“Yes, sir?”“Send me everything.”“Everything?”“Every document from that night. Every admission record, discharge form, transfer request, physician note, security recording, payment, signature, phone call, visitor log.”He paused.“And don't leave out anything because you think it isn't important.”Marcus understood.“I'll have it within the hour.”Ethan looked again at Sophia's image on the security footage.Then at Ava's signature.Two women.Two secrets.One
“She's not the one you think.”The words remained in Ethan's mind long after the call ended.He stared at the dark screen.“Sir?”Marcus's voice sounded distant.Ethan didn't move.The nurse had known.She had been there that night.She had seen Ava.She had seen the babies.And she had been afraid enough to call him five years later.“What does she mean?” Marcus asked.Ethan finally looked up.“I don't know.”That answer seemed to anger him.Ethan Blackwood hated uncertainty.He built his empire by eliminating it.Every contract had a clause.Every investment had an exit strategy.Every threat had a response.But there was no strategy for a truth buried five years ago.No amount of money could tell him what happened to his wife while he was sitting in his study believing she had simply walked away.“Find that nurse.”Marcus nodded.“We have a name?”Ethan looked at the number on his phone.“No.”“Then how do we—”“She called me.”Marcus understood immediately.“I'll trace the number.
The message remained on Ava’s screen.Ask Ethan what happened to Baby Three.She had read it so many times that the words had begun to lose their meaning.Yet one thing refused to disappear from her mind.Baby Three.Ava looked toward the bedroom.Three small bodies were sleeping beneath the blankets. Lucas had somehow taken up most of the mattress despite being the smallest of the three, Noah was hugging his dinosaur, and Lily was curled on her side with one hand beneath her cheek.Three children.Three lives.Three babies she had carried beneath her heart.So why had someone spent five years making her question whether there had ever been three?“Ava.”Olivia’s voice pulled her back.“You're staring at them again.”Ava slipped the phone into her palm.“I keep thinking about the night they were born.&rdq
Ethan read the message again.Ask your father why he paid to make your children disappear.His thumb hovered over the screen.Then another message appeared.And ask him what happened to the third child.Ethan's expression hardened.Three children.He had seen three children.Three little faces standing beside Ava in that hotel lobby.So why would someone ask what happened to the third child?Unless the message wasn't talking about the present.Unless something had happened five years ago that Ava had never told him.He called the number immediately.The call didn't connect.Ethan tried again.Nothing.He tossed the phone onto his desk and stared at the documents scattered before him.The clinic.Richard's payment.Ava's pregnancy.Multiple fetal heartbeats.A missing medical file.And now this message.None of it made sense.Unless the person behind the message wanted him to believe something that wasn't true.That possibility made Ethan even more uneasy.He grabbed his jacket.“I'm g
Ava didn't answer.She couldn't.Ethan stood in front of her, his eyes fixed on hers, waiting for a confession that would change everything between them.“Are those my children?”The question hung between them.Behind Ava, the three children had fallen strangely quiet. Even Noah seemed to sense that something important was happening.Ava tightened her grip on Lily's hand.“It's complicated.”Ethan gave a humorless laugh.“Complicated?”His gaze moved toward the children again.“They're five years old, Ava. They have my eyes, my features, and one of them has the same birthmark I was born with.”He looked back at her.“What part of that is complicated?”Ava's throat tightened.“Ethan, this isn't the place.”“Then tell me where.”His voice wasn't loud, but the desperation beneath it was impossible to miss.“Tell me where you want to have this conversation, and I'll follow you there.”Ava stared at him.Five years ago, she had dreamed of hearing him say something like that.She had wanted







