LOGINChapter 267ElowenDr. Ferraro cleared me for travel with strict conditions.No stress. Frequent breaks. Someone with me at all times. First-class flights with extra legroom. Compression socks. Hydration. The list went on.Caroline flew to Rome first, arriving two days before we did. She texted me updates, she'd found a hotel near the university where Anna worked. She'd seen the woman from a distance. She'd cried for an hour because the resemblance was undeniable.El, she's you. She's literally you thirty years from now. Whatever happens, you need to prepare yourself.Matteo, Kian, and I flew out on a Thursday.Giuliana stayed with Alessandro and Margaret, who'd grown into the kind of family friend who didn't need an explanation, just a "we'll be back in a few days" and a hug.The flight was long. I slept fitfully, my head on Matteo's shoulder while Kian held my hand across the armrest.When we landed in Rome, Caroline was waiting.She hugged me so tight I could barely breathe."Are
Chapter 266ElowenThe weeks after the Elera Caldwell dead end were harder than I expected.Not because I'd gotten my hopes up... I'd been careful about that, or so I thought. But because the near-miss had felt so real. The birthmark. The timing. The way Marlene had been so certain.For a few days, I'd let myself imagine it. A young woman, barely more than a girl, who'd carried me and left me believing she was doing the right thing. Someone I could understand, maybe even forgive.And then the blood types had shattered it completely.I tried not to let it show. Tried to keep moving forward with the same steady determination I'd started with.But Matteo noticed. Of course he did."You're not sleeping," he said one night, his voice quiet in the darkness of our bedroom.Kian was on my other side, his breathing steady but I knew he was awake too. Listening."I sleep," I said."You lie in bed with your eyes closed," Matteo corrected gently. "That's not the same thing."I didn't argue becaus
Chapter 265ElowenAnother three weeks slipped by in a rhythm I was starting to recognize. Mornings turned into prenatal appointments and quiet afternoons where I tried not to hover over Kian’s phone every time it buzzed. Giuliana had taken to asking for “search updates” with serious little face, hands folded, like she was ready to problem-solve if needed. I loved her for it and hated that she had to carry even a piece of this weight.Reina and Declan were ghosts in our lives now—efficient, professional ghosts who sent detailed reports through the guys and rarely needed face-to-face meetings. Their last note had been cautiously optimistic: a possible lead on an unlicensed midwife who’d operated out of a small town about forty minutes from Millbrook in the late ’80s and early ’90s. A woman named Marlene Cross. Word-of-mouth from an elderly nurse who’d worked at one of the regional clinics. Cash-only deliveries. No questions asked.I tried not to let hope bloom too brightly. I’d be
Chapter 264ElowenThey left with a list.Not a plan exactly, Declan had been careful to frame it that way when he stood to leave. A plan implies certainty, he'd said, folding his notepad closed. A list implies work. This is work.I appreciated the honesty more than I expected to.The apartment felt different after the door closed behind them. Matteo stood at the window. Kian was at the table, looking at the spot where Declan's notepad had been, as though the shape of what had just happened was still visible there if you looked carefully enough.I stayed on the sofa with my hands in my lap, not ready to move yet."How do you feel?" Matteo asked without turning around."Strange," I responded genuinely. "Like I've been carrying something so long I stopped feeling the weight of it. And now I've handed it to someone else and I don't know what to do with my arms." He turned then and looked at me. "Good strange or bad strange?"I thought about it honestly. "I don't know yet."Kian looked
Chapter 263ElowenThe investigators arrived on a Thursday morning.I don't know what I had been expecting. Older, maybe. The kind of weathered, seen-it-all professionals who carried their experience in the lines around their eyes and moved through rooms like they already owned them. People who looked like they'd been handed impossible things before and had simply gotten on with it.What walked through the door instead were two people who looked barely past thirty, and something about that surprised me enough that I had to school my expression quickly so it didn't show.Kian noticed anyway. He always did. The corner of his mouth moved and he leaned slightly toward me as they settled into the chairs across from us."Don't let the age fool you," he said quietly.It didn't take long to understand what he meant.Declan Marsh was Kian's contact. British. Dark-haired, lean, with a quality of stillness about him that felt deliberate.The kind a person cultivates over years of learning that
Chapter 262Elowen Later that night, after dinner, I found Giuliana in her room arranging her stuffed animals in some complex pattern only she understood."Hey, baby," I said, knocking on the doorframe. "Can I come in?""Of course, Mama!" She looked up, brightening. "I'm organizing them by color family. Verde says it makes more sense than organizing by size.""Verde is very wise," I said, crossing the room and settling onto the edge of her bed, careful not to disturb the outer ring of the stuffed animal. "He always has been."She nodded with complete seriousness and went back to repositioning a small blue rabbit.I watched her for a moment, let out a slow breath and smoothed a hand over the blanket at the edge of her knee."Can I talk to you about something important?" I asked.Her expression shifted immediately. "Is the baby okay?""The baby's perfect. This is about something else."She set down the stuffed dragon she'd been holding and gave me her full attention. "What is it?"I to
Chapter 158ElowenHis hands moved to my waist and he walked me back slowly until my legs found the edge of the bed. We stopped there.He pulled back and looked at me the way someone looks at something they've been denied for too long.I held his gaze and waited, I didn't fill the silence with any
Chapter 155 The apartment felt colder after Adrian left.I stood in the hallway for a full minute after the elevator doors closed, listening to the faint mechanical hum fade away. Thursdays were his long days—client dinners, late strategy sessions, the kind of nights that stretched until the city
Chapter 148Elowen Inside the apartment, Zac made me promise to stay inside, to not look at social media, to call him if I needed anything.I agreed to all of it, knowing I wouldn't follow through on any of it.The moment he left, I was back online, scrolling through the increasingly vicious comme
Chapter 134ElowenThe next morning I woke up with a tea by my bed side and a note that reads "I spoke to Damien and he agreed to let you take another day off, to clear your mind off everything."What? I don't think it's right that I continuously use my influence as Caroline's friend and take sever







