Chapter 6 - The Secret About Noah
Damian stopped breathing.
Peter stood twenty feet away.
Noah cried against his chest.
The baby had been brought from the chapel during the confusion.
Damian had not even realized one of his own guards had moved him.
“Put him down,” Damian said.
Peter smiled.
“Gun.”
Damian lowered it.
“Kick it away.”
He did.
Isabella was shaking.
“Peter, please.”
“Funny word from you.”
“What do you want?”
“Dominic gets the key.”
Mara held the chip tightly.
Dominic extended his hand.
“Give it to me.”
Mara looked at Damian.
He nodded.
Nothing mattered more than Noah.
She threw the chip.
Dominic caught it.
Peter relaxed slightly.
That was his mistake.
Cole appeared behind him.
One shot.
Peter screamed as the bullet entered his shoulder.
Noah slipped.
Damian lunged.
He caught his son before the baby struck the floor.
Isabella fell beside them.
Peter reached for his weapon.
Cole kicked it away.
The crisis ended in four seconds.
Damian held Noah against his chest.
The child cried.
Then settled.
Alive.
Safe.
Damian kissed his forehead.
When he looked up, Dominic was gone.
So was the chip.
“Damn it.”
Cole secured Peter.
Mara stood near the exit.
“Damian.”
He looked at her.
“The secret.”
Isabella said, “Not now.”
“Yes,” Damian replied. “Now.”
Isabella looked exhausted.
“There’s no easy way.”
“There hasn’t been an easy way since 2:13 this morning.”
She took Noah gently.
Then she looked into Damian’s eyes.
“When I was pregnant, I found something in your father’s medical files.”
“What?”
“Rafael had a genetic condition.”
Damian frowned.
“He didn’t.”
“He did. Rare cardiomyopathy. Hereditary.”
Damian felt his chest tighten.
“What does this have to do with Noah?”
“He doesn’t have it.”
Relief.
Then confusion.
“Good.”
Isabella started crying.
“Damian…”
He understood before she spoke.
“No.”
“He isn’t genetically related to Rafael.”
“No.”
“Which means—”
“Stop.”
Mara stepped back.
Cole looked toward the floor.
Damian stared at Noah.
His son.
The child who smiled when Damian walked into a room.
The baby who slept with one fist pressed beneath his chin.
“No.”
Isabella’s voice broke.
“The fertility clinic switched embryos.”
Damian looked at her.
“What?”
That answer was so unexpected he almost laughed.
“We used fertility treatment,” she reminded him. “After two miscarriages.”
“I know.”
“The clinic was owned through one of Dominic’s companies.”
Damian felt sick.
“He did it?”
“I thought so.”
“Why?”
“To create leverage.”
“With whose embryo?”
Isabella shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
Damian stared.
“So Noah isn’t yours?”
“He is ours.”
“Isabella.”
“I carried him. You’re his father.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No. Biologically, he may not be.”
Damian walked away.
He needed distance from everyone.
Especially his own thoughts.
For eight months, Noah had been his entire reason for surviving Isabella’s death.
Now someone wanted to turn blood into a weapon.
Isabella followed.
“Look at me.”
He did.
“Does this change how you feel when he reaches for you?”
“No.”
“Does it change the nights you walked him through the house?”
“No.”
“Does it change who stayed beside him when I couldn’t?”
Damian’s eyes burned.
“No.”
“Then Dominic loses.”
Damian looked at Noah again.
The baby reached toward him.
Damian took him.
That answered everything.
“He’s my son.”
Isabella nodded.
“Yes.”
“Whatever DNA says.”
“Yes.”
Damian kissed Noah’s head.
Then his expression hardened.
“Now we finish Dominic.”
The chip Mara surrendered was genuine.
But Rachel had built a failsafe.
It required a second authentication factor.
The hospital badge alone was useless.
The remaining authentication was hidden in Isabella’s bracelet.
Which Dominic had discarded after realizing it contained no useful storage device.
Cole recovered it.
Together, the two pieces could open Rafael’s archive.
Dominic had one.
Damian had the other.
“He’ll contact us,” Isabella said.
“He already has.”
Damian’s phone vibrated.
A message.
MIDNIGHT. CROSS TOWER. COME ALONE.
Cross Tower stood in Manhattan.
Forty-eight floors of legitimate businesses.
Law firms.
Investment offices.
Damian’s public empire.
Dominic wanted the final confrontation in the place Damian believed represented his escape from his father’s criminal legacy.
“He’ll have men everywhere,” Cole said.
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Easier than finding them one at a time.”
At 11:58 P.M., Damian entered Cross Tower alone.
At least Dominic believed he did.
Cole coordinated from a building across the street.
Mara remained with Sophie.
Isabella stayed with Noah in a secure location known only to Damian.
The elevator carried him to the top floor.
Dominic waited in the boardroom.
City lights spread behind him.
The chip rested beside a laptop.
“You came.”
“You have something of mine.”
Dominic smiled.
“You mean the archive?”
“No.”
Damian placed the bracelet on the table.
“My peace.”
Dominic laughed.
“You always were dramatic.”
“You killed Rachel.”
“Yes.”
“You tried to kill Isabella.”
“I tried to control her.”
“You used Noah.”
“I used an opportunity.”
Damian’s face showed nothing.
“Why?”
“Because your father chose you.”
There it was.
Not money.
Not business.
Jealousy.
Rafael had chosen Damian to inherit everything.
Dominic received secondary businesses and properties.
He had spent twelve years resenting a dead brother and the nephew who replaced him.
“You built your empire trying to prove he was wrong.”
“No. I built mine because yours is weak.”
“I stopped selling poison.”
“You stopped making money.”
“I stopped selling people.”
Dominic shrugged.
“Sentiment.”
Damian thought of Sophie.
Rachel.
Isabella.
Noah.
“People aren’t inventory.”
“That’s why you’ll never be your father.”
“Good.”
Dominic’s smile disappeared.
He inserted the chip.
Damian placed the bracelet against the scanner.
The archive opened.
Thousands of files.
Dominic leaned forward.
“Finally.”
Damian did not.
A small icon appeared.
UPLOAD IN PROGRESS.
Dominic frowned.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
Then he smiled.
“Isabella did.”
Across Long Island, copies of Rafael’s archive were being transmitted to federal investigators, independent journalists, and attorneys.
Not everything.
Only the evidence tied to violent crimes, corruption, trafficking, and Dominic’s network.
Damian had spent the afternoon separating his legitimate businesses from his father’s sins.
Dominic lunged for the computer.
Too late.
“Stop it!”
“You wanted the archive.”
Damian stepped closer.
“Now everyone gets it.”
Dominic drew a gun.
Damian had expected that.
The boardroom doors opened.
Federal agents entered.
Cole stood behind them.
Dominic laughed.
“You invited the FBI?”
“I invited consequences.”
Dominic aimed at Damian.
A shot rang out.
Glass shattered.
Dominic fell.
Not dead.
Cole had shot his arm.
Agents swarmed him.
For the first time, Dominic looked afraid.
“You think this is over?”
Damian approached.
“For you?”
He looked at the handcuffs.
“Yes.”
Dominic began laughing again.
“No.”
Damian stopped.
“You still don’t know whose embryo Noah was.”
Damian’s face changed.
Dominic smiled through the pain.
“You should ask Isabella why she recognized the donor name.”
Damian turned toward Cole.
Cole’s phone began ringing.
He answered.
His expression collapsed.
“Boss.”
“What?”
Cole lowered the phone.
“Isabella’s safe house was breached.”
Damian ran.
When he arrived, the front door was open.
No guards.
No Isabella.
No Noah.
On the floor was one photograph.
A young man Damian had not seen in fifteen years.
His dead brother.
May you like
And on the back someone had written:
NOAH IS HIS SON.
