Chapter 8 - The Moretti Heir Who Disappeared
Elena stared at Isabella.
“That would make Adrien and my mother—”
“Half siblings,” Isabella said.
Elena’s face went white.
“And us?”
“No.”
Adrien’s voice cut through the room.
“Stop.”
Everyone looked at him.
“We verify this with DNA before another person tells Elena who she is.”
Detective Keller nodded.
“That is the first sensible thing anyone has said about these records.”
Samples were taken.
Adrien.
Elena.
Isabella.
Marcus.
Miriam.
Mateo only if necessary.
Elena refused to let speculation define her child.
Hours later, preliminary kinship analysis arrived.
Adrien and Elena were not close biological relatives.
The room exhaled.
Isabella cried.
Adrien looked furious rather than relieved.
“You knew that.”
“Yes.”
“Then why say Lucian was Camila’s father?”
“Because he was.”
“That makes no sense.”
“It does if you understand that you are not Lucian’s biological son.”
Adrien went still.
The birth record was false.
Lucian had put his name down to protect Isabella.
Adrien’s biological father had been someone else.
Vittorio.
The man who raised him.
The revelation landed differently than the others.
Vittorio had actually been his father.
Lucian had been Camila’s.
Adrien and Camila were cousins.
Elena was Camila’s daughter.
Adrien and Elena were therefore not uncle and niece, nor siblings, nor anything close enough to explain Mateo’s unusual eyes.
But Lucian and Vittorio had inherited those eyes from their mother.
The trait had traveled down both branches.
Adrien looked at Mateo.
The child had become the living proof of two family lines reconnecting.
Not an omen.
Not an heir.
A baby.
Isabella finally told the entire truth.
She had loved Vittorio first.
But Vittorio had been terrified of Theodore Vale.
Lucian had helped Isabella escape while pregnant with Vittorio’s child.
During that escape, Lucian met Camila’s mother, Rosa.
They fell in love.
Two women became pregnant within months.
Two Moretti brothers became fathers.
MRL 27A and 27B were created to protect both babies.
When Rosa died during childbirth, Lucian wanted to raise Camila.
Theodore’s organization made that impossible.
Camila was hidden.
Adrien went to Vittorio.
The brothers separated.
Then Lucian disappeared to continue fighting Theodore from outside Philadelphia.
“So Lucian is Elena’s grandfather,” Marcus said.
“Yes.”
Elena struggled to absorb it.
Her grandfather was alive.
Maybe.
And had spent decades hiding.
“Why didn’t he find my mother?”
“He did.”
Isabella looked at the photograph.
“Camila refused to go with him.”
“Why?”
“She had Elena.”
That answer hit hardest.
Camila had chosen her daughter over a war.
Just as Elena had tried to do.
The pattern was not cowardice.
It was motherhood.
Elena looked at Mateo.
“I understand her.”
Adrien did too.
Detective Keller entered with another result.
They had traced the fake orderly.
His fingerprints belonged to a man employed by a Moretti subsidiary.
Adrien frowned.
“Name?”
“Daniel Vale.”
Marcus looked confused.
“I have no relative named Daniel.”
Miriam whispered, “Mara had a son.”
Everyone turned.
She remembered a letter from their father decades earlier.
Mara had become pregnant at eighteen.
Theodore took the baby.
Miriam had assumed the child died.
He had not.
Daniel Vale had grown up inside Theodore’s network.
Mara’s son.
Marcus’s nephew.
And technically another possible trustee.
“Then Daniel benefits if Elena and Mateo are removed,” Keller said.
Adrien’s expression darkened.
“He doesn’t get near them.”
Elena looked at him.
“We don’t know that he wants to.”
“He put a fake bracelet on my son.”
“We think he did.”
Adrien paused.
She was right.
They were finally learning not to turn assumptions into verdicts.
Keller continued.
“Daniel called the police.”
Everyone stared.
“What?”
“Twenty minutes ago. He asked for protective custody.”
Adrien frowned.
“From whom?”
“His mother.”
Daniel was brought to a secure interview room.
Thirty-four.
Thin.
Exhausted.
Nothing like the threatening figure Adrien expected.
He looked at Elena through the glass.
“She has Camila’s face.”
Elena entered with Keller.
Adrien remained outside because Elena asked him to.
Daniel admitted using the badge.
He admitted replacing Mateo’s bracelet.
“Why?”
“To make Adrien investigate.”
“You put a threat on my newborn child.”
“I put a warning.”
“You wrote second heir.”
“That is what my mother calls him.”
“Mara?”
Daniel nodded.
“She believes the trust belongs to us.”
“Do you?”
“No.”
“Then help us.”
Daniel looked at the camera in the corner.
“She can hear everything.”
Keller checked.
The camera was police-controlled.
Daniel shook his head.
“Not through that.”
“Then how?”
He pointed at Elena’s necklace.
The tracker had been removed.
But Daniel pointed at the chain itself.
Adrien examined it.
Inside one link was a tiny microphone.
Elena ripped the necklace off.
Daniel leaned forward.
“She has Vittorio’s key.”
“We know.”
“She knows you have Camila’s.”
“We know.”
“And tonight Lucian is coming for his.”
Elena froze.
“Where?”
Daniel whispered an address.
Adrien recognized it.
An abandoned Moretti freight terminal beside the Delaware River.
The birthplace of MRL.
Daniel looked through the glass at Adrien.
“My mother isn't going there to meet Lucian.”
“What is she going to do?”
May you like
Daniel swallowed.
“She’s going to make Elena watch him die.”
