Chapter 13 - When Daniel Finally Told the Truth
Luca ran upstairs.
Hazel followed.
Evelyn dragged Sofia toward the edge.
“Stay back!”
The balcony groaned.
Daniel entered from the opposite staircase.
Evelyn saw him.
“You.”
Daniel stopped.
“I’m done running.”
“You should have died with Thomas.”
Hazel froze.
Daniel looked at her.
And finally told everything.
Thomas Brooks had not died instantly.
Daniel had found him after Evelyn shot him.
Thomas made Daniel promise to protect Hazel.
Daniel tried.
Then Salerno found Noah.
Fear won.
Daniel betrayed Thomas’s final request.
“I loved you,” Daniel said to Hazel. “But I loved you selfishly.”
Hazel’s eyes filled.
“I know.”
“I thought keeping Noah alive justified sacrificing you.”
“It didn’t.”
“I know.”
That mattered more than excuses.
Evelyn fired.
Daniel shoved Hazel aside.
The bullet struck him.
Luca reached Sofia.
The balcony collapsed.
Sofia fell.
Luca caught her wrist.
Hazel grabbed Luca.
Daniel, bleeding, grabbed Hazel.
For one terrible second, four lives hung over the church floor.
Federal agents rushed forward.
They pulled Sofia up.
Evelyn tried to escape.
Hazel’s mother blocked the stairway.
The twins faced each other.
“You took seventeen years from me,” Hazel’s mother said.
Evelyn laughed.
“You gave them away.”
Then police surrounded her.
For once, nobody fired.
Evelyn was arrested alive.
Hazel wanted answers.
She would get them in court.
Daniel survived again.
“Apparently I’m difficult to kill,” he joked from the ambulance.
Hazel almost smiled.
Then he handed her an envelope.
“Thomas gave me this.”
“Why didn’t you give it to me before?”
“Because I was a coward.”
Hazel opened it.
Her father’s handwriting covered one page.
At the bottom was a final instruction.
IF ANTONIO FALLS, LUCA MUST NEVER TAKE HIS PLACE.
Hazel looked toward Luca.
Police and federal agents surrounded him.
One agent stepped forward.
“Luca Moretti?”
“Yes.”
“You need to come with us.”
Hazel rushed toward him.
“Why?”
The agent produced an arrest warrant.
Luca read it.
Then looked at Hazel.
May you like
The charge was murder.
The victim’s name was Thomas Brooks.
