Chapter 5 - The Man Who Was Supposed to Be Dead
Salvatore Romano had been dead for twelve years.
At least officially.
Victor stared at his father through the garage doorway.
Salvatore looked older.
Thinner.
But unmistakably alive.
“Come home,” Salvatore said.
Victor raised his gun higher.
“That stopped being your home when they buried you.”
Salvatore smiled.
“You always were stubborn.”
Antonio moved beside Victor.
Salvatore looked at him.
“Antonio.”
“Father.”
“You disappointed me.”
Antonio laughed bitterly.
“I'll survive.”
“You already did.”
Elena stepped forward.
Salvatore's smile vanished.
“You should have stayed hidden.”
Hannah felt Elena's hand tighten around hers.
Victor noticed.
“Why?”
Salvatore looked at Hannah.
There was recognition in his eyes.
Too much recognition.
“You've grown.”
Hannah felt sick.
“You know me?”
“I held you the day you were born.”
Victor stepped between them.
“Don't look at her.”
Salvatore raised an eyebrow.
“Protective already?”
“Who is her father?”
Elena whispered, “Victor.”
But Victor wouldn't stop.
“Who?”
Salvatore smiled.
“Ask Luca.”
Everyone turned.
Luca went pale.
Hannah stared.
“No.”
Luca shook his head.
“Elena, tell her.”
Elena began crying.
Hannah backed away.
Luca looked at her.
“I am.”
Hannah's face emptied.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
The revelation hit differently than everything else.
Luca Bellini.
Victor's adviser.
The man she'd seen at the estate.
The man she'd feared.
Her father.
“Did you know?”
“Not until you were twelve.”
“And you never came?”
“Elena wouldn't let me.”
Hannah turned toward her mother.
“You told me he abandoned us.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“Stop saying that!”
Her voice echoed through the garage.
Mia flinched.
Hannah immediately lowered her voice.
Everyone had lied.
Her mother.
Luca.
Antonio.
Salvatore.
Perhaps Victor was the only person in the room who had known less than she did.
Salvatore tapped his cane.
“This reunion is touching.”
Victor looked at him.
“What do you want?”
“Mia.”
Antonio raised his gun.
Salvatore smiled.
“And Hannah.”
Victor's response was immediate.
“No.”
“Neither belongs to you.”
“They're family.”
“So am I.”
Victor's eyes hardened.
“No. You're a corpse.”
Salvatore's men raised their weapons.
Victor's did the same.
For several seconds the garage became a frozen battlefield.
Then Mia stepped between Hannah and Victor.
She looked at Salvatore.
“No.”
Everyone froze.
The child who had remained silent for two years had spoken again.
Salvatore stared.
Mia grabbed Hannah.
“No Hannah.”
Victor almost smiled.
Salvatore did not.
“Take them.”
Gunfire erupted.
Victor pulled Hannah and Mia behind a vehicle.
Antonio and Luca returned fire.
Elena grabbed Hannah.
A rear door opened.
They ran.
Victor followed.
They escaped into a second vehicle.
The driver accelerated.
Bullets struck the trunk.
Mia screamed.
Hannah covered her.
Victor sat beside them.
“Look at me, Mia.”
She did.
“You're safe.”
She shook her head.
Victor's expression changed.
She was right.
They weren't.
Not anymore.
They reached the Romano mansion twenty minutes later.
Victor doubled security.
Antonio was taken to the medical room.
Elena disappeared upstairs with Luca.
Hannah remained with Mia.
Victor stood at the window.
“Why does Salvatore want her?”
Hannah asked.
“I don't know.”
“And me?”
Victor looked at her.
“I intend to find out.”
“You don't have to protect me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Victor almost answered.
Because you're my niece.
But that wasn't entirely it.
Hannah had done something nobody else had managed.
She had given Mia a place where fear couldn't reach her.
“You protected Mia before you knew who she was.”
Hannah looked down.
“She was scared.”
“Everyone in this house was scared of breaking my rules.”
“I was too.”
“But you broke them.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Hannah looked up.
Victor Romano almost smiled.
Almost.
Then his phone rang.
Security.
“Boss, you need to see this.”
Victor and Hannah went downstairs.
One guard stood beside the damaged foyer.
A section of decorative wall had been broken during the earlier intrusion.
Behind it was a hidden compartment.
Inside sat a metal box.
Victor opened it.
Photographs.
Documents.
A ledger.
And an old cassette recorder.
Victor pressed PLAY.
Salvatore's younger voice filled the room.
“If Elena's child survives, she becomes the controlling heir.”
Victor stopped the tape.
Hannah stared.
“What does that mean?”
Victor opened the ledger.
Ownership percentages.
Trusts.
Companies.
Properties.
His father had built the Romano fortune using a trust established by Victor's grandfather.
The controlling shares did not pass to the eldest son.
They passed through Elena.
And then to her first child.
Hannah.
Victor looked at her.
“You own it.”
“What?”
“Most of the legitimate Romano empire.”
Hannah laughed once.
“That isn't possible.”
“It is.”
Suddenly everything made sense.
Why Salvatore wanted her.
Why Elena hid her.
Why Antonio tracked her.
Why someone maneuvered her into the estate.
Hannah wasn't collateral.
She was the center.
A guard entered.
“Boss.”
Victor looked up.
“We found something else.”
He handed Victor an envelope.
It had been hidden behind the ledger.
Victor opened it.
One photograph.
Hannah at sixteen.
Beside her stood Carol—Elena.
Behind them, barely visible inside a parked car, sat Salvatore.
He had known where Hannah was for years.
On the back, a date.
And a sentence.
WAIT UNTIL SHE TURNS TWENTY-EIGHT.
Hannah's birthday was tomorrow.
Victor looked at her.
Then the mansion alarm began screaming.
A security voice came through the speakers.
“Perimeter breach.”
Victor reached for his weapon.
The voice continued.
“Multiple vehicles.”
Hannah grabbed Mia.
Victor turned toward the front windows.
Outside, headlights appeared beyond the gates.
Then another guard shouted through the radio:
“They're not attacking the mansion.”
Victor frowned.
“What are they doing?”
A pause.
“They brought someone.”
The front gates opened.
One figure stepped out of the darkness.
A woman.
Victor stared through the glass.
Hannah felt Elena appear behind her.
Her mother made a strangled sound.
May you like
Because the woman walking toward the house looked exactly like Elena.
And around her neck hung the same Romano crest.
