Chapter 3 - The Son He Never Knew
“Don't answer it,” Marco said.
Luciano answered.
No one spoke.
He put the call on speaker.
Breathing.
Slow.
Then a distorted voice.
“You should have stayed in Europe.”
The line disconnected.
Marco took the device.
Kate whispered, “Someone put that in your case?”
Luciano nodded.
Her eyes went to the windows.
For months she had believed Luciano had abandoned her.
Now another possibility was taking shape.
Someone had wanted them separated.
But why?
A contraction struck before she could ask.
This one was worse.
Margaret called for towels.
Kate cried out.
Luciano moved to her side.
“Something's wrong,” Kate gasped.
Margaret checked.
Then her voice became urgent.
“We're losing time.”
Luciano felt cold.
“What does that mean?”
“It means this baby may be coming tonight.”
“No.”
Kate's denial was immediate.
“He's too small.”
Margaret looked directly at her.
“We will do everything possible.”
Luciano called for a helicopter.
Margaret refused.
“Not during active contractions unless we stabilize her.”
“Then bring a neonatal team here.”
Luciano made three calls.
Within minutes, specialists were being assembled.
Money could not solve everything.
But Luciano had enough to make distance move faster.
Kate watched him.
“You don't have to do this.”
He stared at her.
“For my son?”
Her face tightened.
“You still don't know.”
Luciano went silent.
Kate realized what she had said.
“Is he mine?”
She looked toward Margaret.
“Kate.”
“Answer me.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“Yes.”
One word.
Luciano sat down.
Not because he chose to.
Because his legs briefly failed him.
A son.
His son.
Alive inside the woman he had spent seven months forcing himself to forget.
“Why didn't you come after me?”
“I tried.”
“I mean physically.”
“Because someone sent me photographs.”
Luciano looked up.
“What photographs?”
“You.”
“With whom?”
“A woman in Milan.”
He frowned.
“There was no woman.”
“I saw you kissing her.”
“I never kissed anyone.”
Kate stared.
“You were outside the Grand Verdi.”
Luciano remembered.
A diplomatic reception.
A woman had stumbled on the steps and grabbed him.
Photographers had been everywhere.
“Show me.”
“The photographs disappeared.”
“When?”
“The night someone entered my bedroom.”
Luciano slowly stood.
“Someone entered this room?”
“I woke up. The drawer was open. Photographs gone.”
“Why didn't you tell security?”
“I did.”
“Who?”
“Your estate manager.”
Luciano's eyes hardened.
“Calvin Reese?”
“Yes.”
Marco looked at him.
“Calvin told me there had been no security incidents.”
Luciano turned.
“Where is he?”
No one knew.
That answer was unacceptable.
Marco called downstairs.
No Calvin.
His room was empty.
His car remained outside.
Luciano ordered a search.
Ten minutes later, one of the guards returned.
“We found something.”
“Where?”
“Manager's office.”
Luciano looked at Kate.
She shook her head.
“Go.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“Luciano.”
“I left once.”
Her expression changed.
“I won't do it again.”
Marco went instead.
He returned with a cardboard archive box.
Inside were copies of Kate's letters.
Eleven envelopes.
All addressed to Luciano.
All opened.
Kate stared at them.
“My letters.”
Luciano picked up the first.
His hands shook slightly.
He read.
Luciano,
I don't know whether you want to hear this from me, but I couldn't let you learn it from someone else.
I'm pregnant.
He stopped.
Seven months of his life rearranged themselves around those two words.
Another letter contained an ultrasound photograph.
Another described hearing the heartbeat.
Another said she had learned it was a boy.
Luciano read only enough to understand what had been stolen from him.
Kate watched his face.
“I thought you read them.”
“I didn't.”
“I thought your silence was your answer.”
“It wasn't.”
Luciano lifted the ultrasound.
The tiny profile meant almost nothing anatomically to his untrained eye.
Yet he could not stop staring.
“When was this?”
“Twelve weeks.”
“You had this sent to me?”
“Yes.”
Marco opened another folder.
Financial records.
Payments from an Aruri-controlled account to Calvin Reese.
Luciano frowned.
“I never authorized these.”
Marco checked the routing number.
“Neither did I.”
Kate whispered, “Then who did?”
Marco turned another page.
Payments to a pharmacy employee.
A courier.
A private investigator in Milan.
Luciano's expression became lethal.
Someone had constructed their separation piece by piece.
Fake photographs.
Intercepted messages.
Changed medication.
Surveillance.
Then Marco found one final document.
A hospital intake form.
Kate Aruri.
Estimated gestational age: twenty-nine weeks.
Across the bottom was an instruction:
NOTIFY UPON LABOR.
The signature beneath it belonged to someone Luciano knew.
He stared.
Marco read over his shoulder.
“No.”
Kate saw their expressions.
“Who?”
Luciano folded the page.
“Not now.”
“Stop protecting me from my own life.”
“Kate.”
“Who signed it?”
Luciano looked at her.
“My uncle.”
Vittorio Aruri.
The man who had raised Luciano after his father died.
The man who had taught him loyalty.
The man who had insisted that family was everything.
Kate went pale.
“Why would Vittorio care when I went into labor?”
Luciano did not know.
But Marco did.
Luciano saw it.
“You know something.”
Marco shook his head.
“Say it.”
“Luciano—”
“Say it.”
Marco looked toward Kate.
Then toward her stomach.
“Your father's will.”
Luciano frowned.
“What about it?”
“There was a clause.”
“What clause?”
“If you had a legitimate biological child while legally married, control of the Aruri family trust passed permanently to your bloodline.”
Luciano stared.
“And if I divorced before the child was born?”
Marco's silence answered.
Kate understood.
“Vittorio gets it.”
Marco nodded.
A sound came from the hallway.
A nurse hurried in.
“Mr. Aruri?”
Luciano turned.
“We found Mr. Reese.”
“Where?”
“In the cellar.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Bring him.”
The nurse hesitated.
“He's asking for Mrs. Aruri.”
Kate stiffened.
“Why?”
“He says he has something that belongs to her.”
Luciano headed toward the door.
Then the nurse added:
“He also said the baby isn't the only Aruri child Vittorio has been watching.”
Luciano stopped.
Behind him, Kate whispered, “What other child?”
May you like
The nurse swallowed.
“Mr. Reese says there was another birth.”
