Chapter 10 - THE WOMAN BURIED UNDER MY MOTHER’S NAME
The funeral had been closed casket.
I remembered asking why.
Daniel told me the crash caused severe injuries.
I remembered touching polished wood while believing my mother lay inside.
Now Daniel was telling me she had survived.
“Where is she?”
He looked away.
“Daniel.”
“I don’t know.”
I grabbed the hospital record.
Margaret had been admitted under another surname after the crash.
Severe head trauma.
Multiple fractures.
Memory impairment.
Three weeks later, somebody transferred her to a private rehabilitation center in Connecticut.
The authorization bore Thomas Vale’s signature.
“She was alive for weeks and nobody told me?”
“I didn’t know then. I found these records four years ago.”
“What happened after Connecticut?”
“She vanished from the system.”
Adrien took the papers.
“We can trace the facility.”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“You think I haven’t?”
The rehabilitation center closed twelve years ago.
Its records were purchased by Vale Medical Holdings.
Thomas again.
Every road led to him.
My phone rang.
Thomas Vale.
Nobody moved.
Adrien mouthed, Answer.
I did.
“Elena.”
His voice was warm.
The same voice that had toasted our marriage.
The same man who sent flowers when I miscarried a pregnancy scare two years earlier.
I suddenly wanted to be sick.
“You sent the photograph.”
He chuckled.
“Which one?”
“The hotel.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To make you leave Adrien.”
“Why?”
“Because separation created opportunity.”
“For what?”
“Your signature.”
I looked at Adrien.
Thomas continued.
“As Adrien’s wife, certain transactions require spousal notification. As his estranged wife preparing for divorce, you would eventually sign documents without him present.”
“You expected me to divorce him.”
“I expected betrayal to do what bullets never could.”
Adrien’s jaw hardened.
“You miscalculated.”
Thomas heard him.
“Adrien. Always listening.”
“Where is Margaret?”
Silence.
Then Thomas laughed softly.
“So Daniel finally opened the wrong box.”
My legs weakened.
“She’s alive?”
“Elena, your mother was always stubborn.”
“Where is she?”
“Bring me the original Bellini certificates.”
Daniel shook his head violently.
Thomas continued.
“No police. No federal agents. No Moretti security.”
“And if I do?”
“You see your mother.”
Adrien stepped closer to the phone.
“If you hurt either of them—”
Thomas interrupted.
“You still think this is your story, Adrien.”
His voice sharpened.
“It never was.”
The call disconnected.
Daniel looked at me.
“You cannot go.”
“I have to.”
Adrien said, “No.”
I turned on him.
He stopped.
Something passed through his expression.
Then he corrected himself.
“We decide together.”
The difference was small.
It meant everything.
Vanessa arrived thirty minutes later with another discovery.
The Bellini stock certificates weren’t merely worth money.
Combined with my inheritance and Luca’s birthright, they could remove Moretti family control from an entire shipping empire.
But Thomas had one final problem.
“He needs Elena alive,” Vanessa said.
“Why?” Adrien asked.
“Because Margaret transferred her voting rights twenty years ago.”
“To who?”
May you like
Vanessa looked at me.
“Her unborn grandchildren.”
