Chapter 13 - THE TWINS REVEALED ANOTHER MORETTI SECRET
Dante tested positive for the same genetic marker.
So did Matteo.
That made sense.
Until Marcus tested negative.
Then Vittorio tested negative too.
The genetic counselor frowned.
Dante stared at the report.
“What does that mean?”
She answered carefully.
“It means the family relationships may not be what you believe.”
We had heard that sentence too many times.
Further testing followed.
The result arrived three days later.
Vittorio Moretti was not Dante’s biological father.
Dante sat silently for almost a full minute.
Then he laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because apparently the Moretti family had finally exhausted his ability to be surprised.
“Who is?”
Marcus knew.
Of course.
Lucia had documented that too.
Dante’s mother, Alessandra, had fallen in love with a federal prosecutor named Michael Hart before her arranged marriage to Vittorio.
The relationship continued secretly.
Dante was Michael’s son.
Vittorio discovered the truth when Dante was two.
He raised him anyway.
Not from kindness.
Because acknowledging the affair would humiliate him publicly.
The irony was brutal.
Dante had spent his entire life becoming exactly what Vittorio demanded in order to earn approval from a man who resented his existence.
I finally understood some of him.
Not enough to excuse him.
But enough to see the cage.
Dante stared at Marcus.
“Is Michael alive?”
“No.”
“How did he die?”
Marcus hesitated.
“Car accident.”
Dante’s eyes hardened.
“Was it an accident?”
“Yes.”
For once, one tragedy was simply a tragedy.
Dante nodded slowly.
Then he asked something that surprised me.
“Did he know about me?”
Marcus handed him a letter.
Michael Hart had known.
He wrote to Lucia every year asking about Dante.
Lucia saved the letters.
Vittorio never allowed contact.
Dante read them alone.
When he returned, his face was swollen from crying.
“He wanted me.”
Three words.
That was all.
I held his hand.
Not as his wife.
Not because everything was repaired.
Because sometimes another human being needed a hand.
He looked down at our fingers.
Then let go first.
That mattered.
Our divorce became final six weeks later.
Dante did not ask me to reconsider.
He rented a modest condo instead of returning to the penthouse.
Started therapy.
Something old Dante would have mocked.
He attended every prenatal appointment I invited him to and none I did not.
No pressure.
No gifts designed to purchase forgiveness.
Then one evening, at twenty-seven weeks, my water broke.
Too early.
Far too early.
Dante was forty minutes away.
I called Rachel.
Then my mother.
Then the hospital.
I did not call Dante.
Somehow, he found out anyway.
He arrived while doctors were rushing me toward delivery.
His face was white.
“Lena.”
“I’m scared.”
He took my hand.
“So am I.”
For once, he did not promise everything would be fine.
He did not pretend to control what he could not.
He simply stayed.
Our daughter arrived first.
Tiny.
Crying.
Alive.
Our son followed forty-three seconds later.
Silent.
The room changed.
Doctors moved faster.
Dante stopped breathing beside me.
May you like
Then someone shouted for respiratory support.
And my newborn son was carried away before I ever heard him cry.
