Chapter 5 - THE BLOOD TEST
Isabella was found twenty-seven minutes later.
Not kidnapped.
Not injured.
She was sitting inside the greenhouse at the eastern edge of the property.
Waiting.
Vincent entered alone.
His mother sat among white roses his father had planted decades earlier.
“You staged it,” Vincent said.
Isabella looked exhausted.
“The darkness. The glove. The note.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To force you to ask the question.”
Vincent remained standing.
“Then answer it.”
She looked toward the flowers.
“Salvatore wasn't your father.”
Vincent had imagined death many times.
He had imagined bullets, prison, betrayal.
He had never imagined four words could make his entire life disappear.
“What?”
“Your biological father was Thomas Hale.”
Rebecca's father.
Vincent stared at her.
“No.”
“I was young when I married Salvatore. Frightened. Pregnant with another man's child again.”
“Again?”
“Rose was Thomas's daughter. So were you.”
Vincent backed away.
All his life, Salvatore Moretti had told him he was his image.
His heir.
His blood.
It had been the foundation of everything.
“You let him believe I was his.”
“I had to.”
“He would've killed me.”
Isabella's silence answered.
Vincent laughed bitterly.
“So the mighty Moretti bloodline was a lie.”
“Bloodlines are always lies when men use them to excuse cruelty.”
Vincent looked at his mother.
“What about Anthony?”
Isabella closed her eyes.
“Salvatore's.”
The answer somehow hurt more.
Anthony was the biological heir.
Vincent was not.
Every rivalry between them suddenly acquired a new meaning.
“Does Anthony know?”
“No.”
“And Frank?”
“Yes.”
Of course he did.
Vincent leaned against the greenhouse table.
“That was his leverage.”
“One piece of it.”
“What else?”
Isabella began crying.
Vincent had seen his mother cry only once before, at Salvatore's funeral.
“Sarah didn't merely save Rose,” she said.
“She saved you too.”
Vincent looked up.
“What does that mean?”
“When Salvatore found out about Rose, he started questioning everything. He became suspicious of you. You were four months old.”
Vincent felt sick.
Isabella continued.
“He ordered a blood test. Frank intercepted the results before Salvatore saw them.”
“So Frank knew.”
“Yes.”
“And Sarah?”
“She overheard us arguing. She knew Salvatore would kill you if he discovered the truth.”
Vincent remembered the cellar.
The straps.
The scratched message.
“What did he do to Sarah?”
Isabella's voice broke.
“He blamed her for Rose's disappearance.”
Vincent said nothing.
“He locked her downstairs. I tried to stop him. I swear to you, Vincent, I tried.”
“But you didn't.”
“No.”
The honesty landed harder than an excuse.
“I was a coward.”
For years Isabella had been the most unbreakable person Vincent knew.
Now he saw the truth.
She wasn't unbreakable.
She had simply spent decades building armor around shame.
“Sarah escaped eventually,” Isabella said. “Frank helped her. Then he spent the next twenty-eight years using what he knew against everyone.”
“Why did she come back?”
“Because Frank found something Salvatore had hidden.”
“What?”
Isabella looked directly at him.
“A video recording.”
Vincent frowned.
“What recording?”
“The night Rose escaped.”
Vincent's skin prickled.
“What is on it?”
“I don't know.”
“You're lying.”
“I wish I were.”
The greenhouse door opened.
Anthony entered.
He looked furious.
“You should hear this.”
He placed the surveillance laptop on the table.
Daniel had broken the password.
Anthony opened a folder containing hundreds of secret recordings.
Bedrooms.
Hallways.
Offices.
Private conversations.
Frank had been recording the Moretti family for years.
Then Anthony clicked the newest file.
The timestamp was from the previous night.
2:19 a.m.
Mara appeared on screen inside the old cellar.
Frank Costello stood behind her.
He grabbed her wrist.
Mara screamed.
Vincent's face hardened.
So there was the man who had left the bruises.
But then the recording continued.
Frank pulled Mara toward the wall.
He whispered something.
Daniel increased the volume.
“I don't want to hurt you,” Frank said. “But you need to stop digging.”
Mara struggled.
Frank lowered his voice.
“Because Sarah isn't your mother.”
Vincent turned toward Mara, who had just entered the greenhouse behind Anthony.
Her face had gone completely still.
The recording continued.
Frank said:
“Sarah Bennett stole you from this house twenty-eight years ago.”
Then he leaned closer.
“And the woman you're trying to expose, Mara…”
May you like
A terrible smile crossed his face.
“Isabella Moretti is your real mother.”
