Chapter 9 - The Bloodline That Was Never His

# Chapter 9 - The Bloodline That Was Never His

The gunshot sounded once.

Then the screen went black.

For three terrible seconds, I stared at my reflection in the dead monitor, unable to breathe.

My twin brother had raised a pistol.

My mother had been standing beside him.

Nathan Cross had been trapped in the same room.

And my two sons were somewhere inside the building.

I had no idea who had been shot.

"Get the connection back!" I shouted.

Rebecca Shaw was already working.

"The transmission was cut at the source."

"Then trace it!"

"I'm trying."

I slammed my fist against the table.

The sound echoed through the empty office.

Eight hours earlier, I had believed my greatest enemy was Adrian Vale.

Now I had discovered that my mother controlled much of the operation, Nathan had been altering medical records, and Dominic—the brother I had only just learned existed—had apparently betrayed me again.

Or perhaps he had been trying to save someone.

I couldn't tell anymore.

That was the cruelest part.

Every person in my life had become both a possible enemy and a possible victim.

Rebecca looked up.

"Roman, the transmission passed through three servers. But I found something."

"What?"

"The final connection came from a facility registered to Meridian Medical Services."

"Where?"

She turned her screen toward me.

Saint Gabriel Medical Research Center — North Annex.

I recognized the address.

It was less than thirty miles from the city.

And according to public records, it had been abandoned for eleven years.

"Get the federal team moving," I said.

Rebecca reached for her phone.

But before she could dial, my phone vibrated.

A text from an unknown number.

Dominic is alive.

A second message arrived.

So is Nathaniel.

Then a photograph appeared.

It showed a shattered surveillance camera hanging from the ceiling.

The camera's black lens had been destroyed by a bullet.

Dominic hadn't shot anyone.

He had shot the camera.

I sank into a chair.

A third message followed.

Your brother bought you twelve minutes. Don't waste them.

At 1:52 a.m., the North Annex appeared beyond a stretch of dark woodland.

The building looked like an abandoned private hospital.

Four stories of stained concrete.

Boarded windows.

A rusted sign beside the main gate.

But behind the neglected exterior, lights glowed through several upper-floor windows.

Someone had maintained the interior while allowing the world to believe the facility was empty.

Rebecca sat beside me in an unmarked police vehicle.

Detective Hayes and a federal response team were establishing a perimeter.

I watched the building through binoculars.

A black van stood near the loading dock.

Its rear doors were open.

Two men in medical uniforms were moving equipment toward it.

"They're preparing to move the children," I said.

Rebecca followed my gaze.

"Possibly."

"No. Look."

A third person appeared.

He carried a small brown stuffed rabbit.

Leo's rabbit.

My stomach tightened.

I reached for the door.

Rebecca caught my arm.

"Roman, don't."

"That's my son's toy."

"And the building may be guarded."

I turned toward her.

"If they leave with my children, we may never find them again."

Her expression softened.

"I know."

For several seconds, neither of us moved.

Then her radio crackled.

"Perimeter established. Entry team approaching north service access."

I looked toward the building.

A narrow service door opened.

Someone stepped outside.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, and moving awkwardly.

One arm hung in a sling.

Dominic.

He leaned against the wall.

Then lifted his face toward the trees.

I knew he couldn't see me.

But somehow, I felt he was looking directly at the place where I waited.

He raised his right hand.

Three fingers.

Then two.

Then one.

The service door behind him opened.

A guard emerged.

Dominic struck him with the butt of his pistol.

The man fell.

Dominic pulled the door wide and shouted something.

The federal team moved.

The next ten minutes were chaos.

Police lights flashed across the courtyard.

Armed officers entered through the north service corridor.

Someone inside triggered an alarm.

A siren wailed through the building.

I heard shouting.

Then two sharp gunshots.

Rebecca kept one hand against my chest, preventing me from leaving the vehicle.

"Wait for confirmation."

I watched the entrance.

Every second felt unbearable.

At last, the radio crackled.

"North corridor secure."

Another voice followed.

"Two adult males detained."

Then:

"Multiple pediatric rooms located. Medical team entering."

I grabbed the radio.

"Are my sons there?"

Rebecca tried to take it back, but I held on.

"Are there two boys? One five years old, one two?"

Silence.

Then the response.

"One male child located. Approximately five years old."

Alessandro.

My heart slammed against my ribs.

"And the other?"

A pause.

"Negative. No second child located in the cleared area."

I stared toward the building.

Leo.

Where was Leo?

They brought Alessandro outside at 2:17 a.m.

A paramedic carried him through the service entrance.

He wore gray pajamas and no shoes.

His dark hair was tangled.

There was a small bandage on his right wrist.

When he saw the lights and the police vehicles, he began struggling.

"No! No, I have to go back!"

The paramedic tried to calm him.

I was already running.

"Alessandro!"

The little boy turned.

Our eyes met.

For an instant, he stopped moving.

He stared at my face as though seeing a ghost.

I slowed.

"Alessandro?"

His lips trembled.

"You're Daddy?"

My knees nearly gave way.

I crouched in front of him.

"Yes."

He looked at me.

Really looked.

Then his face crumpled.

"They said you wouldn't come."

I reached toward him.

He threw himself into my arms.

I held him against my chest, feeling his small heartbeat through his pajamas.

He smelled of antiseptic soap.

His body shook with exhausted sobs.

"I came," I whispered. "I'm here."

He clutched my jacket.

"I tried to keep Leo safe."

The words tore through me.

"You did, sweetheart."

"They took him."

I pulled back gently.

"Who took him?"

Alessandro wiped his face.

"The doctor."

"Adrian?"

He nodded.

"Where did they take him?"

The boy glanced toward the building.

"Downstairs."

I stared at him.

"The basement?"

He shook his head.

"Under the basement."

Detective Hayes joined us moments later.

Alessandro refused to leave my arms.

"Roman, we found an elevator shaft behind the surgical wing," Hayes said. "But the elevator is disabled."

"There's a lower level."

"We're checking."

I looked at Alessandro.

"Sweetheart, did you see where the doctor took Leo?"

He nodded.

"Through the silver door."

"Was anyone with him?"

Alessandro looked down.

"Grandma."

My chest tightened.

"Victoria?"

He nodded.

"And the man with the white hair."

I thought of Nathan.

"Was his name Nathan?"

The boy hesitated.

"He told me to call him Grandpa."

I felt cold.

Nathan had been playing grandfather to my children.

But which role had he truly occupied in our family's history?

Before I could ask more, Dominic emerged from the building supported by two officers.

His face was bruised.

His injured shoulder was bleeding through the bandage.

But he was alive.

He saw Alessandro in my arms.

Relief spread across his face.

"Thank God."

I stared at him.

"Where is Leo?"

Dominic's expression darkened.

"Adrian took him into the underground ward."

"Then we're going down there."

He shook his head.

"Roman, listen."

"No."

"You need to hear this."

I stepped closer.

"Then tell me."

Dominic looked at Alessandro.

Then back at me.

"Nathan was trying to stop Victoria."

I froze.

"What?"

"He wasn't working for her. He was trying to get the boys out."

I remembered the altered medical files.

The threatening messages.

The photographs.

"Then why did he change Leo's paternity report?"

Dominic hesitated.

"Because Adrian intended to use it."

"For what?"

"To establish a hereditary claim under the Meridian trust."

I felt sick.

"Explain."

Dominic lowered his voice.

"Adrian needed documentation connecting one of your children to Antonio's direct bloodline. The reports he controlled were designed to support whichever claim gave Meridian access to the trust."

I stared at him.

"But Nathan changed the report."

"To interfere with that plan."

"Then why didn't he tell me?"

Dominic's expression hardened.

"Because he didn't know whether you could be trusted."

The words hurt more than I expected.

"Trusted?"

"Roman, you inherited Antonio's businesses. Nathan believed you might choose the empire over the children."

I looked down at Alessandro.

The little boy had fallen asleep against my shoulder.

My son.

Not an heir.

Not a genetic asset.

A frightened child who wanted his brother.

"Then Nathan never understood me," I said.

Dominic looked at the boy.

"No," he whispered. "I don't think he did."

At 3:06 a.m., the investigators discovered the underground level.

Its entrance had been concealed behind a reinforced service elevator.

The facility extended beneath the hospital into a network of clinical rooms, storage vaults, and a central laboratory.

But Adrian and Victoria were gone.

So was Leo.

They had escaped through a tunnel connected to the old estate's stormwater system.

The investigators recovered medical equipment, preserved samples, and thousands of pages of records.

Among them was the original nursery ledger.

Page seventeen.

The page Antonio had warned me to find.

Rebecca brought it to me in a sealed evidence sleeve.

I was sitting beside Alessandro in an ambulance.

The little boy was finally sleeping.

I carefully shifted him onto the stretcher under a paramedic's supervision and stepped outside.

"What does it say?" I asked.

Rebecca's expression was strange.

"Roman, this changes the interpretation of everything."

I looked at the page.

Two entries.

Two male infants.

Same date.

Same mother.

Isabella Bellini.

But beneath the entry for Infant B was a notation.

BIOLOGICAL PATERNITY: ANTONIO D'ANGELO.

My hands began shaking.

Antonio.

My father.

The man who had raised me.

The man I had believed was merely my adoptive parent.

"Dominic is Antonio's biological son," Rebecca said.

I stared at the page.

"And me?"

She pointed to the entry for Infant A.

PATERNITY: UNRESOLVED — SAMPLE DISCREPANCY.

I felt the world tilt.

We were twins.

Born to the same woman.

But the surviving records did not establish that we shared a biological father.

Rebecca spoke carefully.

"Twins can have different biological fathers in rare circumstances. But this notation alone doesn't establish that's what happened here."

I barely heard her.

Antonio had raised me as his son while hiding his biological son in another household.

Dominic had been trained to protect me.

Victoria had protected the public identity of the heir.

And Nathan had spent decades trying to determine who truly belonged to the D'Angelo bloodline.

I looked again at the page.

"Who was my biological father?"

Rebecca shook her head.

"We don't know."

But I was beginning to suspect someone did.

At 4:12 a.m., Elena arrived at the hospital where Alessandro was being examined.

She had insisted on leaving her recovery room after hearing that he had been found.

A nurse helped her walk through the corridor.

When Alessandro saw her, he stopped.

For a moment, he simply stared.

Then he ran.

"Mommy!"

Elena dropped to her knees despite the pain in her side.

She caught him and held him against her chest.

I had never heard a child cry the way Alessandro cried.

Not from fear.

From relief.

Five years of stolen birthdays.

Five years of bedtime stories told by strangers.

Five years of being denied the people who should have loved him.

Elena kissed his forehead again and again.

"My baby."

He clung to her.

"Mommy, I waited."

She began sobbing.

"I know, sweetheart."

"I was good."

The words stopped both of us.

Elena pulled back.

"What?"

His lower lip trembled.

"I was good. I did what Grandma said. I didn't cry when they took my blood."

I felt something inside me break.

Elena pressed his head against her chest.

"You didn't have to be good to deserve coming home."

I turned away.

Because I couldn't bear to watch another second without wanting to destroy everyone responsible.

Later, after Alessandro had fallen asleep beside Sophie, Elena and I sat together in the hospital's quiet family room.

Our daughter had greeted her older brother with shy curiosity.

Then she had recognized him.

"The cookie boy!"

Alessandro had smiled for the first time.

And for a few precious minutes, they had played together as though their childhoods hadn't been stolen.

But Leo was still missing.

And that absence filled every corner of the room.

Elena held my hand.

"Roman, what did you find?"

I told her about the nursery ledger.

Dominic's biological father.

The uncertain identity of mine.

She listened silently.

Then she whispered, "Antonio knew."

"I think so."

"He always looked at Dominic differently."

I stared at her.

"What do you mean?"

"With guilt."

I remembered my father's funeral.

Dominic standing beside the coffin.

His hands trembling.

Victoria refusing to look at him.

I had assumed he was grieving the man who employed him.

Now I knew he was grieving a father who had never publicly acknowledged him.

"Elena," I said, "there's something else."

She looked at me.

"Adrian used the children's medical records to support inheritance claims."

She frowned.

"What inheritance?"

"The hereditary trust Antonio controlled."

Her expression changed.

"What?"

I stared at her.

"You know something."

She looked away.

"Roman..."

"Please."

She took a trembling breath.

"Before Antonio disappeared, he asked me to sign a document."

My stomach tightened.

"What document?"

"A trust amendment."

I stared at her.

"Why would he ask you?"

"Because I was Alessandro's mother."

"And?"

She swallowed.

"The amendment would have transferred control of certain family assets to Alessandro when he turned twenty-one."

I looked at her.

"And you signed it?"

She shook her head.

"No."

"Why?"

"Because there was another clause."

I waited.

Elena's face went pale.

"It said that if Alessandro died before reaching adulthood, the assets would pass to the next eligible child born to me."

Leo.

My stomach turned.

"So Adrian needed both boys."

Elena nodded.

"One as the primary heir. One as the replacement."

I stood.

The pieces were beginning to fit.

The strange medical procedures.

The threats.

The forged reports.

The proposed treatment.

Someone had created a system where control of an enormous fortune depended on which child was considered biologically eligible.

And someone was willing to manipulate or kill children to control that outcome.

At 5:33 a.m., Rebecca called.

"We found something in Meridian's financial records."

"What?"

"A transfer scheduled for this morning."

"Where?"

"An offshore trust account."

"How much?"

"Nine hundred and eighty million dollars."

I stared at the wall.

Nearly a billion.

"Who's receiving it?"

Rebecca hesitated.

"That's the problem."

"What problem?"

"The receiving account is registered under a protected identity."

"Who?"

"We're working on it."

I closed my eyes.

Money.

It always came back to money.

Not love.

Not family.

Not even science.

Control.

My phone vibrated.

An incoming video call.

Unknown number.

I answered.

Victoria appeared on the screen.

She was sitting inside what looked like a private aircraft cabin.

Leo slept in a child safety seat beside her.

I nearly dropped the phone.

"LEO!"

My mother's expression remained calm.

"Lower your voice, Roman. You'll wake him."

I could barely breathe.

"Where are you taking my son?"

"Somewhere safe."

"Give him back."

"You'll have him soon."

I stared at her.

"Why are you doing this?"

She looked at Leo.

For the first time, something resembling genuine tenderness crossed her face.

"Because I made a promise."

"To whom?"

"Your father."

I felt cold.

"Antonio?"

She nodded.

"Before he disappeared, he asked me to protect the child who could undo everything Nathaniel had built."

I stared at her.

"Leo?"

Victoria nodded.

"Then why threaten him?"

Her expression darkened.

"Because Adrian controls the records that prove who he is."

I struggled to breathe.

"Who is he?"

Victoria looked directly into the camera.

"Your son."

My heart hammered.

"Biologically?"

"Yes, Roman."

I closed my eyes.

Relief surged through me.

Then I remembered the altered reports.

"You expect me to trust you?"

"No."

She gave a sad smile.

"I expect you to verify it."

I looked at Leo.

His small hand rested against the stuffed rabbit.

He was alive.

He appeared peaceful.

But I could see a medical bandage beneath the collar of his pajamas.

"Where are you taking him?"

Victoria hesitated.

"To someone who can protect him from Adrian."

"Who?"

She shook her head.

"Not over this connection."

I stepped closer to the screen.

"Mother, listen carefully. I don't care about the inheritance. I don't care who my biological father was. I don't care what Antonio wanted."

My voice broke.

"I want my son."

Victoria watched me.

Something shifted in her expression.

For a moment, she looked like the woman who had held me when I was sick as a child.

Then she whispered, "I know."

I stared at her.

"Then bring him home."

She looked away.

"I can't."

"Why?"

A long silence.

Then she said, "Because someone else has already claimed him."

I felt my blood turn cold.

"Who?"

Victoria didn't answer.

Instead, she turned the camera toward the opposite side of the aircraft.

A man sat in the shadows.

His face was hidden.

But I recognized his hands.

The heavy gold ring.

The black onyx stone.

The D'Angelo crest.

I had seen that ring on Antonio.

On the surveillance footage.

And on the stranger who had moved between my family's secrets.

The man leaned forward.

The light illuminated his face.

Nathan Cross.

He looked exhausted.

His shirt was stained with blood.

But he was alive.

He stared directly at me.

"Roman."

I couldn't speak.

Nathan took the phone from Victoria.

"Before you accuse me of anything, you need to listen."

"Where are you taking Leo?"

"To the only person who can confirm the original medical records."

"Who?"

Nathan hesitated.

Then said, "Your biological father."

My heart stopped.

"He's alive?"

Nathan nodded.

"And he's been waiting for you."

I gripped the phone.

"Who is he?"

Nathan stared at me for several seconds.

Then he gave an answer I never expected.

"Adrian Vale."

I felt the floor disappear beneath me.

The man who had threatened my children.

The doctor who had manipulated my marriage.

The architect of Meridian's most disturbing experiments.

My biological father.

"No," I whispered.

Nathan's expression darkened.

"That's what the original records suggest."

I shook my head.

"You're lying."

"Then come see the evidence."

"Where?"

Nathan looked toward Victoria.

She nodded.

He turned back to me.

"There's a private island off the coast of Maine. Meridian operated a research facility there before moving its work to New York."

I stared at him.

"Why would you take Leo there?"

"Because Adrian is already on his way."

My heart hammered.

"What does he want?"

Nathan's voice dropped.

"To retrieve the only surviving specimen from the original program."

I looked at Leo.

A sleeping two-year-old boy.

My son.

Not a specimen.

Nathan continued.

"Roman, the reason Antonio hid your birth records wasn't because he wanted to protect the family fortune."

"Then why?"

"Because Adrian discovered something in your genetic profile that made you valuable to him."

I felt sick.

"What?"

Nathan glanced toward Leo.

Then whispered:

"Your son inherited it."

The connection began breaking apart.

I heard Victoria say something in the background.

Nathan looked frightened.

"Roman, you have to get to the island before Adrian—"

The screen froze.

Then went black.

I stared at my reflection.

Before I could call back, another message arrived.

A photograph.

It showed a medical chart bearing Leo's name.

Under the heading PATIENT STATUS, someone had written:

FINAL SUBJECT — GENERATION THREE.

And beneath it was a handwritten note.

If the boy survives the procedure, the project is complete.