Chapter 12 - The Brother Who Never Existed
Roman ordered every archive in the estate opened.
By noon, the grand library looked as though a hurricane had torn through twenty-five years of family history.
Boxes covered the floor.
Ledgers lay across tables.
Old photographs, legal documents, property deeds, and sealed correspondence formed towers beneath antique lamps.
Roman stood at the center of it all.
Controlled.
Silent.
Furious.
Clara had learned that Roman’s anger was most dangerous when he stopped speaking.
Marcus entered carrying a file retrieved from the family vault.
“Medical records.”
Roman looked up.
“From my mother?”
“Some.”
Marcus placed the file down.
Roman opened it.
Most pages concerned Sofia Duca’s final year.
Private doctors.
Medication.
Cardiac complications.
Clara watched him turn page after page.
Then one document stopped him.
An obstetric consultation.
Twenty-five years old.
Sofia Duca.
Pregnancy: twenty-eight weeks.
Roman slowly sat down.
Clara moved beside him.
“So she was pregnant.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to the baby?”
Roman continued reading.
There was no delivery record.
No death certificate.
No burial.
Nothing.
Marcus cursed quietly.
“Somebody erased him.”
Roman looked at the bracelet lying inside an evidence bag.
“Adrian.”
Clara leaned against the desk.
“If your father hid a child, there had to be a reason.”
“Or my mother did.”
Roman suddenly stood.
He walked to a shelf containing leather-bound family journals.
His father had written obsessively.
Roman found the volume corresponding to the year of Sofia’s pregnancy.
Three months had been cut from the book.
Not removed carefully.
Cut out.
Marcus examined the binding.
“Someone didn’t want those pages found.”
Clara stared at the empty gap.
“Who had access?”
Roman gave a humorless laugh.
“In this family? Anyone loyal enough to be dangerous.”
A knock sounded.
One of Marcus’s security officers entered.
“We traced the paper from the letter.”
Marcus turned.
“And?”
“Custom stationery. Manufactured by a company in Boston. Discontinued twenty-two years ago.”
Roman narrowed his eyes.
“Who bought it?”
“Only four clients according to archived invoices.”
The officer handed Marcus a tablet.
“One was Elias Vane.”
Clara felt the room tighten.
Roman looked at her.
“Elias had access to my mother.”
“And apparently knew about Adrian.”
Marcus scrolled.
“There’s more. Vane owned a private property outside Providence under his wife’s name. It was sold six months after he disappeared.”
“To whom?”
“A charitable foundation.”
“What kind?”
“Children’s homes.”
Roman’s eyes sharpened.
Clara immediately understood.
“You think Adrian was taken away.”
Roman grabbed his coat.
Marcus stepped in front of him.
“Boss.”
“Move.”
“No.”
Roman stared at him.
Marcus had replaced Victor after the betrayal, but unlike Victor, he had never confused loyalty with obedience.
“If this is bait,” Marcus said, “driving blindly across state lines is exactly what whoever sent that package wants.”
Roman’s voice turned quiet.
“If I have a brother—”
“Then he has survived twenty-five years without you. He can survive another hour while we verify it.”
Clara touched Roman’s arm.
“He’s right.”
Roman looked down at her hand.
Slowly, the violence drained from his posture.
“Verify everything,” he ordered.
Marcus nodded.
Two hours later, they had an answer.
The charity had operated a private children’s residence called Saint Gabriel House.
Its records had supposedly burned in a fire seventeen years ago.
Supposedly.
Marcus’s people found one surviving payroll file.
A nurse named Catherine Bell had worked there during the exact year Sofia Duca disappeared from public life.
She was still alive.
Seventy-six years old.
Living quietly in Rhode Island.
Roman stared at her address.
“We leave tonight.”
Clara reached for her coat.
“No.”
She looked at him.
“No?”
“You stay here.”
Clara laughed once.
“Absolutely not.”
“This concerns my family.”
“Roman, I’m wearing your ring.”
“That is exactly why you stay.”
She stepped into his space.
“That ring does not mean you get to put me behind glass whenever you’re scared.”
“I’m not scared.”
“You’re terrified.”
The words hit him harder than an insult.
Clara lowered her voice.
“You spent your whole life being told fear makes you weak. It doesn’t. It tells you what matters.”
Roman stared at her for several seconds.
Then he lifted her left hand and pressed his lips against the emerald ring.
“One condition.”
“What?”
“You stay beside me.”
Clara smiled.
“That was already rule number three.”
For the first time all day, Roman almost smiled.
Then the lights in the library suddenly dimmed.
A computer on Marcus’s desk activated by itself.
Black screen.
White letters appeared.
DO NOT VISIT CATHERINE BELL.
A second line followed.
SHE LIED TO ROMAN’S FATHER ONCE.
SHE WILL NOT SURVIVE DOING IT AGAIN.
Marcus reached for his weapon.
Roman stared at the screen.
Whoever was attacking them was already inside their network.
Again.
May you like
But Victor was dead.
Which meant the betrayal had never ended.
