Chapter 9 - THE BROTHER WHO SOLD OUR FAMILY
For the first time in my life, I was afraid to ask my brother a question.
Not because I feared his answer.
Because I feared I already knew it.
Adrian had always been the reasonable one.
The gentle one.
The brother who stayed away from violence and kept the family businesses clean.
But he also controlled the accounts.
The trusts.
The holding companies.
And nearly every legitimate financial structure our father had created.
If anyone understood what Emma and Noah's existence meant, it was Adrian.
I called him.
He answered immediately.
“Vincent.”
“Where are you?”
“At the office.”
“Stay there.”
He paused.
“What's wrong?”
“We need to talk.”
Another pause.
Then he said, “Is this about Vanessa?”
I went cold.
“Why would you ask that?”
“Because she's been calling me.”
“What did she say?”
“Nothing useful.”
I ended the call.
Ethan looked at me.
“Trap?”
“Maybe.”
“Then don't go alone.”
I nodded.
But before we left, Claire stopped me in the hallway.
She had heard enough of the conversation to understand.
“Vincent.”
I turned.
“Promise me something.”
“Anything.”
“If Adrian is involved, don't become the man you were before.”
I looked toward the nursery.
Emma was asleep.
Noah was making soft noises in his crib.
“I'm trying.”
“I know.”
She stepped closer.
“I see it.”
Her words almost broke me.
Then she touched my cheek.
“Come back.”
I kissed her forehead.
“I will.”
At Adrian's office, the lights were dim.
He was waiting beside the windows.
No whiskey tonight.
No smile.
Just my younger brother, looking older than his thirty-eight years.
“Did you know?” I asked.
He didn't pretend not to understand.
“Yes.”
I felt the floor shift beneath me.
“How much?”
“More than I told you.”
I crossed the room.
“Start talking.”
Adrian looked toward Ethan.
“Can we do this privately?”
“No.”
He nodded slowly.
Then he sat.
“Mom contacted me six years ago.”
I stared at him.
“Six years?”
“She said she had escaped Dad. She said the accident was staged to protect her.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because she said you'd never forgive her.”
I laughed once.
It sounded ugly.
“So you decided for me?”
Adrian lowered his head.
“She wanted control of the trust.”
“Why?”
“Because Dad had moved assets out of her reach before he died. She believed they belonged to her.”
“And the children?”
Adrian's face tightened.
“When Claire became pregnant, Mom realized the trust could pass beyond her control.”
I stepped closer.
“So you helped her take my children?”
“No.”
“Don't lie.”
“I didn't want them taken.”
“Then why did Vanessa name you?”
He closed his eyes.
“Because I knew about the adoption plan.”
Silence.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“And you did nothing.”
“I tried to stop it.”
“How?”
“I paid Margaret Ellis to delay everything.”
I stared at him.
“The two hundred thousand dollars.”
He nodded.
“I thought if I bought time, I could find a way out.”
“Instead, you financed the people threatening Claire.”
“I know.”
His voice cracked.
“I know what I did.”
I wanted to hate him.
It would have been easier.
But he looked like the little boy who used to hide behind me when our father shouted.
“Why didn't you come to me?” I asked.
Adrian looked up.
“Because I thought you'd kill Mom.”
I said nothing.
“And I thought you'd kill Vanessa. Maybe Margaret too.”
He swallowed.
“I was afraid of what you would do.”
That was the part I couldn't dismiss.
I had spent years teaching people to fear my anger.
Now I was discovering what that fear had cost me.
“You should have trusted me,” I said.
Adrian gave a broken laugh.
“Would you have deserved it?”
I looked away.
“No.”
He began crying.
Not dramatically.
Just silently, with his hands covering his face.
“I wanted to fix it before you found out.”
“You can't fix a betrayal by hiding it.”
“I know.”
Ethan stepped forward.
“Adrian, we need the location of Isabella Moretti.”
Adrian wiped his face.
“She left the lake house yesterday.”
“Where did she go?”
“I don't know.”
“Who does?”
Adrian hesitated.
“Vanessa.”
I looked at him.
“Vanessa says you're giving the orders.”
His face changed.
“What?”
“She named you.”
Adrian shook his head.
“No.”
“Then explain why.”
He stood.
“Vincent, Vanessa is trying to turn us against each other.”
“She's already succeeded.”
Adrian looked devastated.
Then he opened his desk drawer.
Ethan immediately stiffened.
“Hands where I can see them.”
Adrian froze.
Slowly, he withdrew a sealed envelope.
“Mom gave me this three months ago.”
He placed it on the desk.
“It contains instructions for what to do if the plan failed.”
I opened it.
Inside was a handwritten letter.
My mother's handwriting.
I recognized it immediately.
Adrian, if Vincent learns about the children, you must convince him that Claire acted voluntarily. Under no circumstances may he learn what happened at the lake house.
I looked up.
“What happened at the lake house?”
Adrian shook his head.
“I don't know.”
“Read the next page,” Ethan said.
I turned it over.
There was a photograph.
My mother stood beside a man whose face had been partially obscured by shadow.
Behind them was a familiar fireplace.
The lake house.
The photograph was dated eleven years earlier.
The night of the supposed accident.
On the back, my mother had written:
He must never know who survived.
I stared at the image.
Something about the man's posture was familiar.
The way he held his shoulders.
The angle of his head.
Then I noticed his right hand.
Two fingers were slightly bent.
A childhood injury.
My father had broken those fingers during a fight long before I was born.
I looked at Adrian.
“Our father died fifteen years ago.”
Adrian's face went white.
“I know.”
“Then why is he in a photograph dated four years after his death?”
No one answered.
My phone vibrated.
A message from Claire.
It contained a photograph of a handwritten note someone had slipped beneath the townhouse door.
Tell Vincent the truth about his father, or the children will never be safe.
Beneath the message was a signature.
May you like
GABRIEL MORETTI.
My father's name.
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