Chapter 3 - THE DNA TEST
By midnight, the Moretti mansion had become a fortress.
Every gate was locked.
Every camera was being reviewed.
Security teams searched the surrounding property.
Vincent sat alone in his study with the photograph in front of him.
The photograph of Elena.
The photograph of the baby.
The photograph that had turned his entire understanding of his family upside down.
The door opened.
His security chief, Marcus, entered.
“We found something.”
Vincent looked up.
“What?”
Marcus placed a folder on the desk.
“The adoption agency that processed Emma's paperwork closed two years ago.”
“That's not what I asked.”
“I know.”
Marcus opened the folder.
“There was no official adoption.”
Vincent stared at him.
“What?”
“Emma's paperwork was fabricated.”
His hand tightened around the edge of the desk.
“By whom?”
“We don't know.”
“Find out.”
“We already started.”
“What else?”
Marcus pulled out another document.
“The birth certificate lists the mother as unknown.”
“And the father?”
“Unknown.”
“Hospital?”
“St. Catherine's.”
Vincent froze.
“What year?”
“Twenty-three years ago.”
“That can't be right.”
Marcus nodded.
“That's why I checked twice.”
Vincent stared at the date.
Twenty-three years.
Emma was three.
Something wasn't adding up.
“Where was the baby for twenty years?”
Marcus shook his head.
“We don't know.”
Vincent stood.
“Get me the hospital records.”
“Sir, the hospital has already been contacted.”
“And?”
“They claim there is no record of an Emma Hayes.”
Vincent's eyes narrowed.
“Someone erased her.”
“Yes.”
“Who has access to the hospital archives?”
Marcus hesitated.
“Your father.”
Vincent went silent.
“My father had connections there.”
“More than connections.”
Marcus placed another document on the desk.
“Your father's foundation funded the hospital for fifteen years.”
Vincent looked at the paperwork.
His father's name appeared repeatedly.
Donations.
Renovations.
Private rooms.
Medical equipment.
He suddenly remembered something.
His mother had spent three months at St. Catherine's twenty-seven years ago.
She had told everyone it was for exhaustion.
But what if that wasn't true?
“What was my mother doing there?”
Marcus shook his head.
“We don't know.”
“Find out.”
Marcus nodded.
Then stopped.
“There is one more thing.”
Vincent looked up.
Marcus placed a sealed envelope on the desk.
“DNA results.”
Vincent stared.
“Whose?”
“Emma's.”
His heart began beating faster.
“Who ordered the test?”
“Margaret.”
Vincent looked toward the door.
“Bring her.”
Twenty minutes later, Margaret entered.
She looked exhausted.
Vincent placed the envelope on the desk.
“You ordered a DNA test.”
Margaret didn't deny it.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Two years ago.”
“Why?”
“I suspected.”
“Suspected what?”
“That Emma was Elena's daughter.”
Vincent stared at her.
“And?”
Margaret sat.
“The test confirmed it.”
He opened the envelope.
The first page was a genetic comparison.
Emma.
Elena.
99.98% probability of biological relationship.
Vincent stared.
Then looked at Margaret.
“So Emma is Elena's daughter.”
“Yes.”
“Which makes her…”
Margaret swallowed.
“Your niece.”
Vincent leaned back.
For a moment, he couldn't speak.
Emma was not merely an adopted child.
She was blood.
Moretti blood.
But there was another question.
“Who is her father?”
Margaret closed her eyes.
“I don't know.”
Vincent's voice sharpened.
“Margaret.”
“I don't know.”
“You tested her.”
“Yes.”
“Then you could test for the Moretti line.”
Margaret remained silent.
Vincent understood.
“You already did.”
She looked at him.
“Yes.”
“And?”
Margaret's eyes filled with tears.
“She isn't Elena's biological daughter.”
Vincent frowned.
“What?”
“The first test was real.”
“But?”
“But the woman in the photograph isn't Emma's mother.”
Vincent's blood went cold.
“Then whose child is she?”
Margaret whispered:
“That's what I've been trying to find out.”
Vincent stared at her.
“You said Elena had twins.”
“She did.”
“So where is the daughter?”
“I don't know.”
“And Emma?”
“I don't know.”
Vincent stood.
“You expect me to believe that?”
Margaret's voice broke.
“Vincent, listen to me.”
He didn't.
“You lied to me.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
He walked toward the window.
Outside, security lights swept across the grounds.
“Who is Emma?”
Margaret followed.
“She is connected to Elena.”
“How?”
“I don't know.”
“Who gave her to Sofia?”
“Your mother.”
“Why?”
“Because your mother knew the truth.”
“What truth?”
Margaret looked at him.
“The Moretti family didn't adopt Emma.”
Vincent turned.
“Then what happened?”
“She was returned.”
“Returned from where?”
Margaret whispered:
“From the Hayes family.”
Vincent's mind raced.
Hayes.
Elena Hayes.
Emma Hayes.
The photograph.
The missing daughter.
The impossible DNA results.
There had to be another explanation.
Then the door opened.
Sofia entered.
She was holding Emma.
The little girl was asleep against her shoulder.
Sofia looked at Vincent.
“I know who Emma's father is.”
Vincent stared.
“Who?”
Sofia's eyes filled with tears.
“Your brother.”
Vincent froze.
“My brother?”
“You have to understand.”
“I don't have a brother.”
“You did.”
“Who?”
Sofia whispered:
“Thomas.”
Vincent's heart stopped.
The man everyone said never existed.
The man his father erased.
The man who had sent the necklace.
The man who apparently wanted Emma.
“Thomas is Emma's father?”
Sofia shook her head.
“No.”
Vincent frowned.
“Then what are you saying?”
Sofia looked down at the sleeping child.
“He isn't her father.”
“Then who?”
Sofia whispered:
“Thomas is her grandfather.”
Vincent stared at Emma.
His blood ran cold.
If Thomas was Emma's grandfather—
then Emma's mother was his daughter.
The daughter who had supposedly died twenty-seven years ago.
The daughter no one could find.
The daughter in the photograph.
Vincent looked at Margaret.
“Where is Elena?”
Margaret whispered:
“Dead.”
“And her daughter?”
Silence.
Vincent's voice became almost inaudible.
“Where is my niece?”
Margaret finally answered.
“We've been looking for her for twenty-seven years.”
Vincent looked at Emma.
Then at Sofia.
Then at the photograph.
A terrible possibility entered his mind.
“No.”
Sofia began crying.
“Vincent…”
“No.”
He stepped backward.
“Emma cannot be…”
The little girl stirred in Sofia's arms.
Her eyes opened.
She looked at Vincent.
“Daddy?”
Vincent's entire body went still.
Emma smiled sleepily.
Then she whispered:
“I dreamed about Grandma.”
Vincent's heart stopped.
“Which Grandma?”
Emma pointed toward the photograph.
“The lady.”
Vincent looked at the photograph.
The woman in it was Elena.
Dead for twenty-seven years.
He looked back at Emma.
“What did she tell you?”
Emma rubbed her eyes.
“She said…”
Vincent knelt.
“What?”
Emma whispered:
“Tell Daddy that the wrong baby came home.”
Vincent stopped breathing.
Behind him, Margaret began to cry.
Because she knew exactly what the words meant.
Twenty-seven years ago, someone had switched two babies.
And if Emma was the wrong baby—
then somewhere in America was the child who had been raised as someone else.
A child who carried the real Moretti blood.
A child who had been hidden for twenty-seven years.
Vincent stood slowly.
“Marcus.”
The security chief appeared.
“Sir?”
“Find every child born at St. Catherine's on the night Elena disappeared.”
Marcus hesitated.
“Every child?”
“Every one.”
Vincent looked at Emma.
“And find the girl who should have been here.”
He paused.
“Because if someone switched the babies…”
His expression hardened.
“…they didn't do it to save Emma.”
“They did it to hide the other child.”
And somewhere in the darkness beyond the Moretti estate, a phone began to ring.
A man answered.
“Yes?”
A woman's voice whispered:
“They know.”
The man looked toward the sleeping city.
“Who?”
“Vincent.”
Silence.
Then the man smiled.
“Good.”
He looked down at an old photograph.
Two newborn babies.
Two hospital bracelets.
One marked:
EMMA HAYES
The other:
ELENA MORETTI
He whispered:
“Let him find her.”
Then he burned the photograph.
“Because once Vincent discovers who that girl really is…”
May you like
He watched the flames consume the last piece of evidence.
“…the Moretti family will finally destroy itself.”
