Chapter 7 - BLACKOUTDarkness swallowed the room.
For half a second, no one moved.
Then Damian’s hand found my arm and pulled me behind him.
“Down,” he ordered.
I dropped to the floor with Leah in my arms just as glass shattered somewhere behind us.
A gunshot cracked through the dark.
Leah screamed.
Damian moved like he had been built for violence. He pushed the dressing table over with one hard shove, creating cover between us and the window. Another shot hit the wall above us. Plaster rained down over my hair.
“Stay low,” he said.
His voice was calm.
Terrifyingly calm.
The guards in the hall shouted. More glass broke. A security alarm began wailing somewhere in the mansion, deep and pulsing like a heartbeat.
I curled around Leah.
“It’s okay,” I whispered, though nothing was okay. “I’ve got you.”
She pressed her face against my chest.
“Mama, dark.”
“I know. I know.”
Damian crouched beside us, gun in hand. I had not seen him draw it. He looked toward the broken window, then toward the hallway.
“Two shooters,” he said into a small radio clipped beneath his collar. “West exterior. One inside grid. Find the breach.”
A voice crackled back.
“Main power cut. Backup delayed.”
Damian’s face hardened.
“Backup doesn’t delay.”
Another voice answered.
“Someone disabled the generator manually.”
Inside the estate.
Again.
I felt cold all the way through.
Rocco had not only threatened us.
He had reached into the mansion’s bones.
Damian looked at me.
“We’re moving.”
“Where?”
“Safe room.”
A bitter laugh escaped me.
“Of course you have a safe room.”
“Several.”
He reached for Leah.
She clung to me and cried harder.
Damian stopped instantly.
Pain flickered across his face.
“She stays with you,” he said.
Then he rose just enough to fire twice toward the shattered window.
The answering gunfire stopped.
He grabbed my hand and pulled me up.
We ran.
The hallway outside was lit only by emergency strips along the floor. Shadows moved everywhere. Men shouted in Italian and English. Somewhere downstairs, Mrs. Bellamy was calling Leah’s name.
Damian guided us through a hidden panel behind a portrait.
A narrow passage opened.
“Inside,” he said.
I hesitated.
“Where does this go?”
“To the east study.”
“That’s where Dr. Vale is.”
“And the DNA.”
He sealed the panel behind us.
The passage smelled of dust and old stone. Leah’s breathing came in quick little bursts against my neck.
Damian moved ahead, one hand on the wall, one hand holding his gun low.
“Did she really see Rocco?” I whispered.
“She said bad man came night.”
“She remembers Sofia’s accident?”
“I don’t know.”
“But she was a baby.”
“Trauma does not ask age.”
The passage ended at another panel. Damian listened before opening it.
Voices.
Not guards.
One voice.
Dr. Vale.
He sounded angry.
“You can threaten me all you want. I am not falsifying the test.”
A woman answered.
Viola.
“Adrian, be reasonable. One result can save everyone.”
“Everyone or you?”
Damian’s face went cold.
He opened the panel silently.
We stepped into a narrow storage room behind the east study shelves.
Through a crack in the panel, I saw Viola standing near the desk. Her hair was loose now, her black coat gone. She held a small pistol pointed at Dr. Vale.
The doctor stood between her and a metal case.
My blood ran cold.
The DNA samples.
Viola’s voice trembled.
“You do not understand what happens if Damian knows everything.”
“He already knows enough.”
“Enough is dangerous. Everything is fatal.”
Damian pushed the panel open.
Viola spun.
But Damian was faster.
“Drop it.”
She froze.
The pistol shook in her hand.
“Damian.”
“Drop it.”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“My sweet boy—”
“Do not.”
The words cracked like a whip.
She lowered the gun slowly.
A guard entered behind us and took it from her.
Dr. Vale exhaled.
“You’re bleeding,” he said.
Damian looked down.
A red line marked his sleeve where glass or a bullet had cut him.
“It’s not mine,” he said automatically.
But it was.
Blood dripped from his wrist onto the floor.
Leah lifted her head.
“Daddy hurt.”
Everyone froze.
Daddy.
Damian’s face changed in a way I will never forget.
His weapon lowered slightly.
His eyes moved to Leah.
She reached one tiny hand toward him.
“Daddy hurt,” she repeated.
For two years, he had waited for that word.
Daddy.
And it came while his aunt stood accused, while gunmen circled his house, while the truth of Leah’s stolen life sat in a metal case between us.
Damian’s throat worked.
“I’m okay, sweetheart.”
Leah looked unconvinced.
She reached farther.
This time, Damian stepped close.
I let her touch his cheek.
For one second, the war stopped.
Then Dr. Vale cleared his throat.
“I have preliminary results.”
My heart stopped.
Viola closed her eyes.
Damian looked at the doctor.
“Say it.”
Dr. Vale’s face softened.
“Leah is Ava Moretti’s biological daughter.”
The room went silent.
The words landed and did not leave.
My knees gave out.
Damian caught my elbow before I fell, but I barely felt it.
Leah touched my face.
“Mama.”
I sobbed once.
Not beautifully. Not quietly. It tore out of me like something trapped for two years had finally found air.
“My baby,” I whispered.
I kissed her forehead, her cheeks, her hair. “My baby. My baby.”
Damian stepped back.
I saw him do it.
Not because he wanted distance.
Because he understood this moment was mine.
Then Dr. Vale spoke again.
“There’s more.”
Damian turned.
“What more?”
The doctor looked at him carefully.
“Leah is not biologically yours.”
Damian’s face did not move.
Viola opened her eyes.
A terrible silence filled the room.
Then Dr. Vale said the words that shattered what was left.
“But she is biologically related to the Caruso family.”
Damian looked slowly at Viola.
May you like
The doctor swallowed.
“Leah’s biological father is most likely your uncle Rocco.”
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