Chapter 9 - THE HEIR THEY BURIED
The word daughter changed the air inside the greenhouse.
Matteo stared at Evelyn.
“I have no daughter.”
“Your father had a child.”
“Who was the mother?”
Evelyn looked at Clara.
“Margaret Hayes.”
Clara stepped backward.
“My aunt?”
“Your aunt was involved with Anton. She became pregnant with your father’s child. Anton intended to use the baby to control the family inheritance.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“Your mother took the baby.”
“Why?”
“To protect her.”
Evelyn’s hands shook.
“Anton said the child died. But we later learned he had exchanged the babies. The infant he showed us was not the heir.”
Clara felt sick.
“Where is the heir?”
“No one knows.”
A gunshot came from the direction of the clinic.
Matteo’s phone rang.
Daniel answered.
His face changed.
“Bruno has been taken.”
Matteo closed his eyes briefly.
Clara grabbed her coat.
“We go now.”
“No,” Matteo said.
“You are not leaving without me.”
“You have no idea what is waiting.”
“I know Bruno is there.”
They drove to the clinic in an armored SUV.
A dark truck followed them.
It rammed the vehicle once, then again.
Matteo lost control and crashed through the gate of an abandoned factory.
Armed men surrounded them.
Luca fired through the rear window while Daniel covered Evelyn.
A masked attacker approached carrying a gas canister.
Clara recognized him and crawled through the side window.
She struck his wrist with a metal bar.
He shoved her down.
Bruno appeared from the darkness and attacked him.
The dog stood over Clara, bleeding through his bandage.
Matteo ran toward them.
“Bruno!”
The dog turned, but then a woman appeared on the factory roof.
Mara Voss.
She held a rifle.
“Your family has always been sentimental,” she called. “That is why it is so easy to control you.”
Matteo aimed at her.
“Come down.”
Mara laughed.
“You do not remember me, do you?”
He did not answer.
“You were ten when I carried the baby through the tunnel.”
Clara’s heart raced.
“What baby?”
Mara looked at her.
“You.”
Everyone froze.
Mara continued, “Your mother found you in the drainage passage. Margaret was supposed to deliver you to Anton. Instead, she took you and raised you under a false name.”
Clara looked at Evelyn.
“Is that true?”
Evelyn nodded through tears.
“You are the Moretti heir,” Mara said. “But not because of blood alone. Because your father left everything to the child who survived his house.”
Mara lowered the rifle.
“Anton wants the trust. Your aunt wants to destroy it. Your mother wants forgiveness. Matteo wants to protect you.”
She smiled.
“And you want the truth.”
Mara disappeared from the roof.
The factory began to shake.
A red light blinked beneath the SUV.
“Run!” Luca shouted.
The explosion threw them through the factory doors.
When Clara regained consciousness, Matteo was lying over her.
She touched his face.
“Are you alive?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He looked toward the smoke.
“Bruno?”
The dog limped from the burning building and rested his head against Clara’s leg.
She began to cry.
Matteo watched her, then whispered, “I do not know how to protect you without becoming another person who controls you.”
Clara looked into his eyes.
“Then protect me by listening.”
May you like
He nodded.
For the first time, Matteo Moretti did not argue.
