Chapter 7 - THE HOSPITAL BRACELET
My hands began to shake uncontrollably.
I stared at the faded ink on the birth certificate. Victoria Moretti.
“I don’t understand,” I whispered, looking up at Dominic. “My mother told us she adopted my brother through a state agency. Because she couldn’t have any more children after my father died. What does Victoria have to do with this?”
Dominic leaned against the doorframe, the heavy weight of his family’s sins etched into his face.
“Victoria didn’t just coordinate the adoption, Nora,” Dominic said softly. “She arranged it. She paid off the clinic. She fabricated the state paperwork.”
“Why?” I demanded, my voice rising. “Why would a mafia boss’s sister orchestrate an adoption for the widow of a man her family murdered?”
“Because,” Dominic said, his eyes filled with a grim sorrow, “your brother wasn’t a random orphan.”
He stepped closer, lowering his voice so Emily, who was watching TV in the other room, wouldn’t hear.
“Twenty years ago, Victoria had a child out of wedlock. A boy. The father was a rival boss. If my father—the patriarch—had found out, he would have killed the child to prevent the rival bloodline from merging with ours. Victoria hid the pregnancy. She gave birth in a private clinic and gave the boy away the same night.”
The room started to spin.
I looked at the piece of paper in my hand.
“My brother,” I breathed, the realization suffocating me. “My brother is Victoria’s biological son.”
“Yes,” Dominic confirmed. “She gave him to your mother because she knew she could keep tabs on you. She knew your mother was too poor and too terrified to ever ask questions. Victoria used your family as a hiding place for her own flesh and blood.”
Tears spilled down my cheeks. “That’s why she hired me. That’s why she paid for his college tuition. She wasn’t holding us hostage. She was paying for her son’s life without exposing him to the syndicate.”
“And now,” Dominic said, his voice hardening, “Victoria has seized control of the entire Moretti empire. She’s the boss. And she has the power to bring her son back into the fold. To make him the heir.”
“No,” I said, panic gripping my chest. “My brother is a good person. He’s studying to be an architect. He knows nothing about this world. If she tells him who he really is, she’ll ruin his life.”
Dominic nodded. “Which is why we have to end this tonight.”
He checked the magazine of his pistol, his jaw set like stone.
“Take care of Emily, Nora. If I don’t come back by sunrise, Marco knows what to do. He’ll get you both out of the country.”
Before I could say another word, Dominic walked out the door, disappearing into the Chicago night to confront the woman who had orchestrated twenty years of misery.
The hours dragged on like a nightmare. I sat in the safe house living room, watching the clock tick past midnight, then one, then two. Emily fell asleep with her head in my lap. I held my father’s gold watch in one hand and my brother’s birth certificate in the other.
At 3:15 AM, the front door of the safe house violently burst open.
I screamed, jumping off the couch, shielding Emily behind me.
Marco stumbled into the room, bleeding heavily from his shoulder. He was out of breath, his suit torn.
“Marco!” I yelled, running to help him. “Where’s Dominic?!”
Marco leaned against the wall, clutching his wound. “It was a trap, Nora. Frank set us up. They knew we were coming to the main estate. Victoria’s men surrounded us.”
“Is Dominic alive?” I asked, terrified.
“Yes,” Marco panted. “But Victoria has him. She’s holding him in the old library. She wants to execute him in front of the family council to legitimize her takeover.”
Marco looked at me, his eyes desperate.
“She’s bringing the kid, Nora.”
My heart stopped. “What kid?”
“Your brother,” Marco coughed, wincing in pain. “Victoria sent men to his dorm. They grabbed him an hour ago. She’s going to reveal his bloodline to the council tonight and crown him the new heir of the Moretti family.”
“He won’t accept it,” I said fiercely. “He’ll refuse.”
“It doesn’t matter if he refuses!” Marco shouted. “Once the council knows he has rival blood in his veins, half of them will try to use him, and the other half will try to assassinate him. If Victoria reveals him tonight, your brother’s normal life is over forever.”
I looked at the birth certificate in my hand.
I thought about my father, murdered and left in a ditch. I thought about my mother, working her fingers to the bone while the woman who killed her husband secretly raised her son. I thought about Caroline, bleeding in the rain just to see her daughter.
I wasn't going to let Victoria destroy my brother, too.
I walked over to the kitchen counter. I picked up Marco’s spare handgun.
It was heavy. Cold. I had never held a gun in my life.
“Nora, what are you doing?” Marco asked, his eyes wide.
“I’m going to the estate,” I said, my voice eerily calm.
“You can’t! They have thirty men guarding the perimeter!”
“They have thirty men guarding the front,” I corrected him. “But I’m the housemaid, Marco. I know how the laundry shoots connect to the basement. I know which security cameras are broken. And I know exactly how to get into the library without opening a single door.”
I turned to Emily. “Sweetheart, stay with Marco. Lock the door. Do not open it for anyone but me or your daddy. Do you understand?”
Emily nodded, tears in her eyes. “Bring him back, Miss Nora.”
“I will.”
I grabbed my coat and drove Dominic’s SUV into the city. The rain had finally stopped, leaving a chilling fog over the streets.
I arrived at the Moretti estate. The front gates were swarming with armed guards. Black luxury cars lined the driveway—the family council had arrived.
I parked two blocks away and walked through the woods behind the property. I slipped through the rusted iron gate near the garden greenhouses, a path only the gardening staff used.
I found the exterior metal grate covering the basement laundry chute. I used a rock to smash the rusted padlock, pulled the grate open, and slid down into the darkness.
I landed on a pile of discarded linens in the basement. I crept through the shadowy corridors, avoiding the main staircases. I could hear the muffled voices of dozens of men gathered in the grand foyer above.
I made my way to the hidden servant’s passage that ran behind the walls of the mansion. I climbed the narrow wooden stairs until I reached the back of the massive oak bookshelf in the library.
I pressed my ear against the wood.
I could hear Victoria’s voice.
“My brother has failed this family,” she announced, her tone echoing with triumph. “He chose a weak, civilian wife over our legacy. He tried to dismantle our empire. For that, the penalty is death.”
I found the small peephole hidden in the woodwork and looked through.
The library was filled with the heads of the Chicago families. In the center of the room, Dominic was kneeling on the floor, his hands zip-tied behind his back, his face bruised and bloody.
Standing over him was Victoria, holding a silver revolver.
And standing next to her, looking absolutely terrified and confused, was a nineteen-year-old boy in a college sweatshirt.
My brother, Leo.
“But the Moretti bloodline will not end tonight,” Victoria proclaimed, placing a gentle hand on Leo’s shoulder. Leo flinched, pulling away from her.
“Who are you people?!” Leo yelled, his voice cracking. “Let me go!”
Victoria smiled, a twisted, maternal affection in her eyes. “Hush, my sweet boy. You don’t understand yet. But you will. Everything you see here… it all belongs to you.”
Victoria raised the revolver, aiming it at Dominic’s head.
“Once I remove the traitor,” Victoria said, looking around the room, “I will introduce you to the true heir of the Moretti empire. My son.”
Dominic closed his eyes, accepting his fate.
I couldn't wait any longer.
I pushed the hidden latch. The heavy oak bookshelf swung open with a loud groan, spilling me out into the grand library.
Every head in the room snapped toward me.
May you like
Before anyone could draw their weapons, I raised Marco’s gun and pointed it directly at the only thing Victoria cared about.
I pointed it at Leo.
