Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN AT THE GATE
My heart stopped.
I didn't wait for Luca's permission. I bolted past Daniel and ran down the hallway.
"Natalie, wait!" Luca shouted, his heavy footsteps following close behind me.
I burst through the front doors of the mansion and ran down the sweeping driveway toward the massive iron gates. The night air was freezing, biting through the thin fabric of my graduation gown, but I didn't feel it.
Floodlights illuminated the front entrance. A silver sedan had crashed into the wrought-iron bars, the hood crumpled, steam hissing from the radiator.
Half a dozen of Luca's armed guards had their weapons drawn, aimed at the driver's side door.
"Hold your fire!" Luca roared as he caught up to me, grabbing my arm to stop me from running directly into the line of sight.
The driver's side door creaked open.
A woman stepped out. She held her hands up in the glaring light, her chest heaving with panicked breaths.
I stopped breathing entirely.
It was like looking into a mirror. She had the same dark hair, the same hazel eyes, the same sharp jawline. She was wearing a beige trench coat over dark slacks, looking like a professional who had been dragged through a warzone.
She looked at the guns pointed at her, terrified, before her eyes locked onto me.
"Natalie?" she gasped, her voice trembling.
"Who are you?" I whispered, though I already knew the answer. The ultrasound photo in my mind suddenly became flesh and bone.
"My name is Claire," she said, taking a hesitant step forward. "I'm your sister."
"Stand down," Luca ordered his men. The guards lowered their weapons but didn't holster them.
Luca kept a protective grip on my arm as we walked toward the gate. He pressed a button on a remote, and the iron bars slowly swung open, grinding against the crumpled bumper of the sedan.
Claire rushed through the gap. She stopped a few feet away from me, her eyes darting frantically between me, Luca, and the armed guards.
"Are you okay?" she asked me, her voice desperate. "Did she hurt you?"
"Did who hurt me?" I asked, my voice cracking.
"Vanessa," Claire breathed. "I heard her on the phone tonight. She said the engagement was off, and she was going to burn Evelyn Brooks's life to the ground."
Luca stepped forward, pulling me slightly behind him. "How do you know Vanessa Bellini?"
Claire looked at Luca, fear flashing in her identical hazel eyes. "Because I'm her personal assistant."
The world tilted on its axis.
"You work for the Bellinis?" I asked, stepping out from behind Luca, shock overriding my fear. "They stole you! They threatened our mother to keep her quiet, and you work for them?"
"I didn't know!" Claire cried, tears finally spilling over her cheeks. "I didn't know anything until three hours ago!"
Luca gestured toward the mansion. "Get inside. Before the Bellini scouts find your car."
We hurried back up the driveway and into the house. Luca led us straight to the library, locking the heavy mahogany doors behind us. He poured Claire a glass of water, which she took with shaking hands.
"Start talking," Luca said, his voice cold and commanding. "Who raised you?"
Claire swallowed hard, staring at the glass. "A family in the suburbs. The Hendersons. They were wealthy. They told me I was adopted privately. They were good to me... but they died in a boating accident when I was twenty-two."
"Leaving you alone," I said softly, the anger draining out of me, replaced by a profound, aching pity.
"I needed a job," Claire continued, looking up at me. "I applied at a corporate firm in the city. Vanessa Bellini was the CEO. She hired me on the spot. She said I had the 'perfect look' for her office."
"She kept you close," Luca muttered, pacing in front of the fireplace. "A trophy. A constant reminder to her father that they owned the nurse who tried to expose them."
"She promoted me to her personal assistant three years ago," Claire said, her voice shaking. "I managed her schedule. Her emails. But tonight... she came back to the penthouse in a rage. She was throwing things. Screaming about a broken engagement. She said, 'The maid thinks she won, but I'll make sure she watches her mother suffer.'"
My blood ran cold. "My mother."
"I asked her what she meant," Claire said, wiping her eyes. "She laughed at me. She opened her safe and threw a file at my feet. It had my adoption papers. And a birth certificate. With Evelyn Brooks's name on it."
Claire looked at me, a sob breaking in her chest. "She told me I was a stolen dog playing fetch for the people who took me. She said she sent men to Evelyn's apartment to 'collect her pension early.'"
"Mom," I gasped, spinning toward the door.
"Daniel!" Luca yelled, pulling open the library doors.
Daniel was already sprinting down the hall. "Boss, we have chatter on the police scanners. A disturbance at an apartment complex on the South Side."
"My mother lives on the South Side," I cried, grabbing Luca's arm. "We have to go!"
"I'll take a strike team," Daniel said.
"No," Luca said, his eyes dark with a terrifying resolve. "I'm going. Prepare the cars."
"I'm coming with you," I said fiercely.
Luca looked at me, then at Claire. "Both of you. Stay in the center of the convoy. If the Bellinis are moving against civilians, the truce is dead. We are at war."
Ten minutes later, three black SUVs tore out of the estate, their engines roaring through the quiet Chicago night.
I sat in the back of the middle vehicle, clutching Claire's hand. We had just met, but our fingers intertwined instinctively, two halves of a stolen life finally touching.
"She'll be okay," Claire whispered, though her hand was shaking as badly as mine. "She has to be."
We pulled into my mother's apartment complex. The parking lot was eerily quiet. No police sirens. No ambulances. Just a single, black van parked haphazardly near the stairwell.
Luca was out of the lead SUV before it even came to a complete stop. He drew a heavy black handgun from his shoulder holster, motioning for his men to flank the building.
"Stay in the car," Luca ordered me through the open window.
He and Daniel moved silently up the concrete stairs to the second floor. I watched through the tinted glass, my heart pounding so hard it hurt my ribs.
A minute passed. Then two.
Suddenly, a gunshot rang out, shattering the silence.
I screamed, throwing the car door open.
"Natalie, no!" Claire yelled, grabbing my graduation gown, but the fabric ripped as I pulled away.
I sprinted toward the stairwell. One of Luca's guards tried to stop me, but I shoved past him, adrenaline fueling my legs.
I reached the second-floor landing just as Luca kicked my mother's front door open.
I froze in the doorway, staring at the horror inside.
The apartment was wrecked. Furniture was overturned, lamps shattered.
Standing in the center of the living room was a massive man in a leather jacket, clutching his bleeding shoulder. Luca stood ten feet away, his gun aimed squarely at the man's chest, smoke drifting from the barrel.
But it was what was behind the man that made me stop breathing.
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Vanessa Bellini stood in the kitchen, her red silk gown ruined.
And she was holding a gun to my mother’s head.
