Chapter 3 - THE SECOND BABY
Nobody moved.
For a long moment, Claire heard nothing except the faint music drifting up from the ballroom.
Vanessa stared at Thomas.
Thomas stared back.
Adrian looked between them, calculating.
Eleanor closed her eyes.
That frightened Claire more than anything.
Adrian spoke first.
“Explain.”
Thomas took a sip of champagne.
“You always did hate waiting.”
“Thomas.”
“One warning, Eleanor. You’ve used my name enough tonight.”
Adrian stepped between them.
“You cut Claire’s shoe.”
Thomas glanced toward her.
“Yes.”
Claire’s stomach tightened.
No denial.
No excuse.
“Why?”
“To make her fall.”
Adrian’s expression changed.
Thomas lifted a hand.
“Not into you.”
“What?”
“The cake wasn’t supposed to hit Adrian,” Thomas said. “You were supposed to fall near the east doors.”
Claire remembered the path she had taken.
The service corridor opened near those doors.
“But somebody pushed me.”
Thomas’s smile faded.
“That wasn’t me.”
Adrian immediately understood.
“There were two people targeting her.”
“Exactly.”
Vanessa scoffed.
“Oh, now we trust him?”
“No,” Adrian said. “We listen.”
Thomas tilted his head.
“Your mother taught you that.”
“My mother apparently taught me a lot of things that weren’t true.”
Eleanor flinched.
Claire almost felt sorry for her.
Almost.
Adrian turned back to Thomas.
“Why make Claire fall?”
“Because she had something I needed.”
Claire frowned.
“What?”
“The photograph.”
“I put it back.”
“You put one photograph back.”
She froze.
Thomas smiled faintly.
“There were two.”
Claire remembered.
The drawer.
The hotel key card.
The photograph.
The handwritten note.
She had assumed everything belonged together.
“Which one did I take?”
“You didn’t.”
Thomas’s gaze shifted toward Vanessa.
“Someone else did.”
Vanessa folded her arms.
“Stop looking at me.”
“Why? You’ve spent fifteen years looking for it.”
Claire caught something.
Fifteen years.
Vanessa’s mother died fifteen years ago.
Adrian caught it too.
“What happened when Rebecca died?”
Thomas’s expression finally lost its humor.
“Everything changed.”
Eleanor whispered, “You have no right.”
“I have more right than anyone in this room.”
“You abandoned us.”
“I disappeared because Michael Moretti tried to kill me.”
Adrian went completely still.
Thomas set the champagne glass down.
“The boating accident was real. The story afterward wasn’t.”
Adrian stared at him.
“My father tried to kill you.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I discovered what he had done.”
“What had he done?”
Thomas looked at Eleanor.
She shook her head.
“Don’t.”
Thomas ignored her.
“He switched two newborns.”
Claire felt cold.
Adrian did not react immediately.
Vanessa did.
Her face changed.
Thomas saw it.
“So Rebecca did tell you.”
Vanessa remained silent.
Adrian said, “Which newborns?”
“You and another boy.”
“No.”
Eleanor’s voice was barely audible.
“Not exactly.”
Thomas frowned.
Eleanor stood slowly.
“If we’re telling him, we tell him correctly.”
Adrian watched his mother.
She looked older with every confession.
“There were two women admitted to St. Agnes Hospital that night,” Eleanor said. “Me and Rebecca.”
Adrian looked toward Vanessa.
Rebecca Cross.
Eleanor continued.
“Rebecca had gone into labor unexpectedly.”
Claire looked at Vanessa.
“But Vanessa is older than Adrian.”
“Ten months older,” Eleanor said. “Rebecca wasn’t giving birth to Vanessa.”
Vanessa’s jaw tightened.
Thomas said nothing.
Eleanor continued.
“Rebecca was carrying another child.”
Adrian’s gaze shifted.
“The second baby.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to him?”
Eleanor started crying.
“He died.”
Thomas shook his head.
“No.”
Eleanor looked at him.
“You don’t know that.”
“I know more than you think.”
“You disappeared.”
“Because Michael shot me.”
Claire’s eyes widened.
Thomas unbuttoned the top of his shirt and pulled the fabric aside.
An old scar crossed the upper part of his chest.
“Three inches lower, you wouldn’t have had a godfather to lie about.”
Adrian asked, “Who was Rebecca’s baby’s father?”
Thomas looked at him.
This time he did not smile.
“Me.”
Vanessa closed her eyes.
The answer landed harder than Claire expected.
Adrian slowly turned toward Vanessa.
“Rebecca had a son with Thomas?”
“Yes,” Eleanor whispered.
“And what does that have to do with me?”
Thomas said, “Michael found out.”
“Why did he care?”
“Because Rebecca knew what Michael was doing.”
“What?”
Thomas’s face hardened.
“Moving money. Names. Records. People.”
Adrian understood first.
“Witnesses.”
“Sometimes.”
“Informants.”
“Sometimes.”
“Enemies.”
“Whenever it paid.”
The room felt smaller.
Thomas continued.
“Your father was building an insurance policy. If the Moretti organization ever turned against him, he could destroy everyone.”
Adrian’s eyes darkened.
“What does a newborn have to do with that?”
“The hospital was owned by one of his shell companies.”
Eleanor covered her face.
Claire stared.
“You mean he used a hospital?”
“Not the hospital,” Thomas said. “Records. Birth certificates. Death certificates. Identities.”
Claire suddenly understood why the scratched photograph mattered.
A hospital.
A hidden baby.
Identity records.
“Michael could make people disappear on paper.”
Thomas looked at her.
“Exactly.”
Adrian asked, “And the babies?”
Thomas took a breath.
“Rebecca was afraid Michael would use our son against us. She begged Eleanor to help hide him.”
Eleanor nodded faintly.
“We arranged false records.”
Adrian’s voice became colder.
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
Thomas looked at her sharply.
“You told me he died.”
“I thought he did.”
“Thought?”
Eleanor gripped her cane.
“Michael discovered what we were doing. There was chaos. A nurse came. Rebecca was sedated. Records vanished. One baby was taken.”
Adrian stared at her.
“Which baby?”
Eleanor’s eyes moved to him.
“I didn’t know.”
For the first time, Adrian looked shaken.
Only slightly.
But Claire saw it.
“You didn’t know whether I was your son.”
Eleanor began crying.
“You had Michael’s bracelet.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“You had my eyes.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I raised you.”
The words came out broken.
Adrian stepped back.
Claire’s chest tightened.
Whatever Adrian was, whatever he had done, he was still a son watching his entire childhood collapse.
Thomas spoke more gently.
“Years later, we found enough evidence to believe the babies had not been switched.”
Adrian looked at him.
“Enough?”
“But never proof.”
“And the second child?”
“Listed as deceased.”
“Body?”
“No.”
“Grave?”
“No.”
“Then why did everyone stop looking?”
Thomas’s eyes changed.
“Because Michael returned.”
Eleanor whispered, “Thomas.”
Adrian turned.
“When?”
“1999.”
The date on Rebecca’s letter.
Thomas nodded.
“Rebecca contacted me. She said Michael had found her.”
“And?”
“She disappeared the next day.”
“Rebecca died in 2011.”
“That’s what her obituary says.”
Vanessa suddenly laughed.
Everyone looked at her.
It was not amused laughter.
It was bitter.
“You’re all unbelievable.”
Adrian faced her.
“What?”
“My mother spent her entire life terrified. I grew up watching her change locks every three months. We moved seven times before I was twelve. She slept with a chair under the doorknob.”
Thomas stared at her.
“I didn’t know.”
“No. You didn’t.”
Vanessa looked directly at him.
“You were busy pretending to be Adrian’s godfather.”
Thomas’s face tightened.
“I was protecting you.”
“You didn’t even know me.”
“I knew who you were.”
“That’s worse.”
Adrian interrupted.
“What did Rebecca tell you?”
Vanessa looked at him.
For the first time that evening, Claire saw something human in her expression.
Pain.
Then it disappeared.
“She told me never to trust a Moretti.”
Adrian almost smiled.
“Yet you agreed to marry one.”
“I had reasons.”
“There it is.”
Vanessa turned away.
Adrian stepped closer.
“You didn’t fall in love with me.”
“I did.”
“But that wasn’t why you came into my life.”
Silence.
Adrian nodded slowly.
“Finally.”
Vanessa looked back at him.
“Rebecca left me a locked box before she died.”
“What was inside?”
“Letters. Photographs. Records.”
“About me?”
“About everyone.”
Thomas asked, “Where is it?”
Vanessa laughed.
“You think I would tell you?”
Adrian spoke quietly.
“You’re standing inside my house after attempting to destroy evidence. Your options are narrowing.”
Vanessa’s eyes flashed.
“I burned one paper.”
“You threatened Claire.”
“That was a mistake.”
“You accused her of drinking before she fell.”
Vanessa said nothing.
Adrian watched her.
“Did you push her?”
“No.”
“Did you disable the camera?”
“No.”
“Did you know Thomas cut her shoe?”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
Vanessa looked at Claire.
Claire felt the answer before she heard it.
“My mother warned me about another family.”
Adrian frowned.
“What family?”
“The Harts.”
Claire’s breath caught.
Samuel Hart.
The doctor on the burned hospital record.
Adrian noticed.
“What?”
Claire shook her head.
“My grandmother’s maiden name was Hart.”
Everyone became silent.
Claire felt suddenly exposed.
Adrian’s stare sharpened.
“Your father’s mother?”
“My mother’s.”
“What was her first name?”
“Margaret.”
Thomas dropped his glass.
It shattered.
Claire jumped.
Thomas stared at her as though seeing a ghost.
“No.”
Eleanor looked equally shocked.
Claire’s heart began pounding.
“What?”
Thomas stepped closer.
“Margaret Hart had a daughter.”
“Yes. My mother, Elaine.”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“Another daughter.”
Claire stared.
“My mother was an only child.”
“That’s what she was told.”
Claire backed up slightly.
“I don’t understand.”
Thomas looked at Eleanor.
“Tell her.”
Eleanor whispered, “I can’t.”
Adrian stepped beside Claire.
“Tell her.”
Eleanor looked into Claire’s face.
Then something seemed to break inside her.
“Rebecca’s second baby wasn’t a boy.”
Thomas frowned.
“What?”
Eleanor nodded through tears.
“That was another lie Michael forced into the records.”
Thomas stared at her.
“You told me we had a son.”
“I was trying to protect the child.”
“From whom?”
“From Michael.”
Thomas looked sick.
Claire felt as if she were standing at the edge of something enormous.
Adrian asked, “What happened to Rebecca’s baby?”
Eleanor’s gaze moved toward Claire.
“She was taken from the hospital.”
Claire stopped breathing.
“By whom?”
“Dr. Samuel Hart.”
The surname echoed through the room.
Claire whispered, “My great-grandfather was named Samuel.”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
Adrian looked at Claire.
Then Thomas.
Then Vanessa.
“Claire’s family raised Rebecca’s daughter.”
“No,” Claire whispered.
She thought of her mother.
Her grandmother.
Her father.
All the ordinary stories of her childhood.
Thomas looked at Claire with stunned disbelief.
“If Samuel Hart took the baby…”
Claire shook her head.
“No.”
“…and Margaret Hart raised that child…”
“No.”
Thomas’s voice broke.
“Then your mother may have been my daughter.”
Claire stepped backward.
She hit the desk.
Vanessa stared at her.
Adrian caught Claire’s arm before she lost balance.
Nobody spoke.
Then Marco’s phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed immediately.
“Boss.”
Adrian turned.
“What?”
“We found the disabled camera technician.”
“Where?”
“Garage.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Marco looked at Claire.
“He says Vanessa never paid him.”
Vanessa stiffened.
Adrian’s eyes narrowed.
“Who did?”
Marco swallowed.
“Claire Bennett.”
Claire went completely still.
“That’s impossible.”
Marco continued.
“He has a transfer receipt.”
Adrian stared at Claire.
The warmth disappeared from the room.
“What account?”
Marco looked at his phone.
“An account registered in her name.”
Claire shook her head.
“No.”
Vanessa smiled for the first time in minutes.
Adrian did not.
He looked at Claire carefully.
Then his phone vibrated.
An incoming photograph.
He opened it.
His face turned to stone.
Claire whispered, “What is it?”
Adrian held the screen toward her.
The photograph showed Claire outside a bank three weeks earlier.
Beside her stood a man Claire had never seen in her life.
On the back of his neck was a tattoo Adrian recognized immediately.
A Moretti family insignia abandoned thirty years ago.
Michael Moretti’s personal mark.
Claire stared at the stranger.
“I don’t know him.”
Adrian looked at her.
Before he could answer, a new message arrived.
SHE DOESN’T KNOW WHO SHE WORKS FOR.
Then another.
BUT HER FATHER DID.
Claire’s face went white.
Her father had died eight months earlier.
Adrian’s gaze hardened.
A final message appeared.
ASK CLAIRE WHY HER FATHER LEFT HER $280,000 IN A BANK ACCOUNT SHE HAS NEVER SEEN.
Claire whispered, “What bank account?”
Adrian looked at her.
May you like
And for the first time since the cake hit his chest, he did not know whether Claire Bennett was the victim—
or the key to the entire conspiracy.
