Chapter 3 - The Man Adrian Trusted Most
Victor Salerno had taken a bullet for Adrian when they were twenty-seven.
That history was the only reason Adrian did not immediately put him through a wall.
Instead, they sat in the library.
Door locked.
Leo upstairs with Mara and Dr. Cole.
Evelyn elsewhere under guard.
“Explain,” Adrian said.
Victor did.
The laundry camera failed eleven weeks earlier.
He ordered replacement.
Then cancelled it.
“Why?”
“Because Sofia contacted me.”
Adrian stared.
The room seemed to stop.
“When?”
“Eleven weeks ago.”
“My dead wife contacted you?”
“Yes.”
“And you said nothing.”
“She told me not to.”
Adrian laughed bitterly.
“Everyone in my life apparently receives instructions from my wife except me.”
Victor looked ashamed.
“What did she want?”
“The camera down.”
“Why?”
“She needed someone entering the laundry area without being recorded.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“She said Leo was being watched.”
“By whom?”
“She didn't say.”
“So you knowingly created a security blind spot around my infant son?”
“Yes.”
Adrian stood.
Victor did too.
“Sit.”
Victor sat.
Adrian paced.
“Why would Sofia trust you?”
“She didn't.”
“Then?”
“She said I owed her.”
Adrian stopped.
“For what?”
Victor looked toward the floor.
“Her sister.”
Mara.
“What about Mara?”
“When she got out of prison, your father wanted her gone.”
Adrian understood what gone meant in the Moretti family.
“I moved her.”
“Where?”
“Milwaukee.”
“You kept her alive.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Evelyn asked.”
Again, his mother.
Adrian rubbed both hands over his face.
His father’s shadow seemed built into the walls.
“What happened eleven weeks ago?”
Victor said Sofia claimed someone inside the house had access to Leo’s room.
“She wanted evidence.”
“So she sent someone through the laundry?”
“Yes.”
“Was it Mara?”
“No.”
“Who?”
“She called herself June.”
Adrian frowned.
“Description?”
Victor gave one.
Mid-fifties.
Red hair.
Nurse.
Mara entered without knocking.
“June Harper.”
Everyone turned.
“You know her?”
“She delivered Leo.”
Adrian’s blood ran cold.
The hospital nurse.
He remembered her vaguely.
“She worked at St. Matthew’s?”
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
“Missing.”
Victor checked.
June Harper had resigned four months earlier.
Same week Sofia supposedly died.
No forwarding address.
Adrian looked at Mara.
“Why did Sofia trust her?”
“Because June helped her.”
“With what?”
Mara hesitated.
Adrian almost laughed.
“No more hesitation.”
Mara nodded.
“Sofia had been afraid for months before she disappeared.”
“Of whom?”
“She didn't know.”
“She told you?”
“Bits.”
“She thought someone was changing Leo’s medical records.”
Adrian stared.
“What records?”
“Birth records.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Dr. Cole entered.
“Mr. Moretti.”
Adrian turned.
“Leo?”
“Sleeping.”
“Good.”
“But I found something.”
Adrian stiffened.
Cole held a photocopy.
“I requested his original newborn screening from St. Matthew’s.”
“And?”
“It doesn’t match the copy in your household medical file.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“What’s different?”
“Blood type.”
Silence.
Adrian knew his son’s recorded blood type.
O positive.
Cole continued.
“The hospital original says A negative.”
Adrian looked at Mara.
“What does that mean?”
“It means somebody altered one set.”
“Why?”
Cole answered carefully.
“Possibly clerical error.”
Adrian gave him a look.
“You don’t believe that.”
“No.”
Cole placed another sheet down.
“More importantly, the infant footprint card in the household file belongs to another child.”
Adrian could not move.
“What?”
“The measurements don't match Leo’s current developmental records.”
Mara covered her mouth.
Adrian whispered:
“Are you saying Leo isn't my son?”
“No.”
Cole raised a hand.
“I’m saying records associated with his birth were manipulated. We need DNA testing before anyone jumps further.”
Adrian stared upstairs.
For six months he had held Leo.
Fed him.
Walked hallways with him.
Loved him.
A laboratory could not change that.
But it could reveal something.
“Do it.”
Cole nodded.
“And Sofia?”
Adrian’s voice changed.
“What about her?”
“If we can locate archived maternal samples from the hospital, we can compare.”
Mara looked alarmed.
“Why?”
Cole replied:
“Because if someone changed the baby’s records, we need to know exactly which identities were altered.”
The next six hours dragged.
At noon, Mara sat in the nursery while Leo slept.
Adrian entered.
“You recognize his cries.”
She nodded.
“Because?”
“I spent his first three weeks with him.”
Adrian froze.
“What?”
“After birth.”
“You said you were there before Sofia disappeared.”
“I stayed at a rented apartment nearby.”
“Why?”
“Sofia asked me.”
“And I knew nothing.”
“She was afraid you’d reject me.”
Adrian looked hurt despite himself.
“I didn’t know you existed.”
“She knew how you felt about your father’s enemies.”
“My father was dead.”
“His rules weren't.”
That was true.
Adrian looked at Leo.
“What was he like?”
“Quiet.”
Adrian laughed.
“Obviously not anymore.”
Mara smiled.
“He liked having one hand here.”
She placed her palm lightly on his chest.
“Sofia did it.”
“That’s why he calmed.”
“Yes.”
“He remembered.”
“Maybe.”
Adrian looked at her.
“You weren’t performing some miracle.”
“No.”
“You were doing what his mother did.”
Mara’s eyes filled.
“Yes.”
That answer hurt more than anything.
Adrian sat.
“Tell me about Sofia.”
“You were married seven years.”
“Tell me who she was before me.”
So Mara did.
Two sisters sharing a bedroom.
Sofia stealing Mara’s sweaters.
Their father making pancakes Sunday mornings.
Their mother dying young.
Vincent Moretti arriving at the house.
Fear.
Threats.
Their father’s disappearance.
Sofia changing names.
Mara going to prison.
Years lost.
“She thought meeting you was an accident,” Mara said.
“Was it?”
“I don't know.”
“What?”
“She met you at a charity auction funded by a Moretti foundation.”
Adrian remembered.
Sofia in a green dress.
Laughing at a terrible painting.
He bought the painting because she called it ugly.
He still owned it.
“Someone may have put her there deliberately?”
“She wondered later.”
“Who?”
“No answer.
Before Mara could continue, Adrian’s phone rang.
Dr. Cole.
Results.
Adrian put it on speaker.
“The paternity test is definitive.”
Adrian stopped breathing.
“Leo is your biological son.”
His shoulders loosened.
Then Cole continued.
“The maternal comparison is more complicated.”
Mara stiffened.
“We located preserved maternal testing from Sofia’s pregnancy.”
“And?”
“Leo is not genetically related to Sofia.”
Adrian stared at nothing.
Mara whispered, “That’s impossible.”
Cole repeated.
“Sofia Moretti was not Leo’s biological mother.”
The nursery became silent.
Adrian looked at the sleeping child.
“Then who was?”
Cole answered:
“That’s what you need to find out.”
But Mara had gone pale.
Adrian saw it.
“You know.”
“No.”
“Mara.”
She backed away.
“I know who might.”
“Who?”
Her voice cracked.
“June.”
The missing nurse.
Adrian stood.
“Find her.”
Victor’s voice came through the doorway.
“We already did.”
Everyone turned.
“Where?”
“Cook County morgue.”
Mara stopped breathing.
Victor continued.
“Jane Doe. Four months ago.”
“Cause?”
He looked at Adrian.
“Hit-and-run.”
Adrian’s face hardened.
The same week Sofia vanished.
The same week Leo’s records were altered.
Someone had not just created a false death.
May you like
They had cleaned up witnesses.
And the only surviving person who might know the truth about Leo was a nanny Adrian had met less than twenty-four hours earlier.
