Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN WHO GAVE ME AWAYThe blood was Lucian’s.
I knew before the test came back.
A smear across the steering wheel.
More on the driver’s seat.
His phone lay shattered on the pavement beside the Chicago River.
No body.
No weapon.
No eyewitness willing to admit they had seen anything.
Marco wanted to move me immediately.
I refused.
“Victor wants the drive.”
“He wants you too.”
“Then hiding won’t bring Lucian home.”
“We don’t know Sloane has him.”
“Who else?”
Marco didn’t answer.
Detective Torres checked herself out of the hospital against medical advice and arrived wearing a sling.
“You look terrible,” I told her.
“You look worse.”
“Thank you.”
“Anytime.”
We worked from a conference room inside a federal building.
By dawn, analysts had recovered partial data from the drive.
One file contained a list of shell companies.
Another contained photographs of payments.
Then a hidden directory appeared.
REBECCA.
Inside was an address.
A farmhouse outside Galena, Illinois.
“Trap,” Marco said immediately.
“Obviously,” Torres replied.
“I’m going.”
They both said no.
I looked at them.
“My husband disappeared after trying to contact my biological mother. The address to that mother is on the evidence everyone is trying to get. I am going.”
Torres frowned.
“You’re seven weeks pregnant.”
“Pregnancy isn’t a hostage situation.”
“No, but bullets are generally discouraged.”
“Then bring people with guns.”
Marco almost smiled.
Torres didn’t.
Two hours later, we drove north with federal agents.
The farmhouse sat beyond acres of bare fields.
No cars.
No movement.
Torres ordered me to remain in the armored SUV.
This time I listened.
Agents entered.
Five minutes.
Ten.
Then Torres returned.
“There’s someone inside.”
My heart hammered.
“Rebecca?”
“We think so.”
I got out.
A woman sat at the kitchen table.
The woman from Lucian’s photograph.
My mother.
Biological mother.
Rebecca Sloane.
She looked at me and began crying.
I didn’t.
Not yet.
“You have Elaine’s eyes,” she whispered.
“No.”
She flinched.
“I have my own.”
“Yes.”
The answer surprised me.
She stood.
“I have imagined this moment thousands of times.”
“I haven’t.”
Another flinch.
Good.
Maybe cruel.
But I had no room left to carry other people’s guilt for them.
“Where is my husband?”
“I don’t know.”
“You met him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Rebecca looked toward the agents.
“Can we speak alone?”
“No.”
“Norah—”
“No more private secrets. That’s how every horrible thing in this family survived.”
Detective Torres nodded approvingly.
Rebecca sat again.
“Lucian found me eight months ago.”
“Why?”
“He was investigating you.”
My heart clenched.
“Before we married?”
“Yes.”
Of course.
Lucian Moretti did not marry someone without understanding every possible threat.
I knew that.
Still, hearing it hurt.
“He discovered Elaine Harper didn’t exist before 1998,” Rebecca said. “Eventually he found me.”
“And?”
“I told him who you were.”
“You told him Richard Cole was my father?”
“Yes.”
“He knew?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
The betrayal cut cleanly.
“He knew all of it?”
“Not all.”
“What didn’t he know?”
“That the ledger still existed.”
“Why did you ask him to leave me?”
Rebecca cried silently now.
“Because everyone who loves you becomes a target.”
“That was not your decision.”
“I know.”
“Apparently nobody in my life understands that.”
“He refused.”
I looked at her.
“What?”
“Lucian refused to leave you.”
She smiled faintly through tears.
“He said you had spent enough of your life having choices made for you.”
That sounded exactly like him.
Which somehow made his lie worse and better simultaneously.
“He promised not to tell you about me because I begged him.”
“Why?”
“I was afraid Victor would find me if you started looking.”
“So protecting yourself mattered more than letting me know my mother was alive?”
Rebecca’s expression crumpled.
“Yes.”
At least she didn’t lie.
“I’m not asking you to forgive me.”
“Good.”
“I don’t deserve it.”
“No.”
The room became quiet.
Then I asked, “Where’s the second half of the ledger?”
Rebecca looked toward my stomach.
“Elaine hid it.”
“Where?”
“In something she knew you would keep.”
My mind immediately went to childhood belongings.
Photos.
Books.
Jewelry.
Then I remembered the tiny black baby shoes.
Not those.
But something about them.
Shoes.
My mother had kept my first pair of baby shoes in a wooden box.
They were at Moretti House.
I stood.
“Baby shoes.”
Rebecca’s eyes widened.
“What?”
“My first shoes.”
A small silver pair.
My mother—Elaine—had kept them inside a cedar chest.
The chest moved with me everywhere.
Chicago.
My first apartment.
My house with Ethan.
Lucian’s mansion.
Victor had been looking for a digital ledger.
What if it wasn’t digital?
We drove back to Chicago.
I called Moretti House.
No answer from the housekeeper.
Marco called security.
Nothing.
His face changed.
“Something’s wrong.”
The property cameras went offline thirty seconds later.
“Go faster,” I said.
We arrived to find the front gate open.
One guard unconscious.
Another bleeding but alive.
Inside, the mansion looked untouched.
Too untouched.
I ran upstairs.
The cedar chest was gone.
On my bed was Lucian’s wedding ring.
I stopped.
“No.”
There was blood on it.
And a note.
OLD UNION STATION.
MIDNIGHT.
BRING REBECCA AND THE DRIVE.
NO POLICE.
Rebecca appeared behind me.
Her face went white.
“This is my fault.”
I turned.
“No.”
She stared.
It was probably the first kindness I had given her.
“Victor’s actions are Victor’s fault.”
Something broke in her expression.
Perhaps she had spent her entire life believing otherwise.
I picked up Lucian’s ring.
My husband was alive.
I chose to believe it.
Midnight gave us eight hours.
Detective Torres started planning.
A federal tactical team wanted to implant a tracker inside the drive.
Marco wanted snipers.
Rebecca wanted to go alone.
Everyone had ideas.
For once, I made the decision.
“We give Victor what he wants.”
Torres stared at me.
“You cannot hand over corruption evidence.”
“Not the real evidence.”
Lucian had once taught me something while explaining why one of his companies stored backups in three countries.
Never keep the only copy of anything someone might kill you for.
Elaine understood that too.
The drive had already been duplicated.
Whatever was inside my baby shoes could be copied before midnight.
“Victor thinks information gives him power,” I said.
Marco smiled slowly.
“He doesn’t know we already have it.”
“Exactly.”
At 7:16 p.m., an analyst opened the heel of the old silver baby shoe.
Inside was a microfilm strip.
Records.
Account numbers.
Photographs.
Names.
Enough to end careers.
Enough to imprison Richard Cole.
And one final photograph.
Victor Sloane standing beside an industrial building.
Written below:
PROPERTY OWNED THROUGH SLOANE DEVELOPMENT.
Marco recognized it.
“Old Union Station warehouse district.”
Torres looked at me.
“We know where he’s holding Lucian.”
We were preparing to move when Rebecca grabbed my arm.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“If Victor has Lucian, he won’t trade.”
“What does he want?”
“You.”
I stared.
“Why?”
She looked at my stomach again.
“Because you’re his only grandchild.”
“He has Ethan.”
“No.”
“What?”
“Ethan isn’t Victor’s biological son either.”
My head actually hurt from the number of false bloodlines in my life.
“Then whose?”
Rebecca swallowed.
“Richard’s.”
I laughed despite myself.
“That is literally the opposite of what Patricia told us.”
“Patricia lied because Victor forced her to.”
“Why?”
“Because Victor never cared about Ethan.”
Rebecca touched my hand.
“He cared about you.”
“That’s supposed to comfort me?”
“No.”
“Then why does he want me?”
Her answer chilled me.
“Victor believes everything should pass through blood.”
“His money?”
“His organization.”
“I don’t want either.”
“He knows.”
Rebecca’s voice dropped.
“And that is why he wants your baby.”
At 11:57 p.m., I entered the abandoned station warehouse wearing a wire.
Rebecca walked beside me.
Marco hated the plan.
Torres hated it more.
But federal agents surrounded the building.
Ethan had disappeared from police custody six hours earlier.
That worried everyone.
Especially me.
Inside, one hanging bulb illuminated the center of the warehouse.
Lucian was tied to a chair.
Blood streaked one side of his face.
But he was alive.
“Lucian.”
His head snapped up.
“Norah?”
Then he saw my stomach.
Or rather, the way both my hands protectively covered it.
His expression turned furious.
“What are you doing here?”
“Saving you.”
“I specifically object.”
Despite everything, I almost laughed.
Then Victor Sloane emerged from the shadows.
He was thinner than his photographs.
Older.
A dying man wearing a perfect gray suit.
“My granddaughter.”
“I’m not your anything.”
His smile disappeared.
“You sound like Rebecca.”
“Good.”
Rebecca stepped forward.
“Let him go.”
Victor barely looked at her.
“You disappointed me from the day you were born.”
Rebecca’s shoulders stiffened.
I took her hand.
Victor noticed.
For some reason that enraged him.
“Give me the drive.”
I lifted it.
“Lucian first.”
He nodded toward one of his men.
Lucian’s restraints were cut.
He stood unsteadily.
Then a gun pressed against his back.
“Walk.”
He crossed half the distance.
I crossed the other.
Victor watched.
“Drive.”
I handed it over.
He smiled.
“You really are Elaine’s daughter.”
Then gunfire erupted outside.
Victor’s smile vanished.
He looked at me.
“You brought police.”
“No.”
Lucian suddenly tackled the armed man behind him.
Chaos exploded.
Rebecca screamed.
I dropped.
Shots cracked overhead.
Victor grabbed me by the hair.
A gun pressed against my stomach.
Everything stopped.
Lucian froze.
Victor breathed against my ear.
“Call them off.”
Before I could answer, another voice came from behind him.
“Let her go.”
Ethan.
He stood in the shadows holding a gun.
Victor laughed.
“The failed son.”
Ethan’s hands shook.
“Let Norah go.”
“You could never protect her.”
“No.”
Ethan looked at me.
“I couldn’t.”
His eyes filled with regret.
“But I can now.”
Victor raised his weapon.
Two shots exploded.
May you like
I screamed.
And both men fell.
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