Chapter 6 - What Elena Hid in Her Daughter’s Blood
Pier 19 had been abandoned since a customs raid two years earlier.
Dominic chose it because he knew the layout.
So did I.
At eleven thirty, fog moved across the river, swallowing the warehouses one by one. Shipping cranes rose above the docks like enormous black skeletons.
I arrived in a sedan with Isabella’s empty wheelchair in the back.
Dominic had demanded the child.
He would receive the chair.
My men approached through the water in two silent boats. Antonio positioned shooters on the roofs. Emma remained at the estate with Isabella under the protection of the only people whose loyalty I could verify by blood and history.
Inside my coat, I carried the surviving medical pages from Locker 317.
Most were copies.
The originals were hidden elsewhere.
I entered the warehouse alone.
Sophia sat beneath a hanging work light, her wrists tied behind her. A bruise darkened one side of her face.
Dominic stood twenty feet away with Dr. Pierce and six armed men.
His wounded shoulder had been bandaged.
“You came,” Sophia said.
Dominic smiled.
“He always comes when family is involved.”
“You are not family,” I said.
“No. I am the man your family used.”
I opened the rear door of the sedan.
The wheelchair rolled into view beneath a blanket.
Pierce stepped forward.
“Where is the girl?”
“Release Sophia first.”
Dominic shook his head.
“The records.”
I held up the folder.
“You tell me what Elena discovered.”
“You are in no position to negotiate.”
“Then shoot me.”
I spread my arms.
“If I die, the records are released to federal prosecutors, three newspapers, and every surviving Moretti captain.”
That gave him pause.
Dominic had always feared public truth more than private violence.
He could kill men.
He could not kill information once it escaped.
Pierce whispered something to him.
Dominic nodded.
“Elena discovered that Isabella carried a rare genetic marker,” he said. “A marker connected to the Moretti bloodline.”
My eyes moved toward Pierce.
“Connected does not mean proof.”
“No,” Pierce admitted. “But Caterina believed it did.”
Dominic continued.
“Elena realized someone had accessed Isabella’s pediatric records. She followed the money to Pierce. Then she found the poison.”
“Why weaken Isabella instead of killing her?”
My mother had given one explanation.
I wanted his.
“Because a dead child creates questions,” Dominic said. “A disabled child creates sympathy. You withdrew from daily operations. You gave me authority. The empire became mine in every way except name.”
So Isabella’s suffering had been a weapon used against me.
Every specialist appointment.
Every night beside her bed.
Every moment of guilt.
Dominic had turned my love for my child into a chain.
“And Elena?”
“She planned to expose everything.”
“You murdered her.”
“I gave the Morettis her route. They believed they were taking revenge. I believed I was removing a threat.”
Sophia looked at him with disgust.
“You burned a mother alive.”
Dominic’s face tightened.
“The car was not supposed to burn.”
“Does that help you sleep?”
He struck her.
I took one step forward.
Six guns rose.
Dominic smiled.
“There he is. The righteous husband. Tell me, Gabriel, how many mothers lost sons because of orders you gave?”
The accusation landed because it was true.
I had filled cemeteries.
I had justified every grave as business, loyalty, or revenge.
But there had always been another choice.
I simply had not taken it.
“Release her,” I said.
“The records first.”
I tossed the folder onto the concrete between us.
Pierce retrieved it.
He opened the first page and frowned.
“These are incomplete.”
“They are enough.”
“No. The genetic report is missing.”
“What report?”
Dominic’s eyes narrowed.
“Elena’s final test.”
I had not known there was one.
Sophia looked at me.
“My mother mentioned blood kept in a church,” she said.
Dominic turned sharply.
“What did you say?”
Sophia realized she had revealed too much.
Pierce grabbed her hair.
“Which church?”
She remained silent.
Dominic moved toward her.
I whistled once.
The warehouse lights went out.
Gunfire erupted from the roof.
Antonio’s shooters shattered the windows while my men breached the side doors. I dove behind a steel container and fired toward the muzzle flashes.
Dominic’s soldiers scattered.
Pierce dragged Sophia toward a rear exit.
I pursued them through the darkness.
A bullet struck the wall beside me.
I fired back and heard a man fall.
At the loading dock, Pierce shoved Sophia into a van.
I reached him before he could enter.
We hit the ground.
Pierce clawed for a syringe inside his coat. I caught his wrist and drove it against the pavement.
The syringe rolled beneath the van.
“You told me my daughter would never walk.”
He smiled through the pain.
“At the time, that was the plan.”
I broke his wrist.
He screamed.
Sophia kicked open the van door and struck him with both feet.
Antonio’s men arrived and pulled us apart.
Dominic escaped again.
But Pierce did not.
Under interrogation, the doctor lasted three hours.
Men like him often mistake education for courage.
At first, he demanded a lawyer.
Then he demanded protection.
Finally, he demanded forgiveness.
He received none.
He revealed that Elena had ordered a second DNA test shortly before her death. She placed the biological sample and the result inside the church where she and I had married.
Saint Michael’s.
A small chapel in Brooklyn.
The priest who helped her was Father Thomas Caruso.
My childhood friend.
The same priest who had performed Elena’s funeral.
At sunrise, I called him.
The number had been disconnected.
We drove to Saint Michael’s.
The front doors were open.
Inside, candles burned before the altar.
Father Thomas sat in the first pew with his back to us.
“Thomas?” I called.
He did not move.
I walked closer.
A red stain spread across his shirt.
He had been shot.
Sophia rushed forward and checked his pulse.
“He’s alive.”
Father Thomas opened his eyes.
His voice was barely audible.
“He came for the box.”
“Dominic?”
Thomas nodded.
“Did he get it?”
“No.”
Relief lasted only a second.
“Where is it?”
The priest looked toward the statue of Saint Michael.
“Not where Elena hid it.”
“What does that mean?”
“She knew someone would search the church. She moved the sample before she died.”
“Where?”
His trembling hand caught my sleeve.
“To the woman she trusted more than anyone.”
“Lucia?”
He shook his head.
“Elena trusted Lucia with the charm. Not the blood.”
“Then who?”
Father Thomas looked toward Sophia.
“Her sister.”
I stared at him.
Elena had no sister.
At least, none I had ever known.
Thomas coughed blood.
“She lived under another name.”
“What name?”
Before he could answer, every candle in the church went out.
A voice came through the darkness from behind the altar.
“My name is Victoria Moretti.”
A woman stepped into the light from the open sacristy door.
May you like
She held a pistol in one hand.
In the other, she carried Isabella’s original birth certificate.
