Chapter 9 - The Woman Who Claimed to Be My Mother
The rain turned the ink cold beneath my fingers.
Teresa.
My biological mother.
The woman who had taught me to read, watched me grow, and supposedly died when I was fifteen.
The woman who had manipulated my marriage and reached into my daughters’ lives before they took their first breaths.
I looked at the mother who had raised me.
“Is it true?”
Her face crumpled.
“Yes.”
One word erased the foundation of my childhood.
“Who are you to me?”
“The woman who chose you.”
“That is not what I asked.”
“I could not have children.”
She wrapped her coat around herself, trembling.
“Your father and I had been married six years. The Moretti elders wanted him to replace me. Then Teresa appeared with a newborn.”
“Why did she give me away?”
“She did not give you away. She made an agreement.”
“What agreement?”
“We would raise you as the Moretti heir. She would remain close as your governess. When you became powerful enough, she intended to use you.”
I remembered Teresa sitting beside my bed during thunderstorms.
You were born for something greater, Adrian.
I had believed it was love.
It had been investment.
“Why fake her death?”
“Your father discovered she had ordered the murder of a prosecutor’s family. He tried to sever our connection to the Crown.”
“So she disappeared.”
“She threatened to kill you if we exposed her.”
Marco approached, his shoulder bandaged.
“Boss, Gabriel made contact.”
I turned immediately.
“The girls?”
“Safe. He moved them to an old monastery outside Albany.”
Relief entered my lungs for the first time in minutes.
“Tell him to stay there. No electronic communication.”
“He also found something inside Sofia’s pink rabbit.”
Isabella had given both girls toys.
Of course she had hidden evidence in both.
“What?”
“A folded map and a train ticket.”
“To where?”
“Grand Central Station.”
The locker.
I looked at the key Teresa had taken.
“She believes the locker is empty.”
“Maybe the key was not for the locker,” Elena said.
Lucia stood beside her, wrapped in a medic’s blanket.
Despite years of captivity, she remained focused.
“Isabella never stored evidence in obvious places,” Lucia explained. “She used instructions that appeared literal but required another step.”
“What does 317 mean?”
“It might be a train number.”
Marco checked archived schedules through a secure device.
“Three years ago, Train 317 ran from Grand Central to Cold Spring.”
The map in Sofia’s rabbit showed a route along the Hudson River.
Cold Spring was circled.
We left the church before dawn.
My mother came with us under guard.
I did not trust her.
But Teresa had tortured her, and fear had limits. If my mother still protected the Crown, she had paid dearly for it.
We reunited with Lily and Sofia at the monastery.
The building sat on a wooded hill, isolated from the road. Father Gabriel met us at the gate.
Sofia ran toward Elena with both arms open.
She took four unsupported steps before stumbling.
Elena caught her.
Lucia watched, tears pouring down her face.
“That is Sofia?”
Elena nodded.
Lucia knelt and embraced both girls.
Lily stared at her.
“You look like Elena.”
“I’m her sister.”
“Where were you?”
Lucia’s smile faltered.
“Far away.”
“Did you bring chickens?”
Gabriel laughed.
“She has priorities.”
Inside, we opened Sofia’s pink rabbit.
The map was stitched beneath the lining. The train ticket had been folded around a thin strip of transparent film.
When held against the map, numbers appeared over a property near Cold Spring.
An abandoned children’s hospital.
Saint Agnes.
Lucia recognized it.
“The Crown used Saint Agnes before St. Catherine’s.”
“For what?” I asked.
“Experimental births.”
The phrase chilled the room.
Lucia spread medical records across the monastery table.
“Teresa was obsessed with genetics. She believed certain bloodlines produced children with unusual resistance to neurological trauma.”
“Sofia?”
“Yes.”
“But Sofia is not biologically mine according to the report.”
“That report may have been intentionally incomplete.”
Lucia pointed toward the genetic markers.
“Sofia does not match the paternal sample provided. We do not know whose sample was labeled paternal.”
Marco understood first.
“Someone substituted Adrian’s sample.”
Lucia nodded.
“And Lily’s maternal comparison may not have used Isabella’s DNA.”
“So the girls might still be ours.”
“Yes.”
Hope was dangerous.
I refused to accept it without proof.
“Why were two other girls shown on the screen?”
“To destabilize you,” Elena said. “Teresa wants you uncertain about everyone you love.”
My mother stood near the window.
“Or they were the children born to another woman.”
We all turned.
“What woman?” I asked.
She looked at the photograph of Teresa.
“Teresa gave birth to twins thirty-two years ago.”
“One was me.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to the other?”
“She claimed the baby died.”
The crossed-out man in the photograph suddenly mattered.
“Was my twin male or female?”
“A boy.”
A twin brother.
Another secret hidden before I was old enough to speak.
Father Gabriel entered carrying an envelope.
“This was left outside the gate.”
My guards had seen no one approach.
Inside was a recent photograph.
The two unknown little girls stood beside a man in a dark suit.
He had my face.
Not a resemblance.
Not similar features.
My face.
The same eyes.
The same scar near the eyebrow, though mine came from a childhood fall.
On the back, Teresa had written:
Your brother has raised Isabella’s daughters well.
Now decide whether you want them back.
A location followed.
Saint Agnes Children’s Hospital.
Sunset.
May you like
Come with the woman who calls herself your mother.
Only one of you will leave.
