Chapter 3
Luca answered.
Nobody spoke.
A woman’s voice came through.
“Mr. Moretti?”
“Yes.”
“This is St. Catherine’s pediatric records department.”
Luca looked at Matteo.
The boy stared back.
“What do you want?”
“We received a request tonight to release your son’s archived medical records.”
Silence.
“From who?”
“A legal representative for Mrs. Vanessa Moretti.”
Everyone looked at her.
Vanessa went pale.
“I didn’t.”
The woman continued.
“We require your authorization.”
Luca’s voice turned cold.
“You do not have it.”
“Understood.”
“Who made the request?”
“I can send the submission.”
“Now.”
“Of course.”
The email arrived.
Daniel opened it.
Digital request.
Vanessa Moretti.
Signature.
Government ID attached.
Vanessa stared.
“That’s my license.”
Luca looked at her.
“Missing?”
“No.”
“In your purse?”
She checked.
Gone.
Daniel looked toward the door.
“Someone was in her room.”
Luca said:
“Lock estate.”
Daniel called security.
Matteo looked at the video frozen on Sarah’s face.
“What records?”
Luca turned.
“What?”
“Why would someone want my hospital records?”
Good question.
Vanessa sat.
“Matteo was treated at St. Catherine’s when he was little.”
Luca stared.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“When Sarah was sick.”
“I would know.”
“You were traveling.”
Luca’s expression hardened.
“For what?”
“Business.”
“Who authorized treatment?”
“Sarah.”
Matteo frowned.
“I don’t remember.”
Vanessa looked at him.
“You were six.”
Claire asked:
“What treatment?”
Vanessa swallowed.
“Blood tests.”
Daniel looked up.
“Why?”
“Sarah thought he had been exposed too.”
Silence.
Luca’s face changed.
“To arsenic.”
Vanessa nodded.
Matteo went pale.
“Was I poisoned?”
“No.”
“Were my levels high?”
Vanessa looked away.
That was answer enough.
Luca stepped closer.
“How high?”
“Not like Sarah.”
“How high?”
“Elevated.”
He closed his eyes.
Someone had exposed his wife.
And son.
Sarah took Matteo to St. Catherine’s secretly.
Then supposedly died.
Or disappeared.
Claire stared at the photograph.
“Maybe she staged her death to get Matteo out.”
Luca looked at Sarah’s letter.
If I can get Matteo out safely...
But Matteo had remained with Luca.
So whatever plan Sarah had failed.
Daniel opened archived hospital directory.
“St. Catherine’s closed its pediatric toxicology unit four years ago.”
“Why?”
“Fire.”
Vanessa flinched.
Again.
Luca noticed.
“Your mother’s apartment fire. Hospital fire. Same year.”
Vanessa whispered:
“Yes.”
Daniel continued.
“One doctor listed in both Sarah and Matteo’s files.”
“Who?”
“Dr. David Kane.”
Vanessa’s father.
Luca stared at her.
“You said he died two years ago.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
She looked down.
“Heart attack.”
Daniel searched.
“No public death record.”
Vanessa’s face changed.
Luca laughed softly.
“Vanessa.”
“I attended a funeral.”
“With a body?”
Closed casket.
Of course.
Daniel found a corporate filing.
David Kane remained listed as a consultant to a medical holding company until six months ago.
Alive after his funeral.
Matteo sat down.
“This family is insane.”
Claire almost laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because he was right.
Luca touched his shoulder.
“We’re going to find out what happened.”
Matteo looked at him.
“Are you sure?”
“No.”
Honesty.
“Good.”
The hospital records arrived before anyone asked again.
Old scans.
Blood work.
One file restricted.
Subject:
MATTEO MORETTI — GENETIC PANEL.
Luca frowned.
“Genetic?”
Daniel opened.
Mother:
Sarah Moretti.
Father:
REDACTED.
Luca stopped moving.
Matteo looked at him.
“What?”
Nobody answered.
Daniel scrolled.
Paternity marker comparison requested.
Result page removed.
Luca’s face emptied.
Vanessa whispered:
“No.”
He turned.
“You know.”
“No.”
“You know why there was a paternity test.”
She shook her head.
“Sarah never told me.”
“But your father ran it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Matteo stared at Luca.
“Dad.”
Luca immediately turned.
Whatever the paper said, the boy was his son.
That was settled emotionally.
But facts mattered.
“Nothing on that screen changes anything.”
Matteo’s eyes filled.
“What if—”
“No.”
Luca crouched.
“I was there when you were born. I held you before Sarah did because she was still in surgery. I fed you at three in the morning. You threw up on every suit I owned for six months.”
Matteo almost smiled.
“You taught me to drive too early. You broke my office window with a baseball and blamed Daniel. You are my son.”
Daniel said:
“He did blame me.”
Matteo laughed through tears.
Then another file opened automatically.
A scanned note from Sarah.
DAVID, DO NOT RUN LUCA’S SAMPLE THROUGH HOSPITAL SYSTEM.
USE PRIVATE LAB.
Luca stared.
Claire frowned.
“Why private?”
Daniel answered.
“So no one would know she was testing.”
Vanessa whispered:
“Or because she wasn’t testing Luca.”
Everyone looked at her.
“What?”
She swallowed.
“My father told me once Sarah had found something in Salvatore’s old records.”
Luca’s eyes hardened.
“What?”
“A list of fertility clinic payments.”
Silence.
Matteo stared.
“Fertility?”
Vanessa continued.
“Sarah had trouble getting pregnant.”
Luca nodded slowly.
They had tried for years.
Then Matteo.
A miracle.
At least that was what they called him.
Vanessa’s voice became smaller.
“Sarah used a clinic.”
Luca stared.
“I know.”
“You don’t know which program.”
“What program?”
She looked at Matteo.
“Donor-assisted.”
The room went silent.
Luca stood.
“No.”
Vanessa shook her head.
“I’m not saying Matteo isn’t yours.”
“You just did.”
“I’m saying Sarah investigated whether the clinic used your sample.”
Luca froze.
“What?”
Daniel looked at the genetic file.
Someone may have substituted material.
Fraud.
The clinic.
Salvatore.
David Kane.
All possible.
Matteo looked sick.
Claire took his hand.
Luca said:
“Get the private lab.”
Daniel started.
Then stopped.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“The lab name is here.”
He turned the screen.
Bellini Genetics.
Vanessa stared.
“My grandfather.”
Luca looked at her.
“You knew.”
“No.”
“Your family owned the lab that helped Sarah get pregnant.”
“I didn’t know.”
“When?”
“It closed before I was eighteen.”
“Why?”
Vanessa whispered:
“Fire.”
Daniel looked at Luca.
Another fire.
Luca almost laughed.
Then security called.
“Sir, we found someone in the east corridor.”
“Who?”
“A woman.”
“Staff?”
“No.”
“Name?”
Pause.
“She says Helena Bellini.”
Vanessa’s mother.
Supposedly dead.
Vanessa stopped breathing.
Luca looked at Daniel.
“Bring her.”
Vanessa whispered:
“No.”
Everyone turned.
She backed away.
“You don’t understand.”
Luca’s voice dropped.
“What?”
“My mother didn’t work for Salvatore.”
“Who did she work for?”
Vanessa’s face collapsed.
“Sarah.”
Silence.
Then the study door opened.
An older woman entered.
Gray-blonde hair.
Scar along her jaw.
Matteo stared.
Recognition.
“Helena.”
The woman looked at him.
Tears filled her eyes.
“You remember me.”
Luca stepped forward.
“Where is my wife?”
Helena looked at him.
Then at Matteo.
“She’s alive.”
Matteo stopped breathing.
Luca’s face changed.
“Where?”
Helena whispered:
“Not if David finds her first.”
The study went completely silent.
Then Matteo asked the question Luca could not.
“Why didn’t she come home?”
Helena looked at him.
“Because she thought coming home would kill you.”
Matteo’s face broke.
Luca closed his eyes.
Another person who had chosen absence in the name of protection.
He was beginning to hate that word.
Daniel looked at Helena.
“Start from the beginning.”
She nodded slowly.
“Sarah found out St. Catherine’s was running two sets of records.”
“For who?” Luca asked.
“For patients who never officially existed.”
“What kind of patients?”
“Witnesses. protected people. people Salvatore wanted hidden.”
Vanessa stared.
“My father?”
“David managed the system.”
“Why?”
“Money at first.”
“And later?”
“Control.”
Luca looked at Matteo.
His hospital file had not just been medical.
It may have been part of an identity network.
Helena continued.
“Sarah realized Matteo’s genetic file had been flagged.”
“Flagged how?”
“Anyone accessing it triggered an alert to David.”
“So she couldn’t move him.”
“No.”
“She couldn’t even test him privately without David knowing.”
“Not through St. Catherine’s.”
Luca’s face hardened.
“Then she disappeared.”
“She staged the death to make David stop watching you.”
“Did it work?”
“For a while.”
Matteo whispered:
“For a while.”
Helena looked at him.
“I’m sorry.”
He turned away.
Enough apologies.
Luca asked:
“Why come back now?”
Helena met his eyes.
“Because David is moving again.”
“What does he want?”
“The evidence Sarah stole.”
“Which evidence?”
Helena looked toward the safe.
“The jewelry.”
Luca understood.
The ring.
Necklace.
Earrings.
Not heirlooms alone.
Evidence.
And Vanessa had almost sold them.
The room changed again.
Helena did not move after saying Sarah was alive.
Vanessa stared at her mother.
Then looked away.
“You don’t get to come back and say sorry.”
Helena’s face fell.
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
Matteo looked between them.
Then at Luca.
“Is this what family is?”
Luca’s face changed.
“No.”
“It looks like it.”
Claire said quietly:
“Family can also be the people who tell you the truth.”
Daniel added:
“Apparently those people are rare.”
Matteo almost smiled.
Then Helena crossed toward him and stopped several feet away.
“Your mother loved you more than anything.”
“Then why leave?”
“Because she believed the people hurting her would hurt you next.”
“Did you tell Dad?”
“I tried.”
Luca froze.
“When?”
“The night Sarah disappeared.”
Daniel checked old gate logs.
No Helena Bellini entry.
Helena continued.
“Victor Hale was on duty. He told me Luca was not home.”
“I was home.”
“Yes.”
“Victor lied.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Victor worked through Vale Health.”
Daniel’s expression hardened.
Another old security man tied to the hospital network.
Luca immediately revoked every legacy-access credential still active in the estate.
No debate.
Matteo watched him.
“You believe her?”
“I believe we verify everything.”
“Good.”
Helena reached into her coat.
A second torn page from Sarah’s letter.
Luca unfolded it.
If I cannot take Matteo, Luca must know the danger is inside the house.
Below that:
Do not trust anyone who tells you my death was peaceful.
Matteo swallowed.
“Was it?”
Helena shook her head.
May you like
“No.”
Then St. Catherine’s called, and the past stopped being past.
