Chapter 4 - Midnight Whispers and the Dying Doctor
The wipers on my black SUV struggled against the relentless sheet of snow blanketing the highway.
Inside the vehicle, the heat blasted through the vents at full power, slowly warming the cabin.
In the rearview mirror, I could see Renata curled up in the leather back seat.
I had wrapped her in two heavy wool blankets I kept in the trunk.
Her small chest rose and fell in slow, steady rhythms as she finally drifted off into exhausted sleep.
Her tiny hands, still pink and tender from the scalding dishwater, were tucked beneath her chin.
My knuckles were white against the steering wheel as I drove through the empty streets of the city.
Every mile that separated us from that cursed estate felt like an exorcism.
Thirty minutes later, I pulled into the underground private garage of my penthouse building downtown.
I carried Renata up the private elevator, her head resting peacefully on my shoulder.
I laid her gently on the oversized king bed in my master suite and removed her damp shoes.
I went into the bathroom, grabbed a tube of medical burn ointment, and carefully applied it to her blistered fingers.
She stirred slightly in her sleep, letting out a soft sigh, but did not wake up.
I kissed her forehead, pulled the thick down comforter over her shoulders, and locked the bedroom door.
Walking into my private library, I poured myself three fingers of bourbon and pulled out my phone.
It was past eleven o'clock on Christmas night, but I didn't care.
I dialed the personal mobile number of Marcus Vance, senior partner at Vance & Sterling LLP.
The phone rang three times before a deep, gravelly voice answered on the line.
“I was wondering when you would call, Mauricio,” Marcus said without any pleasantries.
“You opened the packet.”
“I opened it,” I said, my voice shaking with suppressed fury.
“Marcus, tell me this is not a mistake.”
“Tell me these DNA records and Ward's confession are ironclad.”
A heavy sigh came through the receiver.
“I took the sworn deposition from Dr. Ward myself three days ago at Massachusetts General Hospice,” Marcus said.
“The man has less than a week to live.”
“His conscience broke under the weight of what he did.”
“He gave me the original hospital ledgers, the unedited delivery room logs, and the financial paper trail.”
“Your mother transferred two hundred and fifty thousand dollars from a shell company in the Cayman Islands to Ward’s offshore account on December 14th, seven years ago.”
“The transaction was completed six hours after Elena Rivera was admitted to the emergency ward.”
I closed my eyes, feeling a sick nausea churning in the pit of my stomach.
“And Elena?” I whispered, dreading the answer.
“Did she really suffer for three months?”
“Yes,” Marcus replied softly.
“She had severe internal injuries, but she was conscious for weeks.”
“Ward kept her in a private rehabilitation wing outside city limits under a false name, claiming she was an indigent patient with severe memory trauma.”
“She didn't have memory trauma, Mauricio.”
“Ward confessed that every single day, she begged the nurses to find her baby girl.”
“She told them she remembered hearing her daughter cry in the delivery room.”
“Your mother paid the facility director to ignore her pleas and keep her isolated until her body gave out from complications.”
A ragged sound escaped my throat, somewhere between a sob and a growl.
Elena had spent her final days on this earth trapped in a sterile room, crying for the daughter that had been ripped from her arms.
“Why didn't anyone contact Elena’s family?” I asked, gripping the crystal glass until the edges bit into my skin.
“Her younger sister, Clara.”
“Clara was nineteen when the accident happened,” Marcus explained.
“Your father's legal team descended on that poor girl like wolves.”
“They told Clara that Elena had died on impact and that the unborn baby was lost with her.”
“They paid off Elena’s landlord, seized Elena’s personal sketchbooks, and threatened Clara with financial ruin if she caused public trouble for the DeLuca family.”
“Clara never believed their story.”
“For the last six years, Clara Rivera has been running a small missing-children advocacy center in Queens.”
“She has spent every penny she earned hiring third-rate private investigators, searching for any trace of her niece.”
“She never stopped looking, Mauricio.”
My heart ached with an agonizing mixture of sorrow and hope.
Elena had a sister who was still fighting for her child.
Renata had an aunt who loved her without even knowing her face.
“Where is Clara right now?” I demanded.
“I have an investigator stationed outside her apartment in Astoria,” Marcus said.
“She doesn't know about Ward’s confession yet.”
“I wanted to deliver the news to you first so we could secure protective custody of Renata.”
“Why protective custody?” I asked, my senses instantly going on high alert.
“Because your father is desperate,” Marcus warned.
“Hector knows that under the DeLuca Dynasty Trust, the moment Renata’s true parentage is legally recognized by the probate court, you inherit sixty percent of the conglomerate’s voting shares instantly.”
“The family estate, the shipping terminals, the real estate holdings—all of it vests in your name as the sole surviving biological bloodline.”
“Hector and Carmen will be stripped of their executive board seats.”
“Paola and Richard will lose their entire trust allowance.”
“They will be left with nothing but a minimal living stipend.”
“Hector will do anything to prevent that paperwork from being filed before the courts open on December 26th.”
Before I could answer, the security intercom on my library wall began to beep urgently.
I muted the phone and glanced at the high-definition monitor displaying the building's lobby.
Two black Cadillac Escalades with tinted windows had parked illegally across the pedestrian walkway outside the front entrance.
Four men in dark overcoats were standing at the concierge desk, speaking aggressively to the night guard.
I recognized the man leading them instantly.
It was Victor Cole, the ruthless head of private security who had handled Hector’s dirty corporate work for twenty years.
May you like
They had tracked my vehicle through the blizzard.
They were here to take the documents, and perhaps even my daughter, before the morning sun could rise.
