Chapter 8 - The Son I Never Knew
“No.”
One word.
Nothing else came.
I had never had a child.
I would know.
Hannah handed me another file.
Nine years earlier.
A woman named Elena Russo.
I knew her.
That hurt.
Elena had been the only woman I nearly married.
Brilliant.
Stubborn.
Completely uninterested in my reputation.
Then she disappeared after an argument.
I believed she chose another life.
Three months later, I received proof she died overseas.
Photographs.
Death certificate.
Ashes.
All arranged through Silas.
My stomach turned.
“She was pregnant?”
Hannah nodded.
Silas discovered it before I did.
Why hide my son?
Control.
An heir changes power.
If I had a child, succession inside the Moretti organization became complicated.
More importantly, Elena had discovered Silas was stealing information from my father's network.
She tried to tell me.
Silas intercepted her.
He moved her into hiding.
She gave birth.
Then?
“Did he kill her?”
Hannah looked down.
“I don't know.”
That was worse.
Eli was taken through the illegal adoption network.
Hannah found him while investigating Silas.
She realized who his father was from DNA files.
So she stole the child.
Raised him as her own for two years.
When Silas came after her, she left Eli with Frank and disappeared to protect him.
Frank knew Eli wasn't biologically Hannah's.
But not who his real parents were.
I stared at the DNA report.
Nine years.
My son had lived nine years without me.
Then saved my life without knowing who I was.
I sat against the mine wall.
Dante Moretti didn't sit on floors.
Didn't shake.
Didn't lose control.
I did all three.
Hannah spoke quietly.
“Elena named him Elijah.”
I closed my eyes.
Elena once told me if she ever had a son, she liked that name.
I remembered laughing.
Now I couldn't breathe.
Then Marco's radio activated.
Frank.
Static.
“Marco!”
Gunfire in the background.
I stood instantly.
“Frank?”
“They found us!”
Eli.
Silas.
We ran.
By the time we reached the lodge, one guard was injured.
The front door hung open.
Frank sat against the wall.
Alive.
“Where's Eli?”
His face broke.
“They took him.”
Goliath began whining.
Then my phone rang.
Silas.
I answered.
“Dante.”
“If you hurt him—”
“Now you understand.”
Understand what?
“Why your father became controllable.”
Family.
A man with nothing to lose is dangerous.
Give him someone he loves and you create a weakness.
Silas had built his life around that principle.
“You want the archive.”
“Yes.”
“For Eli.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Silas gave me coordinates.
Then:
“Come alone.”
I laughed.
“No.”
Silence.
“You buried me alone. Didn't work.”
Silas's voice hardened.
“You have one hour.”
Then another voice came through the phone.
Eli.
“Dante?”
My chest tightened.
“I'm here.”
“I didn't tell them.”
“Tell them what?”
Silas swore in the background.
Eli whispered quickly:
“Goliath bit the man's coat. I put his phone in the pocket.”
Silas grabbed him.
The call ended.
I looked at Marco.
“What did he mean?”
Hannah understood.
Goliath's tracking collar.
Eli had removed the GPS module earlier to charge it.
He slipped it into Silas's coat pocket.
The nine-year-old boy had just tagged his own kidnapper.
Marco opened the tracking app.
A signal moved east.
Not toward Silas's meeting coordinates.
Different location.
Hannah stared at the map.
“I know that place.”
“Where?”
“An abandoned children's hospital.”
My stomach dropped.
Silas wasn't only holding Eli there.
Hannah whispered:
“That's where his father kept the adoption records.”
Then the tracking signal stopped.
And another dot appeared beside it.
A second tracker.
Stationary.
Hannah went pale.
“What?”
She looked at me.
“I put that tracker on Elena nine years ago.”
My heart stopped.
May you like
The signal had just come back online.
Elena might be alive.
