Chapter 8 - Lucas Didn’t Meet Me by Accident
Lucas and I met at a charity design gala in Chicago.
At least that was the story I believed.
I had presented a scholarship through Hart Atelier.
Lucas approached because he liked one of my sketches.
We talked.
Coffee later.
Then dinner.
I remembered believing it felt random.
It wasn't.
Three months earlier, Marian approached Lucas.
She told him Hart Atelier was quietly acquiring luxury suppliers linked to Sterling & Co.
She wanted him to meet “the designer behind it.”
Lucas did not know I owned Hart Meridian.
He believed I was a useful industry contact.
So yes:
He approached me intentionally.
Not romantically.
At first.
He admitted it.
“What did Marian want?”
“Information.”
“Did you report to her?”
“For maybe two months.”
My stomach turned.
“What kind of information?”
Who I knew.
Which brands Hart Atelier planned to acquire.
Whether I discussed Sterling & Co.
Nothing deeply personal initially.
Then our relationship became real.
Lucas stopped reporting.
Or said he did.
Records showed the last email to Marian six weeks after our first kiss.
Lucas:
I’m done. Don’t involve Evelyn.
Marian:
You’re sleeping with a source.
Lucas:
She isn’t a source.
That hurt and comforted me simultaneously.
Bad beginning.
Real feeling later.
Again.
Then Marian responded:
You sound like your father.
Meaning Edwin had apparently fallen in love with someone Marian considered strategically inconvenient before.
Who?
Rachel Cole, Sophie’s mother.
Patterns.
Then I asked Lucas:
“When did you learn I was wealthier than I looked?”
He hesitated.
“Two years ago.”
I froze.
Not billionaire.
But wealthy.
He discovered Hart Atelier was worth far more than I claimed.
How?
Tax documents accidentally delivered during refinancing.
He saw holding-company references.
Did he investigate?
“Yes.”
“How far?”
“I found Hart Luxury Group.”
Not Hart Meridian.
So he knew I was worth perhaps hundreds of millions.
Not eight billion.
And stayed.
Did he confront me?
No.
Why?
“I thought you had your reasons.”
I laughed bitterly.
“You gave me privacy while secretly knowing I was hiding wealth, but believed a fake DNA report without asking me one question.”
He looked destroyed.
Good.
Then another discovery shifted everything.
The twins’ real DNA report showed Lucas was their father.
But there was an anomaly.
Both boys carried a rare genetic marker associated with the Sterling line.
One of them also carried a marker strongly associated with the Hart branch.
Normal.
I was a Hart.
Except the specific variation did not come from me.
It appeared paternally.
Meaning Lucas carried Hart-line genetics too.
More than expected from the distant Samuel Hart connection.
Gideon ordered genealogical review only with Lucas’s consent.
He gave it.
Result:
Edwin Sterling was not Lucas’s biological father.
Margot’s husband had raised him.
Biological father:
Daniel Hart.
My uncle.
I stared at Lucas.
He stared at me.
Were we closely related?
No.
Daniel Hart was my father’s half-brother by adoption, not blood.
Thank God.
But financially?
Everything changed.
Lucas was not biologically Sterling through Edwin.
May you like
He was biologically connected to the Hart family.
And Margot had hidden that for thirty-six years.
