Chapter 5 - Everything happened at once.Glass shattered.
Footsteps thundered down the hallway.
Daniel grabbed Mia.
I crawled behind the conference table.
“Stay down!”
A bullet tore through the wall above my head.
Then suddenly the shooting stopped.
Silence.
A second later, the building’s main doors slammed open.
Alexander.
His security team flooded the office.
Within seconds, the attackers fled.
Alexander ran toward me.
“Claire!”
“I’m here.”
He pulled me up.
“Where’s Mia?”
“With Daniel.”
Alexander turned.
Daniel stood in the corner holding Mia.
Their eyes met.
For a brief moment, neither man spoke.
Then Alexander took Mia into his arms.
She buried her face against his chest.
“Daddy.”
His eyes closed.
Relief washed over him.
Daniel watched.
Something about his expression made me uneasy.
Later, we moved to a secured Sterling estate.
No reporters.
No phones.
No staff except people Alexander trusted personally.
Mia was asleep upstairs.
I sat across from Daniel and Alexander.
Three people.
One impossible truth.
“You said Alexander isn’t her biological father.”
Daniel nodded.
Alexander remained silent.
“Then who is?”
Daniel placed a file on the table.
“Five years ago, Claire underwent emergency fertility treatment.”
I frowned.
“I never did.”
“You did.”
“No.”
Daniel slid another document forward.
A hospital record.
My name.
My signature.
My date of birth.
I stared.
“I have never seen this.”
“Because it was forged.”
Alexander looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because someone wanted everyone to believe Mia’s biological father was dead.”
I felt cold.
“What are you saying?”
Daniel opened the final page.
A DNA analysis.
The result shocked me.
I looked at Alexander.
Then at Daniel.
Then back at the paper.
The biological father was…
I could barely speak.
“Lucas Sterling?”
Alexander’s younger brother.
Dead for six years.
A man I had barely known.
A man who had supposedly died in an accident before Alexander and I ever met.
Daniel nodded.
“Lucas is Mia’s biological father.”
Alexander’s face hardened.
“That’s impossible.”
“The DNA says otherwise.”
“I saw Lucas die.”
“No.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“You saw the funeral.”
Alexander went still.
“You never saw the body.”
Silence.
I looked at Daniel.
“Why fake Lucas’s death?”
“Because Lucas discovered the truth about your father’s shares.”
I stared.
Daniel continued.
“He also discovered something far worse.”
“What?”
“Someone inside Sterling International was selling controlling interests through shell companies.”
Alexander’s jaw tightened.
“Who?”
Daniel looked directly at me.
“Marcus’s father.”
I felt my stomach twist.
“But what does that have to do with Mia?”
“Lucas was going to expose them.”
Daniel’s gaze shifted to Alexander.
“He trusted your family.”
Alexander looked away.
“Then he disappeared.”
“And everyone assumed he was dead.”
I whispered, “But how did I become involved?”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“Because Lucas left one person he trusted.”
“Me?”
“Yes.”
I shook my head.
“We barely knew each other.”
“That’s what everyone thought.”
My mind raced.
There were memories I had buried.
A summer five years ago.
A hospital visit.
A man I remembered only vaguely.
A feeling that I had known him longer than I really had.
Daniel spoke softly.
“You were pregnant with Lucas’s child.”
Alexander looked at me.
I saw pain in his eyes.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn't know.”
Daniel shook his head.
“They drugged you before the medical procedure.”
I stared.
“Who?”
Daniel answered with one name.
“Chloe.”
My blood ran cold.
Alexander rose from his chair.
“Where is she?”
Daniel caught his wrist.
“You can’t touch her.”
“Why not?”
“Because Chloe isn’t working alone.”
Alexander stared at him.
Daniel looked at me.
“The person behind all of this is someone you already know.”
“Who?”
Daniel reached into his coat.
He pulled out a photograph.
My hands trembled.
The photograph showed Chloe.
Standing beside a man.
I knew him instantly.
Marcus.
But he wasn’t the shocking part.
The man standing beside them was…
My father.
The father I had believed dead for ten years.
Alive.
May you like
Watching.
And smiling.
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