Chapter 13 - The Truth Written in Her BloodDr. Shaw led Ellie into a small examination room.
The walls were white, the lights were painfully bright, and a collection of medical instruments sat on a steel trolley. Ellie remained close to Elena, holding her mother's hand as tightly as the restraints allowed.
“Please,” Elena begged the doctor. “She's a child.”
Dr. Shaw avoided her eyes.
“I'm following instructions.”
“Whose instructions? Victor's?”
The doctor didn't answer.
Victor entered the room and closed the door.
“Let's stop pretending this is complicated,” he said. “The girl is connected to the Evans family. We need to establish exactly how.”
Ellie stared at him.
“Why?”
“Because blood determines certain things.”
“Like who your family is?”
“Like who inherits what belongs to them.”
Ellie frowned.
“My family doesn't belong to anybody.”
For a moment, Victor seemed unable to respond.
Then he turned toward Dr. Shaw.
“Take the sample.”
Elena pulled Ellie behind her.
“No!”
The guard beside the door moved forward.
Elena struggled, but the restraints cut into her wrists.
Ellie began to cry.
“Mommy!”
Dr. Shaw hesitated.
Then he lowered the syringe.
“I can't do this.”
Victor's expression changed.
“You will.”
“I delivered the child,” Shaw said, his voice shaking. “I know what happened that night. I have spent years wishing I'd made a different decision.”
Victor stepped closer.
“Then you should have thought about that before you accepted my money.”
The doctor looked at Ellie.
“My instructions were to falsify the records, not hurt her.”
“What records?” Elena demanded.
Dr. Shaw swallowed.
“The original birth certificate. The hospital identification bands. The genetic reports. All of them were altered.”
Elena stared at him.
“Why?”
“Because Sarah was dying, and she begged me to protect her baby. She said Victor had threatened Dominic and would destroy anything that could connect the child to him.”
Victor's face darkened.
“Enough.”
But Shaw continued.
“Elena took the baby home. She promised Sarah she would raise her as her own. She changed the child's name, moved between shelters, and disappeared because she knew what Victor would do if he learned the truth.”
Ellie looked up at Elena.
“Mommy?”
Elena's tears fell freely.
“Sweetheart, I wanted to tell you when you were older. I wanted you to have a childhood before the world started demanding things from you.”
“Who is Sarah?”
Elena closed her eyes.
“Your birth mother.”
Ellie went very still.
“And my daddy?”
Nobody answered.
She slowly turned toward Victor.
“Is it him?”
Victor laughed without humor.
“No.”
He crouched in front of her.
“Your father is the one person who has always stood between me and everything I was supposed to have.”
Ellie shook her head.
“Mr. Dominic?”
Victor's silence was enough.
Elena began crying harder.
“Dominic doesn't know,” she whispered. “He never knew Sarah was pregnant. Victor made certain he believed she had left him.”
Ellie stared at the floor.
The man who had helped her eat pancakes, promised to repair her bicycle, and held her hand when she was frightened wasn't her uncle.
He was her father.
And she had asked him to be her daddy for one day without knowing she had been his daughter all along.
Victor straightened.
“Now we understand why she matters.”
He looked at Dr. Shaw.
“Run the test.”
This time, the doctor obeyed, but only after Victor threatened him.
A quick preliminary test was completed using the samples they had available. It wasn't a definitive legal paternity test, but the result was enough to establish a strong biological relationship.
Dr. Shaw stared at the screen.
His hands trembled.
“She's Dominic's biological daughter.”
Victor said nothing.
For the first time, the truth he had been chasing was no longer hidden.
Dominic Evans had an heir.
A daughter who could one day inherit the fortune, the businesses, and the empire Victor believed should have been his.
Victor looked at Ellie.
His expression had become unreadable.
“You were never supposed to find him.”
Ellie raised her chin.
“But I did.”
Victor's eyes narrowed.
“And now he's going to come looking for you.”
She wiped her cheeks with the sleeve of her coat.
“He promised.”
Victor turned toward the door.
“Take them to the lower room.”
As the guards led Elena and Ellie away, Dr. Shaw remained beside the monitor, staring at the result.
Victor paused.
“Erase everything.”
The doctor looked up.
“Victor, this changes the situation. You don't have to hurt the child. You could simply—”
Victor seized him by the collar.
“Do you think I care about the child?”
Shaw struggled to breathe.
“I think you care about what she represents.”
Victor released him.
For several seconds, he stared at the blank monitor.
Then he spoke so quietly that the doctor almost missed it.
“My brother got everything. The name, the power, the respect. Even now, he has a daughter who will love him without knowing what kind of man he really is.”
He turned toward the door.
“I want him to understand what it feels like to lose something he cannot replace.”
Across the city, Dominic stood in his office while a private laboratory specialist examined the recovered documents.
The specialist looked up.
“Mr. Evans, these records indicate that a birth certificate was falsified at a private clinic seven years ago.”
“Whose child?”
The specialist hesitated.
“Your daughter.”
Dominic stopped breathing.
“Say that again.”
“The evidence suggests that Ellie is your biological child. We need a proper DNA comparison to confirm it, but the records are consistent.”
Dominic stared at the specialist.
Ellie.
His little girl.
The child who had offered him a broken bicycle and asked him to become someone she could trust.
His hands began to shake.
Before he could speak, Marco rushed into the office.
“We found the facility.”
Dominic looked up.
“Where?”
“An abandoned medical center near the old shipping docks.”
Dominic picked up his coat.
“Get the cars.”
Marco hesitated.
“Boss, Victor has armed men guarding it.”
Dominic walked past him.
“Then they'll have to decide how badly they want to die for him.”
He stopped at the door and looked back at the birth records.
For seven years, he had believed Sarah had abandoned him.
For seven years, Elena had raised his daughter without being able to ask him for help.
And now, when he had finally found Ellie, someone had taken her away.
Dominic slid the papers into his jacket.
He wasn't going to the medical facility to reclaim an inheritance.
May you like
He was going because a frightened little girl was waiting for the man who had promised he would return.
And Dominic Evans had never broken a promise to his daughter.
