CHAPTER 2: THE SECRET WRITTEN IN HER BLOOD
CHAPTER 2: THE SECRET WRITTEN IN HER BLOOD
"I used to."
The words left my mouth before I could stop them.
Vanessa's perfectly sculpted eyebrows lifted ever so slightly.
"Excuse me?"
"I said I used to know your husband."
I watched her carefully. Women like Vanessa had spent their entire lives reading people. They smiled through charity galas and corporate mergers, detecting weakness the way sharks detected blood.
But she wasn't reading me.
She was measuring me.
"How?" she asked.
"Long ago."
"That's not an answer."
"No." I glanced toward Dominic's unconscious body. "It's the only one you're getting."
Before she could press further, the ICU doors swung open.
A gray-haired physician entered carrying a thick medical file.
"Mrs. Castellano?"
Vanessa turned immediately.
"We've completed another compatibility analysis."
"Tell me the transfusion can begin."
The doctor's expression remained unreadable.
"There is... something unusual."
My heartbeat stopped.
He looked from Vanessa to me, then back to the chart.
"The compatibility isn't simply rare."
"What does that mean?" Vanessa demanded.
"It means the donor isn't just antigen-compatible."
He swallowed.
"She shares hereditary markers with Mr. Castellano at a statistically impossible level."
Silence.
The heart monitor beside Dominic continued its rhythmic beeping.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Vanessa frowned.
"I don't understand."
The doctor hesitated.
"In thirty-two years of trauma medicine..."
He slowly closed the file.
"...I've only seen this pattern in immediate biological relatives."
Everything inside me froze.
Vanessa laughed.
"A relative? That's impossible."
She looked at me dismissively.
"My husband has no children."
My fingers curled into fists.
Not anymore.
Not after today.
The doctor cleared his throat.
"Ordinarily we wouldn't speculate. But the probability..."
He took a careful breath.
"...is greater than 99.99 percent."
Vanessa's smile vanished.
"What are you suggesting?"
"I'm saying the child downstairs..."
He looked directly at me.
"...could be Mr. Castellano's daughter."
The room exploded into silence.
Vanessa slowly turned toward me.
"No."
Her voice was barely audible.
"No."
She took another step.
"That's impossible."
I said nothing.
She searched my face.
Then she searched Dominic's.
Then, almost unconsciously, she whispered,
"The eyes..."
I closed mine.
For six years I had dreaded this exact moment.
Not because I feared judgment.
Because I feared truth.
Six years earlier...
"Congratulations."
The fertility specialist smiled across the desk.
"You're pregnant."
I burst into tears.
Dominic squeezed my hand so tightly it almost hurt.
"We're having a baby?"
The doctor nodded.
"Approximately five weeks."
Dominic laughed.
Actually laughed.
He picked me up right there in the examination room and spun me around.
"I told you we'd have our miracle."
It should have been the happiest day of our lives.
Instead...
Three hours later...
Everything fell apart.
Dominic's grandmother requested an emergency family meeting.
When we arrived at the Castellano mansion, every member of the family was waiting.
His grandmother.
His father.
His mother.
Even the family attorney.
None of them looked happy.
Lady Eleanor Castellano slid a folder across the polished mahogany table.
"You should see these."
Dominic opened it.
Photographs.
Me.
Entering a hotel.
Holding another man's hand.
Kissing him.
I stared at them in horror.
"What is this?"
Dominic looked at me.
His face drained of color.
"Isabelle..."
"They're fake."
"Are they?"
"They have to be!"
His father leaned back calmly.
"Our investigators confirmed the man's identity."
"I don't care who he is!"
"I've never met him!"
Lady Eleanor's voice sliced through the room.
"Enough lies."
She produced another document.
"A DNA report."
Dominic frowned.
"What DNA report?"
"The man in those photographs submitted a private statement."
She folded her hands.
"He claims the child Isabelle is carrying belongs to him."
My ears rang.
"What?"
Dominic looked at me.
Really looked at me.
For the first time...
There was doubt.
One second.
That was all it took.
One second of hesitation.
One second when the man who had sworn to trust me chose uncertainty instead.
I felt something inside my marriage crack.
"I didn't do this," I whispered.
"Dominic..."
"Tell me it's fake."
"It is fake!"
"Swear it."
"I swear!"
He looked back at the photographs.
At the forged DNA report.
At his grandmother.
At his father.
At me.
And he made the choice that would destroy all of us.
"I need time."
Those three words hurt more than any accusation.
Because innocent people don't need time.
They need to be believed.
Present Day.
Vanessa's breathing became uneven.
"You..."
She stared at me as though seeing me for the first time.
"You were Isabelle Morrison."
Not a question.
A realization.
"The ex-wife."
I nodded once.
Her face went white.
"Oh my God."
She looked at Dominic again.
Then back at me.
"No..."
"No..."
"He told me you couldn't have children."
A bitter laugh escaped me.
"So did he."
The ICU doors burst open.
A young resident hurried inside carrying another report.
"Doctor!"
The older physician turned.
"What is it?"
"The emergency genetic screening just came back."
Everyone stared.
The resident's face had gone pale.
"So?"
He looked directly at me.
Then at Dominic.
Then whispered the words that shattered every lie the Castellano family had lived behind for six years.
"The child isn't just a compatible donor."
He held up the report.
"DNA confirms a 99.9998% probability."
He inhaled sharply.
"Mr. Dominic Castellano is Sophie's biological father."
The file slipped from Vanessa's hands.
Across the hallway...
A small voice echoed through the open ICU door.
"Mommy?"
I turned.
Sophie stood there clutching a half-empty apple juice box, Jennifer the nurse frozen behind her.
The little girl looked from my tear-filled face...
...to the unconscious billionaire in the hospital bed...
...then asked the innocent question that stopped every adult in the room from breathing.
"Is..."
May you like
she whispered,
"...that my daddy?"
