Chapter 4

Chapter 4: The Genetic Covenant

​The penthouse didn't feel like a home. It felt like a vault. The elevator doors slid open with a whisper, depositing Bella into a foyer of white marble and glass that overlooked the jagged teeth of the Manhattan skyline. There was no music. No scent of dinner. Just the low, pressurized hum of a climate control system that cost more than her law degree. The air here was thinner, colder, stripped of the grit and noise of the city below.

​Dante was waiting in the library. It was a room of dark wood and leather, lined with books that looked like they hadn't been touched in a century. He wasn't alone.

​A man in a charcoal suit sat at the long conference table in the center of the room. He was older, with wire-rimmed glasses and a face that seemed carved from the same granite as the building. Beside him sat a briefcase, open and organized with terrifying precision.

​"You’re late," Dante said. He was standing by the bar, a glass of amber liquid in his hand that he hadn’t touched. He looked at his watch—7:12 PM. The ice in the bucket nearby had melted into a single, clear block.

​"The traffic was heavy. And Leo needed his second treatment," Bella said. She didn't take off her coat. She didn't sit down. She stood at the edge of the Persian rug, her portfolio tucked under her arm like a shield. "I told you I was coming alone, Dante. Why is your general counsel here?"

​"This isn't a social visit, Bella. You made that clear in the boardroom," Dante said. He gestured to the man at the table. "This is Arthur Vance. No relation, I assume. He handles the Blackwood Family Trust."

​Bella’s eyes flickered to the lawyer. The name was a needle, a small, sharp reminder that Dante could buy even the syllables of her identity if he wanted to. Arthur nodded once, a sharp, bird-like movement.

​"Ms. Vance. Please, sit. We have a great deal of paperwork to get through if we’re to meet the morning deadline for the hospital."

​Bella walked to the table. She pulled out a chair, the sound of the wood on the floor sounding like a gunshot in the quiet room. She sat opposite Arthur, her eyes moving to Dante, who remained standing in the shadows, half-obscured by a shelf of heavy law volumes.

​"The referral," Bella said. "That’s why I’m here. Sign the consent for Dr. Aris to begin the gene-mapping, and we can discuss the audit."

​"The audit is secondary now," Arthur said, sliding a single document across the polished wood. "The Blackwood Trust has a protocol for medical intervention involving potential heirs. We cannot authorize the foundation's resources—specifically the private wing and the experimental serum—without a verified link."

​Bella looked at the paper. It was a Voluntary Acknowledgment of Paternity, coupled with a mandate for a triple-blind DNA screening. The language was cold. Clinical. It stripped the three years of fever dreams, midnight feedings, and scraped knees down to a sequence of base pairs.

​"You want blood," Bella said. Her voice was flat. Professional.

​"I want the truth," Dante said from the shadows. He walked toward the table, the light hitting the sharp planes of his face. "You dropped a medical file on my table that suggests those children carry my markers. If I am to put my name on their files, if I am to move them into the most secure medical facility in the country, I need more than a drawing of a dinosaur on a business card."

​"I’m not denying they’re yours, Dante," Bella said. She didn't blink. She didn't look away. "I never did. I left because of Silas, not because of the biology. If you want the test, you can have it. I’ll bring them to the lab tomorrow morning."

​"The lab is coming to the house," Arthur corrected softly. "At 6:00 AM. We’ve already arranged the couriers. We’ll have the results by noon."

​Bella felt the walls of the room closing in. They had already mapped the morning. They had already decided how the needles would go in before she had even agreed to open the door.

​"Fine," Bella said. "If that’s the price for Leo’s life, take the blood. Take whatever you need. But we do this on my terms."

​Dante leaned against the table, his shadow stretching long across the documents. "You’re in no position to dictate terms, Bella. You’re broke, your son is sick, and your audit is a paper shield that I could shred in an hour."

​"I have three children, Dante," she said, her voice dropping to a dangerous, vibrating low. "Leo, Maya, and Toby. They are a unit. You don't get to pick the one who needs you and ignore the rest. You don't get to be a 'benefactor' from a distance. If you want the DNA, if you want the link to the Blackwood name, you sign a binding non-interference agreement."

​Arthur cleared his throat. "Dante, that’s standard. We can draft a—"

​"No," Bella interrupted. "Not standard. I want a clause that stipulates the results of these tests stay within this room. If Silas Blackwood’s name appears on a single CC list, if he so much as smells their existence, the audit files I have stored in an offshore cloud will be released to the SEC automatically. I’ve set the dead-man’s switch for forty-eight hours. I have to check in, or the world burns."

​Dante’s eyes narrowed. He looked at her with a flicker of something that might have been respect if it wasn't so laced with fury. "You’d destroy the company to spite my father?"

​"I’d destroy the world to keep him away from them," Bella said.

​Arthur looked at Dante. "It’s a reasonable request for privacy, sir. We can wrap the non-disclosure into the Trust’s bylaws."

​"Sign it," Dante said.

​Arthur produced a second pen. Bella watched him sign the privacy agreement first. Then, she took the pen. Her hand was steady as she signed the DNA consent forms for all three children. Three names. Three lives.

​She pushed the papers back across the table.

​"Now," Dante said, his voice a low growl. "Arthur, leave us."

​The lawyer didn't argue. He gathered his files, clicked his briefcase shut, and vanished into the foyer. The elevator chimed, then silence returned.

​Dante walked around the table. He stood directly behind her chair. He didn't touch her, but she could feel the cold, pressurized energy of him. It was a weight on her shoulders, a silent demand for an explanation she wasn't ready to give.

​"You thought you could come here, get a signature, and fly back to the Midwest on Friday," Dante said. "You thought you could use me as a pharmacy."

​"I thought you’d care enough about your son to do the right thing without a contract," Bella said.

​"I am doing the right thing. I’m bringing my family home."

​"They are home, Dante. In a house where they feel safe. Not here. Not in this mausoleum."

​"The lease on that house was purchased by the Blackwood Foundation three hours ago," Dante said. He walked around to face her, leaning his hips against the table. "Technically, you’re my tenant now. And as your landlord, I’m declaring the property uninhabitable for a child with Leo’s condition. The dust, the lack of backup power for the nebulizer... it’s a liability."

​Bella stood up so fast her chair screeched. "You did what?"

​"I’m moving you. All of you. To the estate in Bedford. It has a full medical suite, a private security detail, and it’s twenty minutes from Dr. Aris."

​"I am not moving into your house, Dante! I have a flight! The kids have school, they have—"

​"There are no flights, Bella. Not for you. Every private and commercial seat out of the tri-state area with your names on it has been flagged for 'security reconciliation.' You aren't leaving until this is settled."

​The air in the room felt like it was being sucked out. He had blocked the sky. He had bought her floor. He had surrounded her before she even walked through the door. This wasn't a conversation; it was a siege.

​"This isn't protection," Bella said, her voice trembling. "This is a kidnapping."

​"It’s a legal transition of assets," Dante corrected. He didn't even look guilty. He looked like he was reading a balance sheet. "You wanted the Blackwood referral? You got it. But a Blackwood heir doesn't live in a rental house on a corner. They live where I can see them. Where I can protect them."

​Bella gripped her portfolio. She looked at the door, then back at him. She saw the man who had sat in that boardroom and demanded the world match his numbers. He was doing it again. He was making the world match the reality he wanted, regardless of the wreckage it left behind.

​"Fine," Bella said.

​Dante blinked. He hadn't expected her to fold so quickly. He was prepared for a fight, for a screaming match, for her to throw the glass of scotch at his head. "Fine?"

​"We’ll move to Bedford," Bella said. "We’ll do the tests. We’ll stay until Leo is stable. I don't have the resources to fight you for a plane ticket while my son is wheezing, and you know it."

​Dante straightened his tie, a look of grim satisfaction crossing his face. "I'm glad you’re being rational, Bella. I'll have the cars at the house at 8:00 AM."

​"But I have one condition," Bella said. She stepped closer, into his space, until she was looking up into those slate-gray eyes. She could see the flecks of gold in them, the intensity that had once made her feel like the only woman in the world. Now, it just made her feel hunted.

​"What?" Dante asked, his voice wary.

​"You don't get to see them," Bella said. "You can buy the house. You can pay the doctors. You can even own the sky we fly through. But until Leo is cleared by the hospital, you are not allowed in the same room as the children. You sign the checks from the hallway, Dante. You stay a stranger."

​Dante’s face went stone-still. The satisfaction vanished, replaced by a raw, jagged anger.

​"I’m their father, Bella. You just signed the consent for the test that proves it."

​"The DNA will prove the biology," Bella said, heading for the elevator. "But the contract says I’m the sole guardian. If you want to see them, you’ll have to sue me. And we both know how much you hate the publicity of a custody battle during a billion-dollar merger. You want them 'safe' in Bedford? Fine. They'll be safe. Behind a locked door that you won't touch."

​She pressed the button for the elevator. The doors slid open.

​"I'll see you in the hallway, Mr. Blackwood," she said.

​The doors shut, leaving Dante alone in the library, his reflection staring back at him from the dark wood, a man who had bought everything but the one thing he actually wanted.