Chapter 17: The Woman Behind The Locked Doors

The word mother did not sound like a family title anymore.

It sounded like a threat.

Zara knelt beside Daniel as Adrian pressed the towel harder against the wound.

Blood seeped through almost immediately.

“This is not something we can treat with coffee and towels,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady.

“It missed the artery,” Daniel whispered.

“You don’t know that.”

“I was a surgeon before I became your father.”

The correction caught in her chest.

Before I became your father.

Not a denial.

A choice.

Adrian looked at the wound with clinical focus.

“It’s through and through. The bleeding is slower than it should be if an artery was hit.”

Zara stared at him.

“You know medicine too?”

“Boarding school,” he said dryly. “They considered survival a useful extracurricular activity.”

Under different circumstances, she might have smiled.

Instead, she held the towel while Adrian opened the medical kit again.

Daniel watched them both with a strange expression.

“What?”

His eyes moved between their faces.

“You’re already working together.”

The observation unsettled her more than it should have.

Adrian cleaned the wound quickly and efficiently.

Daniel hissed in pain but did not pull away.

“Who shot you?” Adrian asked.

“I didn’t see.”

“Did they say anything?”

Daniel was silent for a moment.

Then he said, “They asked for the original file.”

Zara’s head snapped up.

“There’s an original file?”

Daniel nodded weakly.

“The copies in the archive were never the real records.”

Adrian stopped what he was doing.

“Where is it?”

Daniel looked at the fire.

“I don’t have it.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

A long silence.

Then Daniel lifted his eyes to Adrian’s.

“Your mother does.”

The room seemed to tighten.

Zara felt a chill crawl up her spine.

“Valentina has the original records?”

“Yes.”

“Why would she keep them?”

Daniel’s voice grew quieter.

“Because they contain the one thing that was removed from every official copy.”

Adrian’s expression hardened.

“The father’s name.”

Daniel did not answer.

He didn’t need to.

The fire popped softly.

Rain continued to drum against the windows, sealing the cottage away from the world.

Zara sat back slowly, trying to breathe through the pressure building in her chest.

“So all of this; the sealed file, the altered records, the marriage; comes down to one missing name.”

“Yes,” Daniel said.

“And Valentina has it.”

“Yes.”

Adrian finished bandaging the wound and tied the dressing firmly.

Daniel winced, then leaned back against the sofa, exhausted.

For a few moments, no one spoke.

Then Zara asked the question that had been waiting in the shadows.

“Did my mother love him?”

Daniel looked at her carefully.

“The man whose name is missing?”

She nodded.

A sad smile touched his face.

“Yes.”

The answer hurt in a way she had not expected.

Because it made Isabella real.

Not a mystery.

Not a scandal.

A woman who had loved someone enough to have a child with him; and feared him enough to hide that child afterward.

“Did he love her?” Zara whispered.

Daniel’s eyes darkened.

“I think that’s the wrong question.”

The silence that followed was heavy with things he still refused to say.

Adrian stood and walked to the fireplace.

“You’re protecting someone.”

Daniel looked up.

“I protected Isabella.”

“You’re still protecting someone.”

Their eyes locked.

And Zara realized Adrian was no longer speaking as a son.

He was speaking as a man investigating a crime.

“Tell me what my father did,” Adrian said quietly.

Daniel held his gaze for a long moment.

Then he looked away.

“That’s the one truth I can’t give you.”

Adrian’s jaw tightened.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Both.”

The answer seemed to anger him more than a lie would have.

He turned away sharply and stared into the fire.

Zara watched the tension in his shoulders, the rigid control in his posture.

For the first time, she understood something important.

Adrian was not defending his father.

He was afraid of what he might discover about him.

A sudden sound broke the silence.

A car.

All three of them froze.

Headlights swept across the rain streaked windows.

Adrian moved instantly, extinguishing the lamp beside the sofa.

The cottage fell into shadow.

Another set of headlights appeared behind the first.

Two vehicles.

Zara’s pulse quickened.

“No one should know we’re here.”

Daniel struggled to sit up straighter.

“They followed me.”

Adrian looked toward the window.

“How many people?”

“I only saw one car when I left the estate.”

The engines cut off.

Doors opened.

Muffled voices carried through the rain.

Adrian crossed to the wall and opened a narrow cupboard Zara had not noticed before.

Inside was a locked metal box.

He entered a code without hesitation.

The box clicked open.

Zara stared.

A pistol lay inside.

She looked at him in disbelief.

“You keep a gun in the wine cottage?”

He checked the magazine with practiced movements.

“My family keeps everything.”

The ease with which he handled it sent a strange shiver through her.

Not fear.

Awareness.

This was a side of Adrian she had not seen before.

Not the distant heir.

Not the reluctant husband.

Someone trained for danger.

Outside, footsteps approached the porch.

One set.

Then another.

A knock sounded.

Slow.

Deliberate.

Three times.

Exactly like before.

Zara’s breath caught.

No one spoke.

Then a woman’s voice came through the door.

Calm.

Elegant.

Terrifyingly familiar.

“Adrian,” Valentina Moretti said. “Open the door.”