Chapter 6 - The Father I Buried Twice
Luka stared at the photograph for a long time.
Too long.
“Why did you stop looking?”
I asked.
He didn’t answer immediately.
That was answer enough to make me angry.
“You told me my father disappeared after the crash.”
“Yes.”
“You told me you believed Cross security took him.”
“Yes.”
“You said you spent two years learning this hospital because you were looking for him.”
“Yes.”
“So why does this say you stopped?”
Luka looked at Rafael.
The older man lowered his eyes.
My stomach tightened.
“You knew too.”
Rafael sighed.
“Some of it.”
“What happened?”
Luka picked up the photograph.
“After Gabriel disappeared, I spent eleven months looking for him.”
“You said two years.”
“I kept investigating for two years.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
“What happened after eleven months?”
Luka’s thumb moved along the edge of the photograph.
“I found him.”
The words hit me so hard that I actually stepped backward.
“You found my father?”
“Yes.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“You were fourteen.”
“My mother was alive.”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t tell her?”
“No.”
I could barely breathe.
“Why?”
“Because Gabriel told me not to.”
Rage came fast.
“You expect me to believe my father wanted his wife and daughter to think he was dead?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he thought it was the only way to keep you alive.”
I laughed bitterly.
“That sentence is becoming everyone’s excuse.”
“It isn’t an excuse.”
“Where was he?”
“A private rehabilitation facility in Vermont.”
“Doing what?”
“Recovering.”
“From the crash?”
“Yes.”
“Why wasn’t he using his real name?”
“He was being protected.”
“By who?”
“I thought federal investigators.”
“You thought?”
Luka’s jaw tightened.
“I was twenty.”
I stared at him.
That detail mattered.
The man standing in front of me looked like someone who had always been dangerous.
But at twenty, he had been barely older than I was when I met Daniel.
“My father told you to leave him there?”
“He told me Cross believed he was dead.”
“But Cross took him.”
“That’s what I believed at first.”
“And then?”
“He told me another group got to the crash first.”
“What group?”
“He wouldn’t say.”
“Why?”
“He said the fewer names I knew, the longer I’d live.”
My father had always been dramatic when telling ghost stories.
Apparently I had mistaken warning signs for personality.
“What did he say about me?”
Luka’s eyes softened.
“He asked about you before he asked about himself.”
My anger faltered.
“What did you tell him?”
“That you were okay.”
“I wasn’t.”
“I know.”
“You didn’t know me.”
“I watched from a distance.”
I felt violated.
“You watched me?”
“Only when I thought Cross people were nearby.”
“How often?”
“More often than I liked.”
“Did you watch my mother?”
“Yes.”
“Did she know?”
“No.”
I stared at him.
“You people made decisions about my life like I was luggage.”
“I know.”
“Did my father contact me again?”
“No.”
“Did he ever ask to?”
“Every time.”
My eyes burned.
“Then why didn’t he?”
“Because someone tried to kill you two weeks after I found him.”
The room went quiet.
“What?”
“Do you remember the gas leak at your mother’s house?”
I did.
I had been fourteen.
My mother and I woke at 3:00 a.m. to firefighters pounding on our door.
The furnace had malfunctioned.
At least that was what we were told.
“Carbon monoxide.”
“Yes.”
“The furnace was old.”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I found the valve they loosened.”
My mouth went dry.
“Who?”
“We never proved it.”
“Cross?”
“I believe so.”
“And Dad thought it happened because you found him?”
“Yes.”
“So he disappeared again.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
That familiar phrase returned.
But this time I believed it.
“What was the last thing he said to you?”
Luka looked down.
“He told me to make sure you never married Daniel Cross.”
I closed my eyes.
“And you did a fantastic job.”
Pain crossed his face.
“By the time I learned you were dating Daniel, you were already engaged.”
“You could have approached me.”
“I tried.”
“When?”
“Your engagement party.”
I remembered.
A man had been removed by security near the entrance.
Dark hair.
Black jacket.
I barely saw him.
Daniel told me he was drunk.
“That was you?”
“Yes.”
“Daniel had you removed.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you come back?”
“I did.”
“When?”
“Three nights later.”
I searched my memory.
Nothing.
“You weren’t home.”
“Where was I?”
“Daniel had taken you to Cape Cod.”
Our surprise engagement trip.
Daniel arranged it with less than twenty-four hours’ notice.
I had thought it was romantic.
Another memory poisoned.
“Then my apartment was burglarized.”
Luka nodded.
“The letter I planned to leave you disappeared.”
My blood went cold.
“Daniel?”
“I never proved it.”
I looked at Vanessa.
She had been silent.
“Did Daniel ever mention Luka before today?”
“No.”
“Never?”
“Not by name.”
“What did he say?”
Vanessa hesitated.
“He used to say there was one man his father had spent twenty years trying to keep away from the Bennett family.”
My eyes moved to Luka.
“What else?”
“He called him the stray.”
Something dangerous flashed in Luka’s eyes.
“That sounds like Adrian.”
I sat.
My body reminded me again that childbirth had happened less than a day ago.
The cramps were stronger.
Luka noticed.
“You need sleep.”
“I need Vault 17.”
“You need medical care.”
“I had medical care.”
I looked toward the hospital bracelet.
“Look how that went.”
Luka crouched.
“Sofia.”
“No.”
“You can’t protect Isabella if you collapse.”
That was the only argument that worked.
I hated him for knowing it.
“Two hours.”
“Four.”
“Three.”
“Deal.”
Rafael almost smiled.
I slept for ninety minutes.
When I woke, Luka was sitting in a chair outside the nursery.
He had Isabella asleep against his chest.
My heart stopped.
Not from fear.
From something stranger.
He held her as if she were made of glass.
One enormous tattooed hand supported her head.
The other rested lightly across her blanket.
His eyes were closed.
“You said you didn’t know how to hold babies.”
He opened them.
“I never said that.”
“Have you done this before?”
“My sister has three.”
“You have a sister?”
“Yes.”
“Does she know about any of this?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I like her alive.”
I frowned.
“That isn’t funny.”
“It wasn’t a joke.”
I approached.
Isabella made a tiny sound.
Luka looked down immediately.
“She likes being upright.”
“She has gas.”
“That explains the face.”
I almost laughed.
Then I remembered the DNA possibility.
The man holding my daughter might actually be her biological father.
The thought was too enormous.
“Give her to me.”
He did immediately.
No hesitation.
That mattered.
“Rafael found something.”
Luka stood.
“What?”
“Vault 17 doesn’t belong to a bank anymore.”
“Who owns it?”
“A private records company.”
“Cross?”
“No.”
“Who?”
“Moretti Family Holdings.”
I stared.
“Yours?”
“It shouldn’t be.”
“Why?”
“My father’s estate was liquidated after his death.”
“Apparently not all of it.”
Rafael entered holding a tablet.
“The property transferred fourteen years ago.”
“To Luka?”
“No.”
He looked at me.
“To Sofia.”
I almost dropped the baby.
“What?”
“You own the building.”
“I own a building I’ve never heard of?”
“Through a trust.”
“Which trust?”
Rafael turned the screen.
BENNETT-MORETTI CONTINGENCY TRUST.
There it was again.
“Who signed the transfer?”
Luka asked.
Rafael zoomed in.
Three signatures.
Carlo Moretti.
Gabriel Bennett.
And a third name.
My mother.
EVELYN BENNETT.
I stared at her signature.
“My mother knew.”
Apparently.
She had spent eight years after Dad’s death telling me to move forward.
She never mentioned Meridian.
Never mentioned Moretti.
Never mentioned Daniel’s family.
And yet her signature was on a secret property transfer.
“She died before I married Daniel.”
“Yes.”
“What did she die from?”
Luka asked.
The question irritated me.
“Breast cancer.”
“How long was she sick?”
“Seven months.”
“Where was she treated?”
I knew before I answered.
“St. Catherine.”
Luka and Rafael exchanged a look.
“Don’t.”
I shook my head.
“Do not turn my mother’s cancer into another conspiracy.”
“I’m not.”
“You were about to.”
“I was about to ask who her oncologist was.”
“Why?”
“Because we need to know everyone who had access to your family’s medical records.”
I tried to remember.
Dr. Lang.
Dr. Peterson.
And during the final month, a specialist.
A woman Daniel’s father recommended.
My heart stopped.
“No.”
“What?”
Luka asked.
“Dr. Whitcomb.”
The same physician who had switched my obstetric care.
The same woman whose credentials erased my IVF file.
Luka went still.
“She treated your mother?”
“Yes.”
“Before you met Daniel?”
“Two years before.”
That meant Anne Whitcomb had been in my life before Daniel.
Before my marriage.
Before my fertility treatment.
Before Isabella.
Rafael spoke quietly.
“Sofia.”
“What?”
“I found one more document attached to the property transfer.”
He opened it.
It was my mother’s handwriting.
Not a legal document.
A note.
If Sofia ever comes here with Luka, give them access to Box 17 without counsel present.
Underneath:
Do not trust Marianne Cole.
My godmother.
The woman who introduced me to Daniel.
I looked at Luka.
“We’re going to the vault.”
He didn’t argue this time.
Three hours later, just before sunrise, we stood inside an old stone building overlooking Boston Harbor.
Isabella was strapped against my chest in a carrier.
Rafael remained outside.
Luka entered the code.
The vault door opened.
Inside sat dozens of metal boxes.
Number 17 was larger than the others.
I used the brass key.
The lid lifted.
Inside were hospital records.
Photographs.
Audio tapes.
A ledger.
And a videotape labeled:
SEPTEMBER 14 - CRASH RECOVERY.
My hands went cold.
Luka found an old video deck in the records room.
We inserted the tape.
Static filled the monitor.
Then an image appeared.
The date read September 14.
11:47 p.m.
A hospital room.
My father lay in bed.
Alive.
Bruised.
Weak.
But unmistakably alive.
A man stepped into frame.
I expected Adrian Cross.
It wasn’t him.
I recognized the man instantly.
Because I had seen him at Christmas dinners.
At my wedding.
At my mother’s funeral.
Daniel’s uncle.
Judge Richard Cross.
He leaned over my father’s bed.
“You should have stayed dead, Gabriel.”
My father smiled weakly.
“You should have destroyed M-17 when you had the chance.”
Richard’s face hardened.
“We did.”
“No.”
My father whispered.
“My daughter is still alive.”
The recording suddenly jumped.
Another person entered.
A woman.
Luka leaned toward the screen.
I stopped breathing.
My mother.
Evelyn stood beside my father’s bed six weeks after I had buried him.
She was supposed to believe he was dead.
Instead, she reached down.
Took his hand.
And said:
“Daniel is already in position.”
I felt the floor disappear beneath me.
May you like
Then my mother said the sentence that destroyed everything I thought I knew about my childhood.
“When Sofia is old enough, we’ll make sure she meets him.”
