Chapter 8 - The Brother He Never Knew
Nobody spoke for several seconds.
Then Luka laughed.
It was not a happy sound.
“No.”
Claire remained on the screen.
“The result is preliminary.”
“No.”
“We need confirmatory testing.”
“No.”
Luka walked away from the laptop.
Rafael watched him carefully.
I sat with Isabella in my arms.
My mind was so tired it had almost stopped reacting.
“First-degree family relationship.”
I repeated the phrase.
Claire nodded.
“Parent-child or full siblings are the most common possibilities.”
Luka turned.
“Daniel is thirty-four.”
“I’m thirty-nine.”
Claire looked at him.
“That makes parent-child impossible in the obvious direction.”
“Thank you.”
His tone was sharp.
Claire ignored it.
“Which leaves full siblings as the strongest initial possibility.”
I looked at Luka.
He looked genuinely sick.
“Who was your mother?”
I asked.
“Lucia Moretti.”
“Is she alive?”
“No.”
“When did she die?”
“When I was twenty-three.”
“Could she have had another child?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
“How can you be sure?”
“Because Daniel is five years younger than me.”
“So?”
“My parents were married.”
“That doesn’t—”
“My mother lived in Sicily for three years after I was born.”
Rafael spoke quietly.
“Luka.”
He turned.
“What?”
“Lucia came back to Boston for six months in 1991.”
Luka stared at him.
“How do you know that?”
“Your father told me.”
“When?”
“Before you were old enough to remember.”
“What was she doing here?”
Rafael hesitated.
“She was receiving fertility treatment.”
Silence.
Luka’s face emptied.
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“She and Carlo had difficulty having a second child.”
Daniel was born in 1992.
Luka stepped toward Rafael.
“What are you saying?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
“You always know more than you say.”
“Because I promised your father.”
“He’s dead.”
“So is your mother.”
“Then stop protecting ghosts.”
Rafael flinched.
That told me the words hit exactly where Luka intended.
I had spent the previous twelve hours discovering secrets about my parents.
Now Luka was entering the same nightmare.
I almost felt sorry for him.
Almost.
Then I remembered he was Isabella’s biological father.
That truth still sat between us like a live wire.
Claire interrupted.
“We need more samples.”
“From who?”
I asked.
“Daniel.”
“He isn’t going to volunteer.”
“We may obtain a court order.”
“From Richard Cross?”
“No.”
Claire’s expression hardened.
“I’ve already filed for reassignment based on the judge’s undisclosed conflict.”
“Will it work?”
“If the evidence you sent me is authentic, Richard Cross is going to have problems larger than your custody case.”
Luka returned to the table.
“What kind?”
“Potential judicial misconduct.”
“Good.”
“Don’t celebrate yet.”
Claire looked at me.
“Daniel’s attorney filed a motion twenty minutes ago.”
“For what?”
“To invalidate Luka’s paternity claim.”
“He has a DNA test.”
“They are alleging the sample was contaminated.”
“Of course.”
“And they claim you were coerced into allowing testing.”
I laughed.
“I asked for it.”
“They say you’re under Luka’s influence.”
“What do they want?”
“A hospital-administered retest.”
“No.”
My answer came immediately.
Claire nodded.
“I expected that.”
“Not St. Catherine.”
“We’ll ask for an independent court laboratory.”
“Good.”
“There’s more.”
There was always more.
“Daniel claims you signed an IVF consent authorizing use of an anonymous donor if his sample was medically unusable.”
My chest tightened.
“I didn’t.”
“He submitted a copy.”
“Forgery.”
“It appears to bear your signature.”
“Daniel copied my signature for the prenatal test too.”
“I believe you.”
Claire looked grim.
“But proving it will matter.”
“Does the consent list M-17?”
“Yes.”
My heart stopped.
“What exactly does it say?”
Claire read.
“In the event primary partner specimen DC-14 fails quality threshold, patient authorizes substitution with designated compatible donor M-17.”
“Compatible?”
I looked at Luka.
“What does compatible mean?”
He said nothing.
Claire continued.
“There’s another line.”
“What?”
“Donor selection approved based on hereditary trust compatibility.”
The room became silent.
There it was.
This had not been medicine.
It had been inheritance engineering.
Somebody selected Luka’s DNA because of the Bennett-Moretti trust.
Somebody used my body to create an heir.
Without telling me.
Without telling Luka.
And Daniel had been placed beside me as the legal father who would eventually control the child.
I felt a kind of rage I had never experienced.
Infidelity suddenly seemed small.
Even abandonment seemed small.
They had taken the most intimate decision a person could make and turned it into a financial transaction.
“I want everyone involved charged.”
My voice was quiet.
Luka looked at me.
“So do I.”
Claire spoke carefully.
“We may be dealing with reproductive fraud, falsified medical consent, conspiracy, unlawful medical access, and potentially kidnapping-related conduct.”
“Potentially?”
“Courts like evidence more than outrage.”
“Then we give them evidence.”
“That’s the plan.”
Claire disconnected to file additional motions.
I took Isabella upstairs.
Luka followed but stopped at the doorway.
“Can I come in?”
I appreciated the question.
“Yes.”
He stood several feet away.
I changed Isabella’s diaper.
She screamed as though I had personally betrayed her.
Luka watched.
“She’s loud.”
“She gets that from Daniel.”
I froze.
The joke had escaped automatically.
Pain followed.
“No.”
Luka said.
“What?”
“She gets it from you.”
I looked at him.
“How would you know?”
“I heard you yell at two security officers while wearing hospital slippers.”
Despite myself, I smiled.
Then the smile disappeared.
“She’s yours.”
He looked at Isabella.
“Yes.”
“Biologically.”
“Yes.”
“What are you going to do?”
His eyes returned to mine.
“Whatever you want me to do.”
“That sounds like avoidance.”
“It’s not.”
“Do you want custody?”
“No.”
The speed of the answer startled me.
“You don’t?”
“I want her safe.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No.”
He exhaled.
“I am not going to meet a woman twenty-four hours after she gives birth, discover someone used my genetic material without consent, and then start making demands about the child she carried for nine months.”
Something in my chest loosened.
“Do you want to know her?”
“Yes.”
Again, immediate.
“If you allow it.”
“She’s your daughter.”
“She is your daughter first in every way that mattered before yesterday.”
I swallowed.
“That isn’t legally how it works.”
“I’m not talking legally.”
He looked at Isabella.
“You did the pregnancy.”
“You did the labor.”
“You kept her alive before I knew she existed.”
“I’m not going to use a laboratory result to erase that.”
Tears came unexpectedly.
I turned away.
“I hate crying.”
“You’re allowed.”
“You already said that.”
“I’ll probably say it again.”
I wiped my face.
“Daniel would tell me I was being dramatic.”
“I’m beginning to dislike Daniel.”
“You noticed?”
A knock sounded downstairs.
Both of us froze.
Rafael called up.
“It’s Claire.”
She had arrived in person.
That immediately worried me.
We went downstairs.
Claire stood beside the dining table with two folders.
She was around forty-five.
Dark suit.
No-nonsense eyes.
“Good news first.”
“I’m listening.”
“Judge Cross has been removed from the emergency custody matter.”
I exhaled.
“Police recovery order?”
“Stayed until tomorrow’s hearing.”
That meant we could breathe.
Briefly.
“What’s the bad news?”
Claire opened the second folder.
“I found the original incorporation documents for Meridian.”
She looked at Luka.
“Your father was not the sole listed parent on your birth declaration.”
Luka frowned.
“What?”
“Carlo Moretti acknowledged paternity.”
“Yes.”
“But the archived hospital genetics file contains a different note.”
Rafael lowered himself slowly into a chair.
He already knew.
Luka noticed.
“You knew.”
Rafael’s face was devastated.
“I suspected.”
“Say it.”
“Carlo couldn’t have children naturally.”
Luka went completely still.
“What?”
“Cancer treatment when he was twenty-four.”
“But he had me.”
“He raised you.”
“That’s not what I said.”
Claire pushed a document toward him.
“Your birth involved donor conception.”
Luka stared at the paper.
“Who was the donor?”
“That’s where things become important.”
She placed another report beside it.
A donor code.
AC-01.
My stomach tightened.
Adrian Cross.
“No.”
Luka stared.
Claire spoke carefully.
“We need a direct DNA sample from Adrian to confirm it.”
Luka did not move.
“If the code is accurate, Adrian Cross may be your biological father.”
I covered my mouth.
That would make Luka and Daniel paternal half-brothers.
It would explain the first-degree family alert.
But Luka was shaking his head.
“No.”
Rafael’s silence confirmed too much.
Luka turned on him.
“You knew my father wasn’t my biological father?”
“I knew Carlo used a donor.”
“Did you know it was Adrian?”
“No.”
“Did Carlo?”
“I don’t know.”
Luka laughed bitterly.
“All of you.”
“What?”
“All of you built our lives out of secrets and then acted surprised when everything rotted.”
Nobody answered.
He walked toward the door.
I followed.
“Luka.”
“I need air.”
“Don’t disappear.”
He stopped.
I immediately wished I could take back the desperation in my voice.
He turned.
“I won’t.”
“You promised you don’t leave children unprotected.”
“I remember.”
He went onto the back terrace.
I watched through the glass.
For the first time, he looked less like a dangerous stranger and more like a son who had just learned his father wasn’t his father.
Claire came beside me.
“There’s something I didn’t tell him.”
I looked at her.
“Why?”
“Because I wanted to tell you first.”
That was never a promising sentence.
“What?”
“Daniel’s new filing included a sworn affidavit from Adrian Cross.”
“And?”
“Adrian admits that M-17 used Luka’s genetic material.”
My pulse quickened.
“He admits the fraud?”
“No.”
“He claims Luka consented.”
“He didn’t.”
“I believe him.”
“What else?”
Claire looked through the window at Luka.
“Adrian also claims Luka knew you were the intended recipient.”
My stomach dropped.
“That’s a lie.”
“Probably.”
“Why would Adrian say it?”
“To make Luka look like a co-conspirator.”
“That’s not going to work.”
“It might.”
She opened the affidavit.
There was a signature beneath an old authorization form.
LUKA ANTONIO MORETTI.
I recognized it.
The same controlled handwriting I had seen on Isabella’s birth certificate.
I stared at the date.
Eight years ago.
Four months before I met Daniel.
The form authorized Meridian successor laboratories to maintain and designate LM-22 material for:
BENNETT CONTINGENCY M-17.
I looked through the glass.
Luka had told me he never consented.
The document said otherwise.
Then I noticed something beneath his signature.
Witnessed by:
GABRIEL BENNETT.
My dead father had supposedly witnessed Luka signing it eight years after his own funeral.
And beside Gabriel’s signature was a fingerprint.
Claire had already run it.
“It matches your father’s military medical record.”
I couldn’t breathe.
“Then he was alive.”
Claire nodded.
“Eight years after you buried him.”
I looked at Luka.
The man who claimed he stopped finding my father when I was fourteen.
The man standing outside alone.
The biological father of my child.
And suddenly the question written on that photograph returned to me.
ASK LUKA WHY HE STOPPED LOOKING.
Maybe he hadn’t stopped.
May you like
Maybe he had found my father again.
And maybe Luka Moretti had been lying to me from the moment he stepped into that hospital hallway.
