Chapter 11 - Dominic's Mother
Celia Vale arrived from Palm Beach that evening wearing white linen, dark glasses, and an expression of annoyance that lasted until she saw Hannah.
Then she stopped in the foyer.
Her sunglasses slipped from her fingers.
"Catherine."
Hannah felt ice move through her veins.
Dominic stood beside her.
"Her name is Hannah."
Celia stared.
"I know."
Dominic's face changed.
"You know?"
Celia looked from him to Hannah and seemed to realize she had already said too much.
"We need to talk privately."
"No."
"Dominic."
"You knew Hannah existed."
Celia's shoulders dropped.
"Yes."
Hannah felt anger rise so quickly it almost made her dizzy.
"Since when?"
Celia removed her gloves slowly.
"Since the day you were born."
Hannah laughed once because the alternative was screaming.
"Of course."
Dominic's voice became dangerously quiet.
"Mother, start talking."
They moved to the library.
Luca stayed by the door despite Celia's objections.
Rosa took the girls upstairs.
Hannah remained standing.
She did not trust herself to sit calmly across from another person who had known her sister existed while she did not.
Celia looked older under the library lights.
"Your mother Catherine and I knew each other."
Hannah stared at her.
"How?"
"We worked together briefly."
"Where?"
"At a bookkeeping office in Brooklyn before I married Victor."
Dominic frowned.
"You never told me that."
"There are many things I never told you."
"I'm noticing."
Celia looked at Hannah.
"Catherine was my friend."
"Then why did your family steal her baby?"
Celia flinched.
"I didn't know Matteo was going to do that."
"But you knew afterward."
"Yes."
"And you did nothing."
"I tried."
"Not hard enough."
Celia's eyes filled, but Hannah felt no sympathy.
"Victor told me Helena had been placed safely with a family who could protect her."
"From what?"
"From Matteo."
Dominic stepped forward.
"Wait."
"Father knew Matteo took the child?"
"Yes."
"And he let it happen?"
Celia looked at her son.
"Your father was not the man you think he was."
Dominic's expression turned bitter.
"I have never thought he was a good man."
"He was worse."
Celia folded her hands.
"Victor ordered Matteo to recover the freight records from Thomas Mercer."
"He did not order him to take a baby."
Hannah crossed her arms.
"Convenient distinction."
"I am not defending him."
Celia's voice sharpened.
"When Victor learned what Matteo had done, he was furious because kidnapping a newborn brought attention he did not want."
"He ordered Matteo to return Helena."
"Matteo refused."
Dominic stared.
"Matteo refused Father?"
"He had already arranged the adoption and destroyed enough records that returning her would expose everyone."
"So Victor paid Thomas?"
"Victor deposited money to make Thomas look compromised."
"Then why did Thomas write ransom returned?"
"Because Victor offered the money afterward as compensation."
Hannah's face twisted.
"Compensation for a stolen daughter."
Celia looked ashamed.
"Thomas left the money at the office."
"Why didn't my father go to police?"
"He did."
Hannah froze.
"What?"
"A detective took his statement."
"Then what happened?"
"The detective was on Victor's payroll."
Hannah closed her eyes.
Every path led back to corruption.
Celia continued.
"I begged Victor to bring Helena home."
"He said it was too late."
"I went to Catherine myself."
"She told me never to come near Hannah again."
Hannah's anger faltered at the mention of her mother.
"Did my mother know where Helena was?"
"Not then."
"Did she ever?"
"No."
"She died when I was a baby."
Celia nodded.
"I attended the funeral from across the street."
Hannah stared at her.
"Why?"
"Because I was a coward too."
The words sounded painfully familiar.
Thomas had called himself the same thing.
Dominic paced once behind the desk.
"How did Elena end up with the Rossis?"
"Maria Rossi was Matteo's second cousin by marriage."
"Did she know?"
"No."
"Anthony?"
"No."
"And you followed Elena's life?"
Celia looked at the floor.
"From a distance."
"Did Father?"
"Sometimes."
"Did Matteo?"
"Always."
Hannah felt sick.
"Why?"
"Insurance."
"Against what?"
"Thomas finding the courage to speak."
Celia looked at Dominic.
"And later, because Elena inherited Maria Rossi's shipping interests."
Dominic's eyes narrowed.
"The trust."
"Yes."
"Did you know Matteo was trying to control it?"
Celia hesitated.
Dominic's expression hardened.
"Mother."
"I suspected."
"You suspected my wife was kidnapped for eighteen months and said nothing?"
"No."
Celia stood.
"I believed Elena was dead until three weeks ago."
The room went still.
Hannah stared.
"Three weeks ago?"
"Matteo called me."
"Why?"
"He asked whether I still had the old Mercer documents."
"What did you say?"
"I said no."
"Was that true?"
Celia looked at her son.
"No."
Dominic swore quietly.
Celia reached into her handbag and removed a sealed envelope.
"I brought this because I thought he might have learned where it was."
Inside was a photograph.
Thomas Mercer stood beside Celia outside a Brooklyn diner.
The date on the back was 2006.
Hannah would have been six.
"Why were you meeting my father?"
"He contacted me every few years."
"About Helena?"
"Yes."
"Did you help him?"
"Sometimes."
"Did you tell him where she was?"
"Eventually."
Hannah thought of Thomas saying he had located Helena when the twins were sixteen.
"You told him."
"Yes."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Celia's eyes filled.
"Thomas made me promise not to."
Hannah laughed bitterly.
"Another promise."
Dominic looked at the photograph.
"Elena said this was stolen from Hannah's apartment."
Celia frowned.
"How would Elena know?"
"We don't know."
"Then someone showed it to her."
Luca spoke for the first time.
"Or she was in the apartment."
Hannah turned.
"What?"
"The break-in happened while we were moving you to the townhouse."
"Elena could have been free by then."
Dominic looked at him.
"The clinic records show Room 314 occupied that night."
"Records Matteo controlled."
Hannah's mind raced.
"Maybe she broke into my apartment looking for our father's files."
"Then why leave the microphone?"
Luca asked.
"Maybe she didn't."
Celia looked unsettled.
"There is something else you need to know."
Dominic's patience visibly thinned.
"Of course there is."
Celia ignored the sarcasm.
"Elena contacted me before she married you."
Dominic stared.
"What?"
"She had discovered she was adopted."
"She asked me about the Vale connection in her adoption file."
"I told her enough to know Victor and Matteo were involved, but not enough to understand why."
Hannah's face hardened.
"Why not tell her everything?"
"Because Matteo was still alive."
"So?"
"You don't understand the man he was then."
Hannah stepped closer.
"I understand him very well now."
Celia lowered her voice.
"No, you understand the man he became after decades of getting away with it."
Dominic stared at his mother.
"Did Elena marry me because she was investigating our family?"
Celia looked stricken.
"I don't know."
The answer hit him harder than Hannah expected.
"You don't know."
"She told me she met you by accident."
"Do you believe that?"
Celia hesitated.
Dominic looked away.
Hannah felt an unexpected urge to defend Elena even though she had never met her.
"She could have started suspicious and still fallen in love with you."
Dominic looked at her.
"That's supposed to help?"
"No."
"Good."
Celia opened her handbag again.
"There is one more thing."
Dominic gave a humorless laugh.
"I am beginning to hate that sentence."
She removed a small prepaid phone.
"Elena called me two days ago."
Dominic crossed the room in two steps.
"You spoke to her?"
"For less than a minute."
"Why didn't you call me?"
"She told me not to."
"And you listened?"
"She said if I told you before she was safe, Matteo would know."
Dominic's voice rose for the first time.
"My wife is alive and you kept it from me for two days?"
Celia stood her ground.
"She was terrified."
"Of me?"
"Of everyone."
Hannah stepped between them before the argument exploded.
"What did she say?"
Celia looked at her.
"She said she had found Carla."
"The nurse?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"She wouldn't say."
"Anything else?"
Celia's eyes filled with tears.
"She asked me one question."
Dominic's hands clenched.
"What question?"
Celia looked directly at Hannah.
"She asked whether Hannah still had the scar behind her left ear."
Hannah froze.
Her hand rose instinctively to the tiny crescent scar hidden by her hair.
"How would she know about that?"
Celia's face crumpled.
"Because you both got it the same night."
Hannah stared.
"What night?"
"The night Helena was taken."
Celia swallowed.
"Matteo tried to take both babies."
The room went dead silent.
"Your mother fought him."
"A metal bracelet cut both of you during the struggle."
Hannah's fingers trembled against the scar.
"He was going to take me too."
"Yes."
Celia nodded through tears.
"And Catherine stopped him."
Dominic's phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered on speaker immediately.
Elena's voice came through.
"Hannah?"
Hannah grabbed the phone.
"I'm here."
A sob broke over the line.
"I have wanted to hear your voice for ten years."
Hannah could not speak for a moment.
"Where are you?"
"Safe for now."
"Let us come get you."
"Not Dominic."
Dominic flinched.
Hannah looked at him.
"Why?"
Elena breathed shakily.
"Because Matteo has someone standing beside him who Dominic trusts with his life."
Luca went perfectly still.
Hannah whispered, "Who?"
The line crackled.
Then Elena said, "Luca."
Celia's confession about Catherine did not end with the hospital.
She told Hannah that her mother had spent the final year of her life collecting every scrap of information she could find about Helena.
"She wrote letters to hospitals, adoption offices, churches, anyone who might know something."
Hannah stared at her.
"Where are those letters?"
"Most were returned unopened."
"Most?"
Celia nodded.
"One reached Maria Rossi."
Elena's adoptive mother had replied without realizing who Catherine was.
She wrote that her baby daughter was healthy, loved, and safe.
Catherine never answered because she died two months later.
Hannah's anger collapsed into grief.
"My mother knew Elena was alive."
"She knew a baby named Helena was alive somewhere with a woman named Maria."
"Did Dad know about the reply?"
"Yes."
"Why didn't he tell me?"
Celia's eyes filled.
"Because after Catherine died, Thomas believed losing Helena had helped kill her."
Hannah looked away.
It was not medically true, but grief rarely cared about medical truth.
Celia continued.
"Thomas decided he would not let the search consume you too."
"So he made the decision for me."
"Yes."
Hannah pressed her fingers against her eyes.
Every adult in her childhood had claimed protection while removing choice.
When she lowered her hands, Celia looked smaller than before.
"There is one thing Catherine wrote that I remember exactly."
Hannah waited.
"She said, 'If Hannah ever finds her sister, don't let anyone tell them they owe each other an instant bond just because blood says so.'"
Hannah's throat tightened.
"She wrote that?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
May you like
"Because she wanted you to choose each other."
That sentence stayed with Hannah long after the conversation ended.
