Chapter 6 - THE BLOODLINE TRAP
Serena did not drop the paper.
She stood her ground, her back pressing against the heavy walnut desk, her fingers clenching the white sheet until the edges crumpled.
“Why do you have this, Mr. Rinaldi?” she asked, her voice shaking but carrying a hard, defiant edge. “Why did you hire an investigator to look into my daughter’s medical records? Why do you care about her blood type?”
Vittorio closed the heavy oak door behind him, the lock clicking into place with a sound that felt as final as a prison door. He walked slowly toward her, his dark eyes fixed on her face with an intensity that made her feel completely exposed.
“You’re a smart woman, Serena,” he said, his voice dropping into a dangerous, quiet register. “You’re a clinical researcher. You know how rare the Cis-AB mutation is.”
Serena’s heart leaped into her throat.
Cis-AB.
The exact mutation she had researched during her late-night sessions at the university biology lab. The rare genetic anomaly that allowed an AB-positive parent to produce an O-negative child.
“Daniel doesn't have the mutation,” Serena said, her voice a whisper. “We ran the tests during the divorce. He’s a standard AB-positive.”
“I know,” Vittorio said, stopping two feet away from her. “Daniel is not Lucia’s biological father.”
“That’s impossible,” Serena cried, her eyes filling with tears of rage. “I have never been with another man! I have never lied about her father! The DNA test proved he was her father!”
“The DNA test was forged, Serena,” Vittorio said, his face completely still, empty of any pity. “My father paid the laboratory in Queens fifty thousand dollars to alter the results in 2019.”
“Your father?” Serena gasped, her knees turning to jelly. She had to grip the edge of the desk to keep from falling. “Why would your father care about my daughter?”
“Because my father was Thomas Rinaldi,” Vittorio said, looking up at the portrait of Clara on the wall. “The man who built the Rinaldi trust. The man who decreed that only a biological descendant of his line could inherit his real estate empire.”
He turned back to look at her, his eyes dark with a deep, historical pain.
“In 2018, before Clara died, we had a child,” Vittorio whispered. “A baby girl. She was born at the private clinic in Atlanta. But Clara was sick, Serena. She was dying of leukemia, and she knew she couldn't survive the treatment. She didn't want the child to grow up in the shadow of this house, under my father’s control.”
He stepped closer, his hand reaching out to touch the paper in her hand.
“Clara gave the baby to her sister,” he said. “A sister who had changed her name and moved to Astoria to escape the family. A sister named Serena Valente.”
Serena’s breath froze.
The world seemed to tilt on its axis, the rich wood of the study spinning around her like a carousel.
Lucia.
Lucia was not her daughter.
She was Clara’s daughter.
She was Vittorio’s daughter.
“No,” Serena whispered, her head shaking back and forth. “No, that’s... that’s a lie. I gave birth to her. I remember the hospital. I remember the pain. I remember—”
“You had a miscarriage at seven months, Serena,” Vittorio said, his voice dropping to a level of profound, terrible gentleness. “You were in a coma for three days at Baptist Memorial. When you woke up, your sister Clara was there. She had just given birth to Lucia. She told you the baby was yours. She told you the doctors had saved her.”
He took the paper from her hand, his fingers brushing against hers.
“Clara did it to save you both,” he said. “To give you a reason to live after you lost your own baby, and to keep Lucia safe from my father’s ambition. But my father found out. He spent his final years trying to find the child, trying to prove she was his biological granddaughter so he could lock her into the trust.”
May you like
He looked toward the window, where the rain was starting to hit the glass with a heavy, rhythmic beat.
“And now,” Vittorio said, “my father is dead. But the trust is still active. And in ten days, the court is going to audit the estate. If they find out that Lucia is my biological daughter, she will inherit everything. And my enemies... the people who have been waiting for me to fail... they will use her to destroy us both.”
