Chapter 4 - A Stolen Medical Record and Blood That Doesn't Match
The man pocketed the radio, raised his weapon, and began sweeping the master bedroom.
His flashlight beam darted across the bed, the vanity, and then stopped squarely on the closet doors.
My lungs locked.
I reached blindly behind me in the darkness of the closet. My fingers brushed against a heavy brass curtain rod leaning in the corner.
The footsteps moved closer.
One step.
Two steps.
The wooden louvers rattled as the barrel of his pistol pushed against the door.
I didn't wait.
With every ounce of strength I had, I kicked the closet door wide open, slamming the heavy wood directly into the man’s face.
He grunted in pain, stumbling backward as blood sprayed from his nose.
I lunged out of the darkness, swinging the brass curtain rod with both hands. It struck his wrist with a sickening crack. His pistol clattered across the floorboards, sliding under the king-sized bed.
He roared in fury and lunged at me, catching my coat collar.
We crashed onto the floor.
He was twice my weight, his hands clawing for my throat. I jammed the heel of my boot into his knee joint with all the adrenaline surging through my veins. He howled, his grip loosening just enough for me to twist free.
I grabbed my satchel containing Sarah’s diary, scrambled to my feet, and sprinted down the hallway.
Behind me, he was already recovering, cursing loudly as he limped after me.
I didn't use the stairs. He would cut me off at the bottom.
I bolted through the second-floor library, kicked open the French doors leading to the balcony, and looked down.
A steep wooden trellis covered in thick climbing vines ran down to the soft garden mulch twelve feet below.
A bullet tore through the doorframe above my head with a muffled phut.
I jumped.
I caught the trellis, the wood splintering under my weight, tearing the skin on my palms as I slid down before dropping hard into the rose bushes. Pain flared through my ankle, but I ignored it, scrambling to my feet and dashing into the fog.
I reached Luca’s sedan, threw myself into the driver's seat, locked the doors, and slammed the ignition.
The engine roared to life just as the gunman burst out of the cottage front doors, firing wildly into the mist.
Tires screeched as I threw the car into reverse, whipped it around the circular driveway, and blasted through the iron gates out onto the main road.
My hands shook violently against the wheel.
Once I hit the highway and confirmed no headlights were tailing me, I turned on the interior dome light and pulled out the medical files from Sarah’s satchel.
My eyes scanned the yellowed neonatal chart from Mercy General Hospital, dated seven years ago:
Patient: Lily Moretti.
Mother: Sarah Moretti.
Blood Type: O-Negative.
I turned to the next page. Sarah’s private medical history:
Sarah Moretti: Blood Type AB-Positive.
And beneath that, Luca Moretti’s official donor record from the family archives:
Luca Moretti: Blood Type AB-Positive.
I stared at the paper in disbelief.
I was not a doctor, but anyone with basic high school biology knew the truth written on that page.
Two parents with AB-positive blood cannot biologically produce a child with O-negative blood.
It was genetically impossible.
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Lily was not Luca and Sarah’s biological child.
And Valentina Vance—the woman currently living in Luca’s mansion under the name Vanessa Bellini—was the nurse who had orchestrated the entire switch seven years ago.
