Chapter 5
For a moment, nobody moved.
Not me.
Not Claire.
Not Mason.
Even Eli slept through the kind of truth that could split a family in half.
“Grace had another child?” I asked.
Elena nodded.
“Before Nathan.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
I gripped the edge of the table.
“My brother would have told me.”
“Grace was seventeen,” Elena said. “Her father forced a private adoption. She spent years trying to find the baby.”
Claire’s voice came out small.
“Rose.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t Grace tell Nathan?”
“She planned to. I have the letter.”
Elena opened another folder.
Inside was Grace’s handwriting.
Nathan, before I became your wife, I was a scared girl who lost a daughter. I found her. Her name is Rose. I want her home. I want Eli to know his sister.
My throat closed.
Eli had a sister.
Nathan had a stepdaughter he never knew.
Grace had died before she could bring her home.
And Vivienne had used that child like a key.
“Why would Vivienne take Rose?” Mason asked.
Elena looked at me.
“Because Rose’s adoption was never legally finalized. If Grace’s death investigation reopened and Rose was recognized, she could challenge control of Whitmore shares.”
I understood.
Vivienne did not care about Rose.
She cared about money.
Power.
The empire behind the baby.
Claire held Eli closer.
“My mother was Grace’s sister. Rose is Grace’s daughter. Eli is Grace’s son.”
Elena nodded.
“You are family.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“I spent two years balancing Gabriel’s books and never knew I was counting my own blood.”
Her voice broke.
I wanted to reach for her.
I did not.
She had been touched enough by fear tonight.
Mason’s phone rang.
He listened.
His eyes lifted to mine.
“We found Vivienne’s driver.”
“Alive?”
“Yes. He says she took Rose to St. Agnes.”
My blood went cold.
St. Agnes was the private hospital where my mother died.
Where Vivienne still chaired the donor board.
Where rooms could disappear behind private wings and paid silence.
Claire stood.
“No.”
“Claire.”
“She is a baby.”
“You are injured.”
“I am family.”
There was no arguing with that.
We moved before dawn.
Elena stayed behind with copies of every document.
Mason sent decoy cars to three locations.
I took only four people I trusted completely.
That number used to be larger.
Tonight had made it smaller.
St. Agnes rose from the rain like a stone church.
Too clean.
Too quiet.
The night nurse at the donor wing said no infant had been admitted.
Then Eli woke and began to cry.
A soft, hungry cry.
From behind a closed door down the hall, another baby answered.
Claire turned toward the sound.
“That’s her.”
The nurse stepped in front of me.
“You cannot go in there.”
I looked at her badge.
“Nurse Talbot. Move.”
“I have orders.”
“From who?”
She said nothing.
Mason gently moved her aside.
Inside the room, Rose lay in a hospital bassinet with an IV taped to her small foot.
Vivienne sat beside her in a cream coat.
She did not look surprised.
“Gabriel,” she said. “You always did arrive dramatically.”
Claire rushed to the bassinet.
I stepped toward Vivienne.
“What did you give her?”
“Nothing harmful.”
“That was not the question.”
Vivienne sighed.
“You sound like your father.”
“You sound like a kidnapper.”
Her face tightened.
“I saved this family from ruin.”
“You took babies.”
“I protected assets.”
Claire made a sound behind me.
Not fear.
Disgust.
Vivienne looked at her.
“And there she is. The little accountant with borrowed blood.”
I moved between them.
“Do not speak to her.”
Vivienne smiled.
“You care for her.”
I said nothing.
“That will become inconvenient.”
Mason checked Rose’s IV.
“Doctor says she’s stable, boss. Mild sedative only.”
Only.
As if sedating a stolen baby could ever be small.
Vivienne stood.
“You don’t understand what Grace planned. She was going to hand everything to outsiders. A hidden sister. A bastard child. A baby who cannot even stand.”
I stepped closer.
“Those are children.”
“They are leverage.”
“No,” I said. “They are Kane family now.”
Vivienne laughed.
“You think you can make a family by saying it?”
Claire lifted Rose carefully from the bassinet.
Rose whimpered, then settled against her.
Eli reached from Mason’s arms toward the sound.
Two babies.
Brother and sister.
Alive.
Vivienne’s face twisted.
Then police entered the room.
Elena followed them, holding a court order.
“Vivienne Kane,” she said, “you are out of time.”
Vivienne looked at me.
“You called police on your own aunt?”
May you like
I met her eyes.
“No. I called them for my nephew and his sister.”
