Chapter 7 - My Father Had Never Abandoned Me
The NICU went into lockdown.
Nobody entered without identification.
Dominic doubled private security outside the hospital, but only after I approved it.
I sat beside Eli and Noah and watched every person who came through the doors.
Fear changed motherhood into surveillance.
Was that nurse really a nurse?
Was that technician supposed to be there?
Was the woman pushing a supply cart looking too long at my babies?
Dr. Kline noticed.
“Rachel, you need rest.”
“I’ll rest when they come home.”
“You won’t help them by collapsing.”
She was right.
I hated that.
The following afternoon, Dominic brought me something from the storage unit.
A cassette player.
“One tape is labeled Rachel.”
I stared at it.
“His voice?”
Dominic nodded.
My father.
Sixteen years dead.
My hands trembled as I pressed play.
Static.
Then a man’s voice.
Warm.
Familiar.
Older than I remembered.
“Rachel, if your mother ever lets you hear this, you’re probably old enough to understand why I had to leave.”
I stopped breathing.
Dominic turned away.
My father continued.
“I need you to know something first. I did not leave because I stopped loving you. I left because I loved you more than I loved being near you.”
Tears filled my eyes.
He talked about the threats.
The financial records.
The fear that someone would use me to silence him.
He explained that he planned to disappear for six months.
Then a year.
Then return after federal investigators acted.
They never did.
Someone tipped off the people he was trying to expose.
Toward the end of the tape, his voice softened.
“You used to ask me why the moon followed our car at night.”
I covered my mouth.
I remembered.
“I told you it followed because it liked you.”
I began sobbing.
“If you ever look up and feel alone, remember your dad looked at that same moon and thought about you every single night.”
The tape ended.
For eighteen years, I had believed I was abandoned.
Now grief changed shape.
My father had loved me.
He had been trying to come home.
Later, I asked Dominic to sit with me.
“You knew about the tape?”
“No.”
“Do you believe him?”
“Yes.”
“Do you believe Vale killed him?”
“I believe Vale was involved.”
“Why didn’t you investigate him?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“He had an alibi. Clean financial records. Powerful lawyers.”
“So he won.”
“For sixteen years.”
I looked through the NICU glass.
“Not anymore.”
Dominic studied me.
“You sound like your father.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“The highest one I can give.”
That evening, Evelyn entered carrying new information.
Victor Hale had died three years earlier.
Britney inherited his records.
And Britney had received payments from a trust administered by Martin Vale.
More importantly, Vale was still sending her money.
The most recent transfer occurred forty-eight hours before my emergency C-section.
Amount:
$250,000.
Memo:
CLOSURE.
“What does closure mean?” I asked.
Nobody answered.
We all knew possibilities.
Bradley had been supposed to separate from me.
Move assets.
Marry Britney.
Perhaps gain complete control over anything tied to my trust.
But something went wrong.
I nearly died.
Dominic appeared.
The old storage records surfaced.
Now the secret Vale had buried for sixteen years was alive again.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Dominic told me not to answer.
I answered.
A woman spoke.
“Rachel?”
I knew the voice immediately.
Britney.
“What do you want?”
“To explain.”
“Why were you near my babies?”
“I wasn’t there to hurt them.”
“Then why were you wearing stolen scrubs?”
She started crying.
Whether it was real, I couldn’t tell.
“Because Vale has people watching the hospital.”
“You work for him.”
“Not anymore.”
“Bradley says you were assigned to him.”
Silence.
“Yes.”
“Did you love him?”
“No.”
The answer came without hesitation.
Strangely, that hurt less than if she had said yes.
“Why marry him?”
“Because Vale needed legal distance between Bradley and you.”
“For the trust?”
“Yes.”
“What were you doing in the NICU?”
“I was trying to leave something.”
“What?”
“A flash drive.”
My eyes went to Dominic.
“Where?”
“Inside the family waiting room. Behind the vending machine.”
“Why should I believe you?”
“Because my father ruined your family.”
Her voice broke.
“And before he died, he told me exactly what Martin Vale did to Daniel Russo.”
My grip tightened.
“What did he do?”
Britney whispered, “Vale didn’t order your father’s death.”
I frowned.
“Then who did?”
She inhaled shakily.
“Someone your uncle has trusted for almost thirty years.”
Dominic’s expression changed.
I put the phone on speaker.
Britney continued.
“Ask Dominic who became chairman of Russo Holdings the year Daniel died.”
Dominic went white.
He already knew the answer.
I stared at him.
“Who?”
His lips barely moved.
“My stepfather.”
May you like
And suddenly the conspiracy was no longer near Dominic’s family.
It was inside it.
