Chapter 5 - THE MIDNIGHT LAB RESULTS
-5
The digital clock on the bedside table flipped from 3:59 AM to 4:00 AM.
I hadn't slept a wink. I sat cross-legged on the center of the plush mattress, little Leo curled up and fast asleep against my lap, his soft breathing providing the only soundtrack to my mounting dread. Every tick of the clock felt like a countdown to an execution. If the test came back negative, what would Dante do with me? Would he let me go, or would I become a loose end that needed to be permanently tied up to protect the Alighieri syndicate's secrets? And if the test came back positive... God help me, what kind of terrifying legacy was I walking into?
A sharp, authoritative knock shattered the silence of the suite.
Before I could even react, the heavy deadbolt turned, and the door swung open. Dante walked in. He wasn't wearing his suit jacket anymore; his white dress shirt was unbuttoned at the collar, his sleeves rolled up to reveal the black dragons coiling over his forearms. Behind him stood Dr. Sterling, clutching a crisp, printed manila folder with both hands. The doctor's face was as pale as a sheet of parchment, his hands trembling slightly as he stared down at the papers.
I instinctively pulled Leo closer, my heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird.
"Well?" Dante demanded, his voice a low, dangerous rumble that filled the entire room. He stepped up to the foot of the bed, his dark eyes locked onto Dr. Sterling. "Give me the numbers."
Dr. Sterling swallowed hard, clearing his throat. He adjusted his rimless glasses before speaking. "Mr. Alighieri... we ran the mitochondrial DNA sequencing twice. We cross-referenced the markers against the secure genetic database recovered from the old estate archives—samples preserved from both you and... and Elena Vance."
He paused, looking at me with a mixture of awe and sheer terror.
"And?" Dante barked, taking a menacing step toward the doctor.
"The genetic match is ninety-nine point nine-nine percent," Dr. Sterling breathed out, the words dropping into the quiet room like lead weights. "Mara Vance-Alighieri is your biological daughter. She is Elena's child."
The breath rushed out of my lungs. The room spun violently, the walls tilting sideways. Daughter. Not a stranger. Not a lookalike. Not a ghost. I was the missing heir to the most powerful, ruthless mafia dynasty in the country—a daughter stolen away from a massacre twenty-six years ago, raised in poverty by a woman who had apparently risked everything to keep me hidden from the monsters who ruled the underworld.
Dante froze.
The imposing, terrifying syndicate boss—the man who made entire syndicates tremble with a single word—looked as though he had been struck by lightning. All the color drained from his scarred face. His broad shoulders slumped just an inch, and for the first time since I met him, his hands began to tremble.
He slowly walked around the bed, stopping just a foot away from me. He looked down at my face, tracing the lines of my nose, my jawline, and the tiny dimple on my left cheek with wide, unbelieving eyes.
"My little girl," Dante whispered, his voice cracking with a raw, shattered emotion that sounded entirely foreign to him. "My Mara."
"Stay away from me," I choked out, tears overflowing and running hot down my cheeks. I pressed myself back against the headboard, shielding Leo with my entire body. "If you're my father... where were you? Why did my mother have to run? Why was I raised in cheap apartments terrified of men with dragons on their skins if you were looking for me?"
Dante stopped, his expression twisting with a sudden, violent agony. "I didn't abandon you, Mara. On the night you were born, enemies breached our home. They burned the west wing to the ground. They told me everyone was dead—that my wife and my newborn daughter had perished in the inferno. I spent twenty-six years waging a war of extermination against every family in this city because I thought they took my family from me."
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He sank down slowly onto the edge of the mattress, his heavy frame bowing under the weight of decades of grief. He reached out a trembling hand, hovering just inches from my knee, asking for permission he had never needed before.
"Your mother survived that night," Dante whispered, his eyes shining with unshed tears. "And she took you away to keep you safe from me. Because in my world, blood is always a target."
