Chapter 6 - THE HOUSE IN UPSTATE
The silence in the room was heavier than concrete. Adrian slowly let go of Richard’s lapels and turned to look at the woman he had asked to marry him just three months ago.
Julia was trembling, the crayon drawing fluttering in her hands.
“Julia?” Adrian’s voice broke. “What is he talking about?”
“I… I didn’t know,” Julia stammered, tears spilling down her cheeks. She looked at me, desperate for an ally, but I was just as stunned. “Adrian, I swear on my life, I didn’t know who the boy was.”
“Who is he?” Adrian demanded, his voice rising to a shout.
“My parents took in a foster child four years ago,” Julia cried, clutching the drawing to her chest. “A little boy named Leo. It was a closed, private adoption. They told me his mother was a young girl who couldn’t care for him. I swear, Adrian, I never saw a picture of your sister! I didn’t know!”
“Eleanor orchestrated it,” Richard said, straightening his suit. He looked exhausted, like a man who had been carrying a corpse for years. “Eleanor couldn’t bring herself to kill the child. But she couldn’t risk you finding him. So she hid him in plain sight. She arranged the adoption with Julia’s parents, knowing they were a quiet, respectable family upstate. And then, years later, she introduced you to Julia.”
“She engineered our relationship?” Adrian looked sick. “Why?”
“To keep her enemies close,” Richard said. “If you married Julia, Leo would technically become your nephew-in-law. You would visit him on holidays. You would watch him grow up. But you would never know he had DeLuca blood. Eleanor would control the narrative forever, and the true heir to the DeLuca trust would remain hidden.”
“And Elena?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper. “What happened to the mother?”
Richard looked at the floor. “Elena didn’t trade her life for Leo’s safety. Eleanor forced her to sign away her parental rights. When Elena tried to fight back… Eleanor had her committed to a private psychiatric facility under a different name. She’s been there for four years.”
The cruelty was beyond comprehension. Eleanor hadn’t just ruined lives; she had engineered a masterpiece of suffering to maintain her social standing.
“We have to go get him,” Adrian said, turning toward the door. “We’re going to upstate New York right now.”
“You can’t,” Richard said quietly.
Adrian stopped. “Watch me.”
“You don’t understand,” Richard said, stepping in front of the door. “Eleanor knows you left the dinner. She knows you took Nora. She is already moving to secure her assets. If you show up at Julia’s parents' house, Eleanor will trigger a clause in the trust. She has legal custody papers drawn up stating that if Elena is ever deemed unfit—which she arranged—Eleanor becomes the sole guardian of the child.”
“She can’t take him,” Julia said fiercely. “My parents legally adopted him!”
“Your parents signed a private contract heavily funded by Eleanor,” Richard corrected. “If you fight her, she will ruin your family, Julia. She will take Leo, and she will make sure Adrian never sees a dime to fight her in court.”
“I don’t care about the money,” Adrian said.
“You will when you realize how much power it buys her,” Richard countered.
“Why are you telling us this now?” I asked, staring at the man who had been the villain in my mind for the last hour. “Why betray Eleanor today?”
Richard reached into his pocket one last time. He pulled out a heavy, vintage Patek Philippe watch. The one Elena had pawned.
“Because Elena wasn’t running from me,” Richard said softly. “She was running to me. She was my goddaughter. She trusted me. And when Eleanor found out I was helping her escape with the baby… she threatened my grandchildren. She threatened Tommy.”
He placed the watch on the coffee table.
“Eleanor is having a fundraiser gala tomorrow night at the estate,” Richard said, his eyes hard and determined. “Three hundred guests. Board members. Press. It’s her crowning moment for the year.”
Adrian looked at the watch, then at Richard. The anger in his eyes was slowly transforming into a cold, focused calculation.
May you like
“You’re going to help us destroy her,” Adrian said.
Richard nodded. “Yes. But to do it, Nora has to go back into the house.”
