Chapter 6 - The Twins In The Dark
The silence in the hospital hallway was suffocating.
The acrid smell of gunpowder hung in the air, but all I could focus on was the small, braided rosary trembling in Elena’s pale hands.
“What girl, Elena?” Luca asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Elena looked at my mother.
My mother’s face went completely white. She stumbled backward against the medicine cart, shaking her head.
“I didn’t know,” my mother gasped. “Elena, I swear to God, I didn’t know.”
“You delivered them, Sarah!” Elena cried, tears streaming down her hollow cheeks. “You were there!”
Luca stood up slowly, towering over my mother in the dim light of the hallway.
“Mrs. Carter,” Luca said, the dangerous edge returning to his tone. “Explain.”
My mother was hyperventilating. I grabbed her hands to steady her.
“Mom, what is she talking about?” I pleaded.
“When Elena went into labor… it was premature,” my mother stammered, tears blurring her vision. “Vanessa brought her to the clinic in the middle of the night. Vanessa stood in the room the entire time. She forced me to deliver the child.”
“The boy,” Luca said.
“Yes,” my mother sobbed. “The boy. I cleaned him. I wrapped him in a blanket. And then Vanessa ordered me out of the room. She said she was going to take the baby to the incinerator.”
I covered my mouth in horror.
“But I didn’t leave,” my mother continued, her voice shaking. “I hid in the supply closet. I watched Vanessa leave the room with the boy. She gave him to one of Victor’s men in the alley. But… but Elena was still screaming.”
Elena looked at Luca, her eyes filled with an agonizing, ancient grief.
“There were two, Luca,” Elena whispered. “I had twins. A boy and a girl.”
Luca staggered backward, leaning heavily against the tile wall. The revelation hit him like a physical blow. He had a son. And a daughter.
“Vanessa didn’t know about the second baby,” Elena said. “She left the room before the girl was born. I was alone. I delivered her myself on the floor.”
“Where is she?” Luca demanded, dropping to his knees again, grabbing Elena’s shoulders. “Where is my daughter?”
Elena looked down at the braided rosary in her hands.
“I didn’t know what to do,” Elena wept. “Vanessa was coming back. If she found the girl, she would have killed her. I wrapped the rosary around her wrist. I opened the window… and I handed her to the janitor in the alley.”
“The janitor?” Luca roared. “You gave my daughter to a stranger in an alley?”
“He was a good man!” Elena screamed back. “He promised me he would take her to the fire station! He promised!”
Suddenly, the crackle of a police radio echoed from the stairwell. The authorities were arriving.
“We have to move,” Luca said, his survival instinct kicking in. He scooped Elena into his arms. She weighed almost nothing. “Emily, help your mother. We are going to my safe house.”
An hour later, we were in a heavily fortified penthouse overlooking the Chicago skyline.
Elena was resting on a velvet sofa, wrapped in warm blankets, sipping hot tea my mother had made.
Luca paced the length of the massive living room, barking orders into his phone in rapid Italian, deploying every asset his family possessed to find the janitor from Pine Ridge Sanctuary.
I sat near the window, trying to process the magnitude of the night.
I looked at the rosary resting on the coffee table.
It was beautifully crafted. The beads were made of dark olive wood, and the silver crucifix was slightly tarnished.
I reached out and picked it up.
My fingers traced the small, delicate beads.
A sudden, chilling realization washed over me.
I turned the crucifix over. On the back, engraved in microscopic script, were the letters: S.M.
Santa Maria.
I dropped the rosary onto the table as if it had burned me.
“Emily?” Luca asked, hanging up his phone and noticing my pale face. “What is it?”
I looked at him, my heart hammering so hard I thought it would break my ribs.
“I know this rosary,” I whispered.
Luca crossed the room in three strides. “Where have you seen it?”
“I haven’t seen this exact one,” I stammered. “But I know who makes them. The nuns at the Santa Maria Orphanage in the South Side.”
Luca’s eyes widened.
“That’s where the janitor took her,” Luca breathed. “He didn’t take her to the fire station. He took her to the orphanage.”
“Mr. Moretti,” I said, my voice trembling. “The Santa Maria Orphanage burned down seventeen months ago. It was an electrical fire. Three children died.”
The silence in the penthouse was deafening.
Elena let out a guttural, heartbreaking scream and collapsed onto the sofa, burying her face in the pillows.
Luca stood perfectly still. His chest heaved, but his face was an unreadable mask of grief.
“She’s gone,” Elena sobbed. “My baby girl is gone.”
But my mother slowly stepped forward from the kitchen area.
She was staring at the rosary on the table.
“Emily,” my mother said quietly. “Do you remember what you asked me for your eighth birthday?”
I frowned, confused by the sudden question. “I asked for a little sister.”
“And do you remember what happened a week later?” my mother asked, tears welling in her eyes.
I froze.
“You… you brought home a baby,” I whispered.
I was twenty-five now. Eighteen years ago, my mother had brought home an infant. She told me it was my cousin’s baby. She named her Lily.
Lily was now seventeen years old. She was at home, asleep in her bedroom at Ashland Avenue.
I looked at my mother in absolute horror.
“Mom,” I said, my voice cracking. “Lily is seventeen. The fire at the orphanage was seventeen months ago. Elena’s baby was born eighteen months ago.”
My mother covered her face with her hands, weeping softly.
“The janitor didn’t take her to the orphanage,” my mother confessed, her voice breaking. “He brought her to me. In the alley. He knew I was a nurse. He told me Elena gave him the baby.”
Luca stared at my mother, his mind struggling to comprehend the massive web of lies.
“You raised my daughter?” Luca whispered.
“I had to protect her!” my mother cried. “I knew Vanessa was looking for the baby! I faked the adoption papers. I raised Lily as my own. I gave her the life she deserved!”
Before anyone could speak, the heavy oak doors of the penthouse suddenly blew open with a deafening crash.
Smoke filled the entryway.
And walking through the smoke, flanked by four heavily armed men, was Vanessa Bellini.
She held a sleek black phone in her hand.
“What a beautiful family reunion,” Vanessa smiled coldly. “It’s a shame little Lily won’t be joining us.”
She tossed the phone onto the coffee table.
On the screen was a live video feed.
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It was my teenage sister, Lily. She was tied to a chair in a dark, empty warehouse, crying.
“Sign over the estate, Luca,” Vanessa commanded. “Or the girl burns.”
