Chapter 5 - Adrien Took a Bullet Meant for Me, and I Finally Admitted That the Stranger I Once Fled From Had Become My HomeThe attack came three nights later.
Adrien and Elena were leaving a charity dinner when the first shot hit the car.
Glass shattered.
Security moved.
Elena screamed.
Adrien pulled her down.
Another bullet struck the door.
He was bleeding.
“You're shot.”
“Not badly.”
“You're lying.”
“Probably.”
He smiled.
Even then.
Elena's hands shook.
They escaped to a private clinic.
The bullet had grazed his shoulder.
Elena sat beside him.
“You could have died.”
“Yes.”
“You don't look scared.”
“I am.”
“For yourself?”
“No.”
He looked at her stomach.
“For both of you.”
Elena's eyes filled.
“Why do you care this much?”
Adrien stared at her.
“Because I love you.”
She stopped breathing.
He looked almost surprised that he had said it.
“I didn't plan to.”
“Neither did I.”
He laughed softly.
“That's not helpful.”
She took his hand.
“I love you too.”
He closed his eyes.
For a moment, the outside world disappeared.
Then the doctor entered.
“We found something.”
A medical record had been altered.
Someone had accessed Elena's prenatal file.
A familiar name appeared.
Sabrina's.
Elena felt betrayed all over again.
But Sabrina arrived at the clinic before they could confront her.
She was crying.
“I didn't change anything.”
“Then why is your name here?”
“They forced me.”
“Who?”
“Malcolm.”
She gave them access codes.
Security footage.
Account numbers.
A secret location.
Crane's private warehouse.
Adrien immediately assembled a team.
Elena refused to stay behind.
“No.”
“It's dangerous.”
“So was marrying Victor.”
He stared.
She continued.
“I am done being moved around like property.”
Adrien smiled.
“Good.”
They went together.
Inside the warehouse were boxes of documents.
Money.
Fake passports.
Contracts.
And photographs.
Hundreds of them.
Elena's life.
Her childhood.
Her mother's funeral.
Her relationship with Grant? No. There had been no Grant.
Her first job.
The bar where she met Adrien.
Someone had been watching her for years.
At the bottom of one box was a photograph of Elena's mother.
Behind it was a note.
Her daughter must be controlled before she becomes independent.
Elena's knees almost gave out.
“My whole life.”
Adrien caught her.
“This isn't your fault.”
“I should have seen it.”
“You were surrounded by people who lied to you.”
“I trusted them.”
“You were supposed to.”
Then they found the final file.
PROJECT HAWTHORNE.
Inside was a detailed plan.
Force Brooks Industrial into debt.
Manipulate Richard.
Use Sabrina.
Arrange Elena's marriage to Victor.
Remove Elena's voting rights.
Trigger a hostile takeover.
Then pressure Moretti Capital into merging.
The unborn child would become the leverage point.
At the bottom was one name.
Malcolm Crane.
But there was another.
Someone above him.
A final beneficiary.
Adrien read it.
His face became blank.
“Who?”
He did not answer.
Elena looked.
The beneficiary was:
Arthur Moretti.
Adrien's uncle.
Supposedly dead.
The same man from the photograph.
She whispered:
“Your uncle is alive.”
Adrien stared at the file.
“My father told me he died.”
“Then your father lied too.”
Before they could process it, the lights went out.
Men entered.
Gunfire erupted.
Adrien pushed Elena behind a steel cabinet.
She held her stomach.
A bullet struck the metal.
Then a voice came from the dark.
“Hello, nephew.”
Adrien froze.
The voice belonged to Gideon Moretti.
His dead uncle.
The man every Moretti had believed was buried twelve years ago.
Gideon stepped into the light.
Older.
Scarred.
Alive.
He looked at Elena.
Then her stomach.
“That's a valuable child.”
Adrien's expression became lethal.
“You should have stayed dead.”
Gideon smiled.
“So should you.”
He raised his gun.
But before he could fire, the warehouse doors exploded open.
Police.
Federal agents.
Sabrina had called them.
Gideon escaped through a back exit.
But not before looking directly at Elena.
“You're carrying more than a child.”
He smiled.
“You're carrying the end of an empire.”
Adrien wrapped his arm around Elena.
“What did he mean?”
She shook her head.
“I don't know.”
But deep inside, she knew.
The child wasn't the only secret.
Her mother's inheritance contained something they had not yet found.
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Something Gideon feared.
And they had to find it before he did.
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