Chapter 4 - The Brother Who Was Supposed to Be Dead
We found Matteo alive two days later.
Not at a hideout.
Not in a warehouse.
Not across the border.
He was hiding in a church basement in Little Italy.
When Raphael saw him, he didn't move.
Matteo looked older than the photographs.
His hair was gray.
His face carried scars.
But his eyes were unmistakably the eyes of Raphael's younger brother.
“I knew you'd find me,” Matteo said.
Raphael's voice was flat.
“You were supposed to be dead.”
“I needed everyone to think I was.”
“Why?”
“To survive Giovanni.”
I stared.
“You worked for him.”
Matteo shook his head.
“I worked against him.”
He explained everything.
Eight years earlier, Matteo discovered that their father's research wasn't designed to control memories.
It was designed to preserve testimony.
People involved in organized crime were disappearing.
Witnesses.
Doctors.
Whistleblowers.
Their memories were being destroyed through drugs and experimental techniques.
Raphael's father wanted to preserve the truth so criminals could not erase it.
Giovanni saw an opportunity.
He altered the research.
He began trying to identify people whose genetic patterns made memory preservation possible.
Mara's mother was one.
Micah was another.
And Matteo.
The program needed a living test group.
Matteo refused.
His father tried to protect him.
Giovanni killed him.
Or tried to.
The explosion was staged.
Matteo survived.
He went into hiding.
“Then why did you attack Raphael?”
“I didn't.”
I looked at him.
“You appeared last night.”
“No.”
Matteo pulled a phone from his pocket.
“There is another person who looks like me.”
Raphael frowned.
“Who?”
“Your father's second son.”
Silence.
I stared.
“Second son?”
Matteo nodded.
“A child nobody knew existed.”
Raphael looked horrified.
“My father had another son?”
“He did.”
“Name?”
“Julian.”
A man who had spent twenty years hidden.
A man who looked enough like Matteo to fool surveillance cameras.
A man Giovanni had trained.
We found Julian's existence in a hospital archive.
He had been born under a false surname.
His mother had died during childbirth.
Giovanni raised him.
Made him believe the Orsini family had abandoned him.
By adulthood, Julian believed Raphael had stolen everything that should have belonged to him.
The mansion.
The money.
The family name.
The respect.
Giovanni used that resentment.
But there was more.
Julian was the man searching for Raphael that night.
He had impersonated Matteo.
He had attacked Raphael.
He had kidnapped Micah.
And he knew exactly how to access every hidden room in the Orsini estate.
Because he had been trained by Giovanni.
We found Julian at St. Vincent's.
He had Micah.
The hospital was empty.
Lights flickered.
Emergency doors locked.
Raphael walked forward.
“Julian.”
A man stepped from the shadows.
He looked like Matteo.
But colder.
Micah sat behind him in a wheelchair.
He was conscious.
He looked at me.
“Mara.”
I ran toward him.
Julian raised his gun.
“One step.”
I stopped.
Raphael spoke calmly.
“You don't have to do this.”
“You've had everything.”
“That wasn't my choice.”
“Liar.”
“You believe Giovanni?”
Julian's expression changed.
“He saved me.”
“He used you.”
“No.”
“He told you I wanted you dead.”
Julian said nothing.
Raphael stepped closer.
“My father wrote about you.”
Julian froze.
“He said you were his son.”
Julian's hand trembled.
“He also said he was sorry.”
Julian shook his head.
“Stop.”
“He tried to find you.”
“Stop.”
“He sent money.”
“I don't care.”
“He loved you.”
Julian's eyes filled with tears.
For the first time, he looked like a lost child instead of a killer.
Giovanni had given him anger.
But Raphael was giving him truth.
Julian lowered the gun.
Micah rolled forward.
“Please.”
Julian looked at him.
“I didn't want to hurt you.”
Micah nodded.
“I know.”
The gun fell.
Raphael moved instantly.
Julian collapsed into his arms.
Not from violence.
From grief.
“My father really knew me?”
Raphael nodded.
“He did.”
Julian cried.
“I thought he hated me.”
“He didn't.”
I watched them.
Two brothers who had spent years thinking they were enemies.
One had been hidden.
The other had been manipulated.
And both had been victims of the same man.
Giovanni.
But Giovanni wasn't done.
That night, every major news network received a package.
Inside were photographs of Raphael.
Money transfers.
Weapons.
Names of officials.
For the first time, the entire city saw the Orsini empire exposed.
Law enforcement flooded the streets.
Raphael was officially wanted.
I expected him to run.
He didn't.
He looked at me.
“You should leave.”
“No.”
“Mara.”
“No.”
“You don't understand what will happen.”
“I understand.”
I took his hand.
“You helped my brother when nobody else did.”
He looked at me.
“You risked everything for me.”
“I'd do it again.”
He shook his head.
“They'll take everything.”
“Maybe.”
“Why stay?”
I smiled.
“Because you came to my bedroom door when you were drunk.”
He laughed for the first time in days.
“That is not a good reason.”
“It is to me.”
Then the sirens grew louder.
Raphael looked toward the window.
“We don't run.”
I nodded.
“We fight differently.”
“How?”
“We tell the truth.”
And the next morning, Raphael surrendered.
Not because he trusted the system.
Because he trusted us.
He turned over the financial records.
The hidden laboratories.
The names of the corrupt officials.
Every piece of evidence his father had preserved.
The city expected a war.
May you like
Instead, it got a confession.
And that confession became the beginning of the end for Giovanni.
