Chapter 10 - The Wrong Son)
Nobody moved.
Caesar stared at Vittorio.
“Say that again.”
Vittorio entered the bedroom.
Marcus raised his weapon.
Vittorio ignored him.
“The night you were born, two boys were brought into the Moretti medical wing.”
Caesar felt numb.
“One was my son?”
“Yes.”
“And the other?”
Vittorio looked at him.
“The first successful Orpheus child.”
Amelia whispered, “Oh God.”
Caesar shook his head.
“No.”
Vittorio continued.
“The project began long before you. Selective breeding. controlled implantation. genetic screening. Most attempts failed. Some children were unhealthy. Others did not survive infancy.”
“And me?”
“You survived.”
Caesar laughed bitterly.
“So you switched babies.”
“I made a choice.”
“You stole someone’s son.”
Vittorio’s face hardened.
“I replaced weakness with strength.”
Caesar crossed the room and punched him.
Vittorio fell against a chair.
Marcus did not intervene.
Caesar grabbed his father by the collar.
“What happened to the real Caesar?”
Vittorio smiled through a split lip.
“I raised him elsewhere.”
“To do what?”
“To become everything you were not.”
Caesar hit him again.
Amelia grabbed Caesar’s arm.
“Stop. We need answers.”
Caesar released Vittorio.
Vittorio wiped blood from his mouth.
Rose watched him with hatred.
“You lied to the Keepers.”
“I lied to everyone.”
“Why?”
“Because secrecy was survival.”
Caesar paced away.
The entire architecture of his identity was collapsing.
His name.
His father.
His childhood.
Perhaps even his mother.
“Who are my biological parents?”
Vittorio hesitated.
Caesar turned.
“Who?”
“Your genetic father was a research physician named Thomas Vale.”
Vanessa gasped.
“Dr. Vale?”
Vittorio nodded.
“And my mother?”
Vittorio looked at Clara.
Clara’s face changed before he spoke.
“No.”
Amelia looked at her sister.
Vittorio said, “Margaret Bennett.”
Clara sat down.
“Our mother?”
Caesar looked between Clara and Amelia.
“Your mother is my mother?”
Amelia stared at Caesar.
That would make them...
Vittorio spoke quickly.
“Not biologically in the conventional sense.”
Caesar turned.
“What does that mean?”
“Margaret donated genetic material. Thomas Vale did as well. The embryo underwent modification before implantation.”
“Into whom?”
Vittorio did not answer.
Rose whispered, “Isabella.”
Caesar looked at her.
She nodded.
“The Keepers told us.”
Vittorio sighed.
“My wife carried you.”
Caesar’s knees nearly failed.
Isabella had raised him.
Loved him.
Protected him.
Perhaps she had also carried him knowing he was not Vittorio’s son.
“Did she know?”
“Yes.”
“Did she agree?”
“At first.”
“What changed?”
“She loved you.”
Caesar laughed bitterly.
“That sounds like a problem to you.”
“She began seeing you as a child rather than an achievement.”
Evelyn moved closer to Caesar and took his hand.
He looked down at her.
Something inside him settled.
Whatever he had been created to become, Evelyn did not care.
He was her father.
That was real.
Vittorio looked at the memory drives.
“We need to leave.”
Marcus said, “You are not giving orders.”
“The Directorate will burn this house to the foundation within minutes.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that is what I would do.”
Caesar stared.
“Where is Adrian?”
Vittorio looked at him.
“He is the Directorate.”
The sentence landed heavily.
“The man who took Amelia?”
“Yes.”
“The man attacking my house?”
“Yes.”
“The man whose identity you stole from him?”
Vittorio’s expression became complicated.
“I gave him another life.”
“You gave me his.”
“I gave you mine.”
“No.”
Caesar stepped closer.
“You gave me a name and trained me to protect an empire you built on stolen children.”
Vittorio looked almost offended.
“You enjoyed that empire.”
“I did not know its price.”
“Most powerful men avoid asking where power comes from.”
Caesar had no answer.
Because part of him knew Vittorio was right.
He had inherited companies.
Properties.
Political relationships.
He had asked many questions.
Never enough.
Rose suddenly opened another drive.
“There is something else.”
The recording showed Isabella Moretti.
Caesar’s mother.
Not ill.
Not confused.
She sat upright in a medical room and spoke clearly.
“If Adrian ever sees this, I need him to know that I tried.”
Caesar leaned closer.
She was speaking to him.
Not the other man.
To Adrian.
His real name.
“I tried to take you away from Vittorio. I tried to expose Orpheus. That is why they declared me incompetent.”
Caesar covered his mouth.
Isabella continued.
“I am not sick. They are drugging me.”
Vittorio looked away.
Caesar turned slowly.
“You knew.”
Vittorio did not answer.
“You knew.”
“She became dangerous.”
“To whom?”
“To everything I built.”
Caesar hit him again.
This time Marcus stopped him.
“Sir.”
Caesar struggled once, then released his rage with a broken sound.
“My mother has been imprisoned for eleven years.”
Vittorio straightened his jacket.
“She is alive.”
“Where?”
Vittorio met Caesar’s eyes.
“I do not know.”
Caesar nearly attacked him again.
Vittorio raised a hand.
“The Directorate moved her after Adrian took control.”
Rose checked another file.
“There may be a location.”
Before she could open it, gunfire erupted in the hallway.
Daniel shouted.
Marcus pushed the children toward the hidden passage.
The bedroom doors blew inward.
Smoke filled the room.
Armed men entered.
Caesar saw a figure behind them.
His own face.
Adrian.
May you like
The man who had been born Caesar Moretti smiled.
“Hello, brother.”
