[CHAPTER 3]
We left the apartment before my father did.
Mom called her lawyer, Daniel Mercer, and told him to meet us at a private medical clinic.
Noah hated that idea.
“No hospitals.”
“It’s only a DNA test,” I told him.
He shook his head.
“I said no.”
His hands were trembling.
Mom didn’t force him.
She sat beside him in the back of a yellow taxi because he still refused black cars.
“We can do it somewhere else.”
He looked at her suspiciously.
“You’d wait?”
“As long as you need.”
I knew she wanted proof immediately.
I did too.
But watching her swallow that urgency for Noah made something in his expression soften.
Daniel arranged for a technician to meet us in his office instead.
No needles.
Just cheek swabs.
The technician rubbed cotton inside my mouth, then Noah’s.
Mom provided a sample too.
Noah stared at the sealed envelopes.
“How long?”
“Usually a couple of days,” Daniel said.
My mother looked furious.
“Make it faster.”
Daniel sighed.
“I already paid for expedited testing.”
Noah glanced at me.
“Rich people can make DNA faster?”
I almost laughed.
“Apparently.”
He gave me the smallest grin.
Mom did not smile.
She was staring at Daniel.
“I want to know what Richard can legally do.”
Daniel closed the conference room door.
“That depends on what happened.”
“He stole my son.”
“If we can prove that, Richard has a serious problem.”
“If?”
Daniel looked at Noah gently.
“A locket and resemblance are powerful emotionally. Legally, we need documents, DNA, witnesses.”
Noah’s eyes dropped.
“I have documents.”
“Where?”
He hesitated.
“Rosa hid them.”
Dad’s question echoed in my head.
Where are they?
Daniel noticed the hesitation.
“You don’t have to tell me yet.”
Mom leaned forward.
“Richard knows they exist.”
“How?”
“He was there when Noah mentioned them.”
Daniel’s expression changed.
“Then we should assume he may try to find them.”
Noah suddenly stood.
“I need to go.”
I jumped up too.
“Where?”
“To my old apartment.”
Mom grabbed her coat.
“We’ll come.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because if someone sees you—”
“I don’t care.”
“I do.”
His voice cracked.
“They threatened Rosa because of me.”
My mother went still.
Noah looked at her.
“I just found you. I’m not getting you hurt.”
She looked like she might cry.
Instead, she said, “Then Daniel sends someone with you.”
Daniel called a private investigator he trusted.
Her name was Maya Chen.
She arrived twenty minutes later wearing jeans, boots, and a jacket that looked ordinary enough.
Noah approved.
I insisted on going.
Mom said no.
I argued.
She still said no.
Then Noah surprised both of us.
“He can come.”
Mom stared.
“Why?”
Noah shrugged.
“He’s annoying, but he’s my brother.”
That was the first time he said it.
My brother.
Two words.
I felt stupidly happy.
We traveled downtown with Maya.
Noah’s building was nothing like ours.
The hallway smelled like old grease and bleach.
A television screamed through one wall.
Someone’s baby cried through another.
Noah stopped outside apartment 4C.
There was police tape across the door.
Maya frowned.
“When did Rosa die?”
“Six weeks ago.”
“You’ve been living where?”
He didn’t answer.
I knew the answer was wherever he could.
Maya spoke to the landlord.
Rosa’s belongings had supposedly been cleared.
Noah’s face drained.
“No.”
He pushed into the apartment.
It was empty.
No couch.
No table.
No mattress.
Nothing.
He ran to the bedroom.
I followed.
He dropped to his knees beside a radiator.
His fingers searched the baseboard.
Then he stopped.
“There was a loose panel.”
Now there was only a fresh strip of wood.
Someone had replaced it.
Noah punched the floor.
“No!”
Maya crouched beside him.
“Who knew?”
“Only Rosa and me.”
“Did Richard know the apartment?”
“No.”
I remembered something.
“Could he have found it from Rosa’s name?”
Maya looked grim.
“A man with money can find almost anyone.”
Noah sat against the wall.
“He got here first.”
I wanted to tell him we didn’t know that.
But I remembered my father’s face.
Where are they?
I believed Noah.
Maya photographed the replaced wood.
Then she noticed something in the corner.
A tiny metal button.
She picked it up with a tissue.
“What is it?” I asked.
She turned it over.
There were initials engraved on the back.
R.B.
Richard Bennett.
My father had custom cuff links with those initials.
I had seen them a hundred times.
Noah looked at me.
Neither of us said anything.
Maya bagged the button.
“This proves someone with these initials may have been here. Not necessarily your father.”
“It’s his,” I said.
She looked at me.
“You’re sure?”
“He wears a set with black onyx around the letters.”
The button had black stone around the edge.
Maya’s jaw tightened.
We returned to Daniel’s office.
Mom was pacing.
The moment she saw the evidence bag, she stopped.
Maya explained.
Mom didn’t cry.
She became frighteningly calm.
“File for a protective order.”
Daniel nodded.
“I’ll start.”
“And freeze joint accounts.”
“That’s more complicated.”
“Make it uncomplicated.”
For the first time in my life, I saw the woman beneath my mother’s elegant clothes.
Not the charity-board wife.
Not the woman who smiled beside my father at galas.
A mother.
Angry enough to burn down her own comfortable life if it meant protecting her child.
The DNA results came the next morning.
Daniel called us all into his office.
Noah sat beside me.
Mom held both our hands.
Daniel placed the report on the table.
“Claire is the biological mother of both boys.”
My mother closed her eyes.
“And Ethan and Noah are identical twins.”
Noah stopped breathing.
I squeezed his hand.
He squeezed mine back.
There it was.
Proof.
Thirteen years of lies destroyed by a few lines on white paper.
Mom leaned toward Noah.
“My son.”
This time when she hugged him, he didn’t pull away.
He held her.
Awkwardly at first.
Then desperately.
I joined them.
For a few seconds, we were three people trying to rebuild thirteen missing years with one embrace.
Then Daniel’s phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed.
“What?”
He listened.
My mother turned.
“What happened?”
Daniel slowly lowered the phone.
“Richard filed an emergency petition.”
“For what?”
“Custody of Ethan.”
I stared at him.
Mom went white.
Daniel continued.
“And he’s alleging that Noah is an unidentified runaway who poses a danger to the family.”
Noah released us.
Just like that, fear returned to his face.
My father had lost the DNA battle.
May you like
So he had chosen a new one.
If he couldn’t prove Noah wasn’t my brother, he was going to make the world afraid of him.
