Chapter 3
Gregory tried to make kidnapping sound like protection.
That alone told me he had rehearsed the argument.
“You were becoming dangerous.”
I stared at him across my consultation desk.
“My son was two.”
“You were taking over Venturi.”
Secretly.
Publicly I was still the neighborhood doctor.
Privately, my father had already begun transferring command to me.
Only a small circle knew.
Gregory knew because he was my husband.
That trust had apparently purchased the weapon used against me.
“What does my leadership have to do with Theo?”
Gregory laughed bitterly.
“Everything.”
There.
I waited.
“Once your father chose you, Theo became the obvious future bloodline.”
“He was two.”
“Families think in decades.”
True.
Ugly.
True.
Gregory continued.
“My mother said if Theo stayed with you, the Hayes line would become nothing more than your marriage attachment.”
I almost smiled.
“So you stole a child.”
“No.”
He leaned forward.
“We removed him before your family turned him into another Venturi asset.”
I stared.
“You removed him from his mother and turned him into yours.”
Silence.
That landed.
“How did you do it?”
Gregory looked away.
I already knew the public story.
Rain.
Bridge.
Vehicle abandoned near the river.
A driver supposedly lost control while transporting Theo between estates.
No body.
Only a child’s coat downstream.
I spent months searching.
Then years hating hope.
“Who was in the car?”
“No one.”
There.
First clean confession.
“The accident was staged.”
“Yes.”
“Who took Theo?”
“My mother’s people.”
“Where?”
“Different properties.”
“Why move him?”
Gregory hesitated.
“Because you kept looking.”
My breathing slowed.
Every time I increased pressure, they moved my child.
Every false lead.
Every abandoned room.
Every rumor that kept me awake for nights.
May you like
They had not merely hidden Theo.
They had been watching my search closely enough to stay ahead of it.
