Chapter 11 - THE LAST DNA ENVELOPE
Security footage showed a nurse entering my room during the blackout.
Except she wasn't a nurse.
It was Evelyn.
She had taken Grace.
Derek punched the wall.
“I should've known.”
Luka grabbed his jacket.
“We're going.”
I stopped him.
“She said alone.”
“You're not going alone.”
“She has my daughter.”
“Our daughter.”
Derek corrected himself.
Then his voice broke.
“My daughter.”
I looked at him.
For all his lies, that part was real.
Grace was his.
At least I thought she was.
The DNA envelopes sat on the table.
I picked up Grace's.
Derek stopped me.
“Don't.”
“Why?”
“Because if Charles tested her…”
His voice faded.
The fear in his face became mine.
I opened it.
MATERNAL MATCH: EMMA HALE — 99.99%.
Then I read the paternal line.
My knees weakened.
Derek took the paper.
His face went white.
PATERNAL MATCH: DEREK CALLOWAY — EXCLUDED.
“No.”
He read it again.
“No.”
I couldn't breathe.
“That's impossible.”
Derek stared at me.
I knew exactly what he was thinking.
“I never cheated.”
“I know.”
“Derek, I swear—”
“I know.”
His voice cracked.
“I know you didn't.”
Luka grabbed the paper.
He read it.
Then closed his eyes.
“You knew.”
I stared at him.
“You knew there was a possibility.”
He said nothing.
“LUKA.”
“Yes.”
Derek slammed him against the wall.
“You signed the father line.”
Luka didn't resist.
“Did you know?”
“No.”
“Are you her father?”
“No.”
“Then who is?”
Luka pushed Derek away.
“Grace was conceived through IVF.”
I froze.
We had struggled to conceive for two years.
One round of IVF.
One miracle embryo.
“The clinic.”
Luka nodded.
“Calloway Fertility Center.”
Derek looked sick.
“My father owned it.”
“Yes.”
My stomach turned.
“They switched the embryo?”
“Possibly.”
“Then Grace isn't genetically Derek's.”
“No.”
“But she's mine.”
“Yes.”
“Who was the biological father?”
Luka looked at the final sealed envelope.
His.
“No.”
He immediately understood.
“No.”
Derek opened it.
I couldn't stop him.
He read.
Then stared at Luka.
“What?”
I took the page.
PATERNAL RELATIONSHIP TO GRACE CALLOWAY: 25.1%.
Not father.
Close family.
The investigator looked at the report.
“Approximately twenty-five percent suggests grandparent, uncle, half-sibling—”
Luka whispered.
“Gabriel.”
I stared at him.
“My father is dead.”
“Yes.”
“Then how?”
His face became horrifyingly clear.
“The M-17 laboratory preserved biological samples.”
My stomach dropped.
“Charles used my father's DNA?”
Luka nodded.
“To create Grace.”
The room spun.
Grace wasn't Derek's biological daughter.
She had been created using an embryo involving preserved genetic material from Gabriel Moretti.
My biological father.
The implications made me physically sick.
But the investigator shook his head.
“That wouldn't work.”
Everyone looked at him.
“If Gabriel Moretti was Emma's biological father, using his sperm with Emma's egg would create an extreme consanguinity problem.”
Luka froze.
He grabbed the report.
Then looked at me.
“That means…”
My heart stopped.
“Gabriel wasn't my father.”
Luka slowly turned toward the unopened envelope containing my DNA comparison.
The last envelope.
The one Charles had died talking about.
May you like
The one Derek would eventually beg me not to open.
And suddenly I understood why.
