Chapter 6 - The Secret in the Archives
Lena stepped back instinctively, her back hitting the edge of the mahogany dresser.
“You think I’m a plant? You think I was set up?” she demanded, anger momentarily overriding her terror. “I didn't even know who you were when I got hired at that café! I needed a job because my rent doubled, and Mr. Romano was the only person who didn't run a background check!”
Marco didn't raise his voice. He didn't flinch. He just watched her with that terrifying, calculated stillness.
“Mr. Romano’s Café was purchased by a shell corporation tied to my import firm three years ago,” Marco stated calmly. “Anyone who works there is vetted. Thoroughly. Your application, your tax records, your social security number—they crossed my desk the week you were hired.”
“Then why did you let me stay?” Lena cried out, tears of frustration stinging her eyes. “Why keep a waitress around if you knew everything about me?”
“Because,” Marco said, stepping closer until she could feel the heat radiating from his chest, “when my security team pulled your file, they found something very interesting hidden beneath layers of forged adoption papers and sealed state records.”
Lena froze. The color drained entirely from her face, leaving her looking as pale as marble.
“What... what are you talking about?” she whispered, her voice trembling.
“Your real name isn't Lena Moore,” Marco said softly, the words dropping like lead weights into the quiet room. “Your real name is Elena Vance Jr. You are the younger sister of Elena DeSantis—the wife I buried three years ago.”
The world stopped spinning.
Lena’s knees felt weak. She grabbed the edge of the dresser to keep from collapsing.
For twenty-four years, she had believed she was completely alone in the world. Her parents had died in a car crash when she was a toddler, leaving her in the care of a distant foster system that bounced her from one abusive home to another until she ran away at sixteen. She had changed her last name, buried her past, and built a fragile, invisible life out of sheer survival instinct.
And now, a feared mafia boss standing in a lakefront mansion was telling her that her older sister hadn't died of a tragic illness, as the coroner’s report had claimed—and that she was somehow connected to the terrifying empire surrounding her.
May you like
“That’s... that’s impossible,” Lena choked out, hot tears finally spilling over her eyelashes. “My family is dead. I have no one.”
“Your sister didn't die of natural causes, Elena,” Marco said, his voice darkening with a cold, ancient fury that made the air in the room drop ten degrees. “She was murdered. And the men who killed her thought they had erased every single blood relative she had left on this earth.”
