52-I CAME HOME EARLY AND FOUND MY TEN-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER EATING DINNER ON THE KITCHEN FLOOR BESIDE OUR DOG—THEN I DISCOVERED MY MOTHER HAD BEEN HIDING SOMETHING FAR WORSE.

"Step away from the table, Gabriel," a gravelly, aristocratic voice called out from the doorway of the locker.

Lightning cracked across the coastal sky, illuminating the silhouette in the doorway. It wasn't the courier. It was an older man, leaning slightly on a silver-tipped walking cane, his face half-shadowed by an expensive cashmere overcoat.

Gabriel’s voice caught in his throat. The hair, though silvered, the sharp Roman nose, the piercing ice-blue eyes—it was impossible.

"Grandfather?" Gabriel choked out, the word tasting like ash. "You died in Boston. We buried you in the family mausoleum."

"You buried an empty casket paid for by your doting mother," Arthur Vance replied smoothly, stepping into the locker. Behind him, two armed men in tactical rain gear flanked the exit, blocking any chance of escape. "Marlene was ambitious, but she was sloppy. She panicked when Nora began uncovering the offshore transfers. Nora was a brilliant girl. Too brilliant for her own good. She followed the paper trail all the way from Zurich to my private accounts."

"You let my mother abuse Amelia," Gabriel hissed, his hands curling into white-knuckled fists. "You let her force a ten-year-old child to eat off the floor like a dog!"

Arthur sneered, a look of profound disgust crossing his weathered face. "Marlene’s pettiness was always her downfall. She couldn't stand looking at the girl because Amelia was the living, breathing proof that Marlene’s entire empire was built on a lie. You think Marlene was just cruel, Gabriel? She was terrified."

"What are you talking about?"

Arthur tapped his silver cane against the concrete floor. "Amelia isn't your daughter by blood, boy. Nor is she Nora’s. She was the sole surviving heir of the Sterling trust—a thirty-million-dollar estate left behind by Nora’s late sister, who died under... questionable circumstances. Marlene falsified the birth certificates, bribed the attending physicians, and placed the infant in your arms to ensure the Vance family kept control of the trust dividends."

The room seemed to spin. Gabriel felt as though all the air had been violently sucked from his lungs. *Amelia isn't my blood?*

He saw Amelia’s sweet face—the way she smiled when she set the table, the gentle way she stroked Biscuit's ears, the tears in her eyes when she asked if love had to be earned.

"It doesn't matter," Gabriel snarled, stepping forward, his eyes burning with fury. "Blood or not, she is my daughter. I raised her. I loved her. And I will burn you and Marlene to the ground before I let you touch her."

Arthur smiled a cold, reptilian smile. "Admirable, Gabriel. Truly. But look outside. You left her in the car, didn't you?"