CHAPTER 4 — The Woman Everyone Was Hunting
Vincent dragged Emily behind a stone fountain as bullets tore apart the courtyard.
She stared at him in disbelief.
"They don't want you..."
"They want me."
Vincent nodded slowly.
"I know."
Emily grabbed his collar.
"You knew this would happen?"
"I suspected."
"You still brought me here?"
Before Vincent could answer...
A rocket launcher slammed into the mansion.
The explosion shook the entire estate.
The home that had stood for generations was now burning.
Inside the smoke...
Dante fought like a machine.
One assassin after another fell.
Yet more kept coming.
Far too many.
This wasn't an ordinary attack.
It was an execution.
Vincent rushed Emily into an underground bunker hidden beneath the mansion.
The steel door locked behind them.
For the first time...
There were no guards.
No servants.
Only silence.
Emily looked directly into Vincent's eyes.
"No more lies."
He slowly opened an old safe.
Inside rested dozens of classified government files.
Birth records.
DNA reports.
Photographs.
Military documents.
One envelope carried Emily's name.
She opened it with trembling hands.
Inside was a DNA report dated twenty-one years earlier.
Father: Unknown.
Mother: Classified.
Status:
Subject transferred under Project Phoenix.
Emily whispered,
"What... am I?"
Vincent finally told her the truth.
Twenty-one years ago...
Several powerful crime families secretly partnered with corrupt politicians.
They stole children from influential bloodlines.
Some were raised to inherit criminal empires.
Others disappeared forever.
Project Phoenix wasn't an experiment.
It was a replacement program.
Children's identities were exchanged.
Entire families were rewritten.
Emily's real identity had been erased before she could even speak.
Tears filled Emily's eyes.
"So my parents..."
Vincent answered quietly.
"They may have spent twenty years searching for a daughter who no longer officially exists."
Emily collapsed into a chair.
Everything she believed about her life...
Was a lie.
Above them...
Marco entered the burning mansion.
He smiled as flames swallowed priceless paintings.
He wasn't looking for money.
He wasn't looking for Vincent.
He walked directly into the destroyed archive room.
Inside the ashes...
He picked up one untouched metal box.
Hidden inside...
Was a faded photograph.
Marco laughed.
"So..."
"The final witness is still alive."
On the back of the photo was a handwritten address.
St. Gabriel Orphanage.
July 18... Twenty-Two Years Ago.
Marco immediately ordered his men,
"Burn the orphanage."
"Leave no survivors."
Deep underground...
The bunker lights suddenly shut off.
Darkness swallowed the room.
A hidden speaker crackled to life.
Then an elderly man's voice echoed through the bunker.
"Vincent..."
"If you're hearing this..."
"It means they finally found Emily."
Vincent turned pale.
He recognized the voice instantly.
Impossible.
The man speaking...
May you like
Had officially died twenty years ago.
To Be Continued...
