CHAPTER 6 – The Brother Everyone Thought Was Dead
The news spread across the Hayes family like wildfire.
Eleanor Hayes had another son.
No one had ever heard his name.
No photographs had ever been released.
Every family record had been sealed for more than thirty years.
Even Ethan had no idea his mother had given birth before him.
"Who is he?" Ethan asked, his voice shaking.
The attorney took a slow breath.
"His name was Noah."
"Madam Eleanor believed he died in a hospital fire when he was only two days old."
Ethan frowned.
"Believed?"
The attorney nodded.
"Last month, she received evidence that the fire was no accident."
He slid a thick investigation file across the table.
Inside were faded newspaper clippings, hospital records, and a single DNA report.
One sentence was highlighted in red.
'The infant survived and was secretly adopted under a new identity.'
Ethan's hands began to tremble.
"So... my brother has been alive all these years?"
"Yes."
"But there's something even worse."
The attorney pressed a button on the remote.
A security video appeared on the screen.
It showed a middle-aged man quietly repairing trucks in a small rural garage.
Grease covered his hands.
His clothes were worn.
He had no idea he was the biological heir to a ten-billion-dollar empire.
The caption beneath the video read:
NOAH HAYES — CURRENT OCCUPATION: MECHANIC.
At that exact moment...
Thousands of miles away...
Noah closed his garage early because his six-year-old daughter was waiting for him at home.
He smiled as he bought her favorite chocolate on the way.
He had no bodyguards.
No private jet.
No mansion.
Only an old pickup truck... and a promise to never miss dinner with his little girl.
What Noah didn't know...
Was that powerful people had already seen the same file.
And not everyone wanted the true heir to survive long enough to claim the Hayes fortune.
As a black SUV quietly pulled up across the street from Noah's garage...
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A masked man loaded a silenced pistol.
His target had finally been found.
