CHAPTER 7 — My Brother Never Died
Rain poured over the abandoned stone church.
Lightning flashed across the cracked bell tower.
For nearly a century, no one had prayed there.
Tonight...
Two armies arrived instead.
Black SUVs lined the muddy road as Joseph Salvini stepped out first.
More than sixty armed men spread across the cemetery, scanning every broken window and weathered gravestone.
Across the courtyard...
Victor Moretti stood waiting.
No rifle.
No body armor.
Only a dark overcoat and the same constellation tattoo exposed on his wrist.
For twenty years Joseph had imagined this moment.
He expected rage.
He expected revenge.
Instead...
He felt confusion.
Because the man standing before him looked strangely familiar.
Not like an enemy.
Like someone he had known long ago.
Victor smiled.
"You finally came home."
Joseph raised his pistol.
"You're going to tell me why you destroyed my family."
Victor slowly shook his head.
"I didn't destroy it."
"I survived it."
The words echoed through the empty churchyard.
Marco whispered behind Joseph,
"Boss... don't listen."
But Joseph couldn't look away.
Victor reached into his coat.
Dozens of rifles instantly locked onto him.
He ignored them.
Instead, he removed an old silver pocket watch.
Joseph's breathing stopped.
His father had owned that watch.
The same dent.
The same cracked glass.
The same initials engraved inside.
A.S.
Anthony Salvini.
Joseph's father.
"Where did you get that?"
Victor looked down at the watch.
"He gave it to me."
Joseph's voice turned to ice.
"My father died twenty-three years ago."
Victor's eyes filled with quiet sadness.
"No."
"He died protecting both of us."
Joseph froze.
"What do you mean... both of us?"
Victor took one slow step forward.
"You always believed Anthony Salvini had one son."
He smiled without joy.
"He had two."
Silence.
Even the wind seemed to disappear.
Rose covered her mouth.
Marco stared at Victor in disbelief.
Joseph laughed once.
A short, bitter laugh.
"No."
"My mother would have told me."
Victor nodded.
"Your mother never knew."
Joseph frowned.
Victor continued.
"My mother worked in your grandfather's house."
"She and Anthony fell in love before he married."
"When she became pregnant..."
"...your grandfather paid everyone to erase us."
Joseph felt the world tilt beneath his feet.
Victor wasn't lying.
The dates matched.
The ages matched.
Even their eyes...
The same gray-green color.
The same scar near the left eyebrow.
Anthony had once claimed Joseph inherited it from him.
Maybe...
They both had.
Victor slowly rolled up his sleeve.
Beneath the constellation tattoo...
Another mark appeared.
A birthmark shaped like a crescent moon.
Joseph instinctively touched the identical mark hidden beneath his own shoulder.
Rose whispered,
"Oh my God..."
"They're brothers."
No one spoke.
No one fired.
For several endless seconds...
The entire war stopped.
Then Victor quietly said the sentence Joseph never expected to hear.
"I spent twenty years trying to find you."
Joseph's jaw tightened.
"You kidnapped Rose."
Victor nodded.
"Yes."
"You forged the miscarriage."
"Yes."
"You separated my daughter from me."
"Yes."
Joseph's finger tightened on the trigger.
"Then don't tell me you were trying to help me."
Victor's voice broke for the first time.
"I wasn't trying to save you."
"I was trying to save Audrey."
Joseph blinked.
Victor reached into his coat again.
Marco shouted,
"Gun!"
Instead...
Victor dropped a thick classified file onto the wet ground.
Inside were hundreds of government documents.
FBI reports.
CIA intelligence.
Swiss banking records.
Photographs.
DNA files.
At the very top...
One sentence was stamped in bright red letters.
PROJECT CONSTELLATION
Joseph slowly opened the file.
The blood drained from his face.
Rose looked over his shoulder.
Audrey stopped breathing.
Project Constellation wasn't a criminal operation.
It was a secret international program created decades earlier by corrupt politicians, intelligence officers, and mafia leaders to hide billions of dollars in illegal wartime assets.
Only one bloodline possessed the genetic key needed to unlock the biometric vault protecting those assets.
The Salvini bloodline.
Victor whispered,
"They didn't separate your family because they hated us."
"They separated us..."
"...because they needed your daughter alive."
Joseph looked up slowly.
"You've known where Audrey was all this time."
Victor nodded.
"I watched her every birthday."
"I paid for anonymous scholarships."
"I stopped three kidnapping attempts."
"I never let her know."
Rose stared at him in horror.
"You could have told us."
Victor looked away.
"If I had..."
"...every person connected to you would have died."
Before anyone could respond...
A deafening explosion ripped through the church.
The ancient floor collapsed beneath their feet.
Joseph grabbed Audrey.
Victor grabbed Rose.
Stone shattered.
Dust swallowed everything.
When the noise finally stopped...
The underground vault had opened.
And lying at its center...
Was not gold.
Not cash.
Not diamonds.
It was a steel cryogenic chamber.
Inside, through the frosted glass...
Lay the perfectly preserved body of Anthony Salvini.
Joseph's father.
The death certificate had been signed twenty-three years ago.
But Anthony Salvini had never been buried.
He had been hidden.
And strapped to his chest...
A monitor suddenly emitted a single, unmistakable sound.
Beep.
May you like
His heart...
...was still beating.
