Chapter 21 - THE LOST TWIN’S REUNION AND THE GHOST IN THE BLOOD
The heavy oak doors of the grand foyer swung shut with a thud that echoed like a heartbeat through the cavernous estate. For three agonizing seconds, no one moved. The air was thick with the scent of rain, leather, and the faint metallic tang of old secrets.
Leo stepped forward first. His small leather shoes clicked against the polished marble as he stared at the little girl who possessed his exact dark, wavy hair, his almond-shaped eyes, and the identical plastic dinosaur clutched in her trembling left hand.
“Lyra?” Leo whispered, his voice cracking with a mixture of wonder and disbelief.
The little girl dropped her plastic toy. It bounced across the marble floor, coming to rest at my feet—the exact same spot where six years ago, Leo’s dinosaur had frozen mid-air before a shower of lethal crystal glass changed my life forever.
“Mama?” Lyra choked out, looking past Leo straight into my eyes.
Tears burst from my eyes as I collapsed to my knees, opening my arms. Lyra didn't hesitate. She sprinted across the foyer, throwing her small body into my chest with a force that sent a sharp pang through my healed shoulder blade. I wrapped my arms around her, burying my face in her soft hair, weeping open-mouthed against her neck. Eleven years of grief, eleven years of mourning a daughter I was told had died in a cold delivery room, dissolved into tears of pure, unadulterated motherly devotion.
Dante dropped to his knees beside us, his massive arm encompassing all three of us—his wife, his son, and the daughter he never knew existed.
Suddenly, the elderly woman who had brought Lyra to the gates gasped violently. She clutched her throat, her eyes rolling back into her head as blood trickled from her lips. She collapsed onto the marble tiles beside the fountain.
“Security!” Dante roared, instantly shifting his body to cover us as guards flooded the foyer with rifles raised.
The dying woman reached out a trembling, blood-stained hand toward me. “Empress Maya...” she wheezed, her breath rattling in her lungs. “I... I brought her back to you... but you must run... She doesn't know... Valentina... put a sleeper chip in her heart...”
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Before Dante could question her, the old woman’s hand fell limp.
Dante turned to me, his dark eyes ablaze with terrifying clarity. Valentina was the rogue twin sister of Dante’s deceased first wife, Elena. The woman who had helped execute the illegal adoption eleven years ago hadn't sold Lyra to a random family—she had delivered her into the hands of a monster who had spent eleven years raising my daughter as an unwitting Trojan horse.
