Chapter 5
I was left at St. Catherine’s when I was eleven days old.
That was all I knew.
No birth certificate in the old files.
No letter.
No surname.
A blanket.
One silver button sewn into the corner.
The nuns called me Gabriel because I arrived on the feast day of Saint Gabriel.
Mercer came later.
From Father Thomas Mercer, the director who eventually became the closest thing I had to a parent.
He gave me his name when I was sixteen.
Not legally important.
Emotionally permanent.
I never looked for biological family.
At least that was the story I told people.
Truth?
I looked once.
Twenty-three.
Angry.
Rich enough to hire people.
Found nothing.
Stopped.
Built a life around not needing the answer.
Now Gideon Vale apparently had one.
“Where is the notebook?”
He remained silent.
Rafe stepped forward.
I raised my hand.
No.
Fear would make Gideon defensive.
I wanted him useful.
“Did the notebook identify my mother?”
He looked at me.
“Yes.”
One word.
Forty-three years inside it.
Martha covered her mouth.
I asked:
“Name.”
Gideon hesitated.
“Margaret Vale.”
The hallway disappeared around me.
Vale.
Serena’s family.
I stared at him.
“My mother was a Vale?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“My older sister.”
Serena’s aunt.
Gideon’s sister.
My biological mother.
That made Serena—
my cousin.
The realization hit the room all at once.
Martha sat down.
Rafe swore under his breath.
I did neither.
I just looked at Gideon.
“How long have you known?”
His eyes dropped.
“Always.”
That almost broke something in me.
Not finding truth hurts.
Discovering people preserved it beside you hurts differently.
“Serena?”
He did not answer.
I already knew.
“How long?”
“Three years.”
Before our engagement.
Before our relationship became serious.
Before she let me put my ring on her hand.
My fiancée had known we shared blood.
She had still planned to marry me.
No.
There had to be another layer.
Even Serena would not ignore that casually.
“Why?”
Gideon looked exhausted.
“Because the Vale family did not consider Margaret’s child a Vale.”
I laughed once.
Cold.
Convenient.
Biology mattered when it gave them leverage.
Disappeared when it complicated marriage.
Then Martha whispered:
“Where is Eli?”
Right.
My past could wait.
A child could not.
Gideon closed his eyes.
“He took the notebook and ran back into the old home.”
May you like
So Eli had never left St. Catherine’s.
And Serena had ordered the building cleared while a nine-year-old remained hidden inside it.
