Chapter 14 - THE DAUGHTER OF THE GARDENER
For several seconds, Alessio thought he had misheard.
“Serena was Dominic Vale’s daughter.”
Gabriel nodded.
“No.”
“Your wife’s mother had an affair with Dominic before Serena was born.”
Alessio stepped forward.
“You lie about her again—”
“I’m not insulting her.”
Gabriel held his ground.
“I’m telling you why she understood the garden routes.”
Alessio stopped.
Serena’s instinct for the greenhouse.
The hidden passages.
The old estate layout.
The strange symbols.
She had not simply discovered Dominic Vale’s world.
She inherited pieces of it.
“Did she know?”
“Not until three years ago.”
“How?”
“Dominic left something with Benedict.”
“What?”
“A recording.”
Gabriel looked toward the floor.
“He confessed that Salvatore ordered the warehouse fire.”
“And?”
“Dominic helped.”
Alessio’s jaw tightened.
“But afterward Dominic turned against Salvatore.”
“Why?”
“Because Salvatore began using children as leverage.”
Alessio’s expression hardened.
Even in their world, some lines remained.
Gabriel continued.
“Dominic created hidden routes to move threatened family members out.”
“The Door?”
“Thomas inherited that part.”
“And Gardener?”
“Originally Dominic.”
“So who inherited it?”
Gabriel shook his head.
“That is the mistake.”
“What?”
“Everyone assumes the Gardener is one person.”
Alessio stared.
“It became a role.”
Like a shadow passing between hands.
Dominic created it.
Someone else turned it into a weapon.
“Serena believed she could reclaim the network.”
“For what?”
“To protect people.”
Alessio almost laughed at the tragedy.
Every generation believed it could control the dangerous machine left by the previous one.
Gabriel.
Dominic.
Serena.
Silence rarely changed the nature of power.
“What happened after she disappeared?”
“I hunted.”
“Whom?”
“Anyone using the black rose.”
“And?”
“I killed two men.”
“Names?”
“Neither mattered.”
Gabriel’s mouth hardened.
“They were hands.”
“Not the head.”
“No.”
Alessio looked toward the passage.
“What are we doing here?”
Gabriel understood.
“We stop following Serena’s clues.”
“Why?”
“Because the Gardener knows them too.”
Alessio thought of Claudia finding the key.
The black rose.
Evelyn’s disappearance.
Every discovery had been followed.
Maybe not because Alessio was being watched from outside.
Because someone knew Serena’s entire trail before he began.
“Who had access to her before she died?”
Gabriel asked.
“Everyone.”
“No.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“Who had access to Serena when she was alone?”
Alessio thought.
Claudia.
Damian.
Staff.
Ruby’s nanny.
Garden workers.
Her closest friend—
Alessio stopped.
Gabriel saw it.
“Who?”
“Margaret Vale.”
Damian’s mother.
Dominic’s widow.
Seventy years old.
She had practically raised Damian.
She had also been close to Serena.
After Ruby’s birth, Margaret spent months at the estate helping her.
She knew Serena’s routines.
The garden.
The tunnels through Dominic.
And if Serena was Dominic’s daughter…
Margaret knew her husband had fathered a child with another woman.
Possible hatred.
Possible motive.
But too simple.
Alessio shook his head.
“Margaret is old.”
Gabriel laughed.
“So is poison.”
The line was not literal.
It meant influence did not require strength.
They returned to the estate.
Damian was waiting.
Alessio looked at him.
“Where is your mother?”
“At home.”
“Call her.”
Damian frowned.
“Why?”
“Call.”
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
Damian’s face changed.
They went to Margaret’s house.
Empty.
No struggle.
No blood.
On the kitchen table stood one vase.
Black roses.
Beside it, Serena’s gardening gloves.
Alessio picked them up.
Damian stared.
“My mother had these?”
Gabriel moved through the room.
He opened a cabinet.
Inside were dozens of small wooden boxes.
Flower symbols carved into each lid.
Exactly like Serena’s hidden collection.
Damian whispered, “No.”
Alessio opened one.
Thomas’s old cufflink.
Another.
A photograph of Claudia outside the estate.
Another.
A small toy belonging to Evelyn.
Another.
A baby sock.
Ruby’s.
Damian staggered backward.
“No.”
Gabriel’s face became cold.
“She was watching them.”
Alessio looked at Damian.
“Did your mother ever speak about Serena?”
“All the time.”
“What did she call her?”
Damian thought.
Then his face emptied.
“Her mother’s mistake.”
Silence.
Alessio turned.
“What?”
“I thought she meant Serena married into violence.”
Damian’s voice cracked.
“My mother hated my father’s affair.”
There it was.
Not enough for the entire conspiracy.
Enough for motive.
Margaret had spent decades beside Dominic.
She knew the routes.
The symbols.
The black roses.
When Dominic died, she inherited everything he left behind.
And unlike Serena, she did not want to protect the Ventrescas.
She wanted to punish them.
Damian sat heavily.
“She threatened Evelyn?”
Gabriel looked at the boxes.
“Maybe.”
“Ruby?”
“Maybe.”
“Serena?”
Alessio stared at Serena’s gloves.
Then he saw another box.
No flower carved into it.
Only one word burned into the lid.
SERENA.
His hands became cold.
He opened it.
Empty.
Except for a small audio recorder.
Newer than the others.
Alessio pressed play.
Margaret Vale’s voice filled the kitchen.
“Alessio.”
Damian closed his eyes.
His own mother.
“If you found this, then either Serena succeeded…”
A faint laugh.
“…or you finally learned to look somewhere other than the man you wanted to kill.”
Alessio’s jaw tightened.
“Your wife was clever. Too clever.”
Damian whispered, “Mom…”
“She discovered Dominic’s old network and thought she could turn it into something clean.”
Margaret’s voice hardened.
“Nothing born in this family is clean.”
Alessio listened.
“I did not cause Serena’s crash.”
Gabriel looked up.
“But I did tell the man who did where she would be.”
Alessio’s blood turned cold.
Not Margaret.
Another person.
“I did it because I wanted Serena frightened enough to leave you.”
A pause.
“She survived longer than any of us expected.”
Alessio stepped closer to the recorder.
“She was still alive when I last saw her.”
Nobody breathed.
Margaret continued:
“And if Gabriel has told you she disappeared from his safe house, then he has finally admitted half the truth.”
Gabriel’s face changed.
Alessio looked at him.
“What half?”
The recording answered.
“Serena did not escape Gabriel.”
Silence.
“He let her go.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
Alessio turned toward him.
Margaret’s voice became almost gentle.
“Ask your brother where he took your wife after the river.”
The recording ended.
Alessio stared at Gabriel.
“You said she left.”
Gabriel said nothing.
“You said she knocked you unconscious.”
Still nothing.
Damian looked between them.
Alessio stepped forward.
“Where did you take Serena?”
Gabriel finally looked at him.
“To the only person she believed could hide her from the Gardener.”
“Who?”
Gabriel’s answer came quietly.
“Your mother.”
Alessio stopped breathing.
Their mother had been dead for twenty-six years.
Gabriel looked toward the recorder.
May you like
And whispered:
“At least that’s what you were told.”
