Chapter 2 - MY MOTHER'S OTHER NAME
I had known my mother’s maiden name was Russo.
I had never known it meant anything.
In Chicago, Russo could belong to anyone.
My mother said her family was gone.
Her parents died young.
No siblings.
No relatives worth mentioning.
I believed her.
Now I stood in Luca Moretti’s dining room looking at a photograph labeled PATIENT 17 — MARIA RUSSO.
And the woman in the hospital gown had my mother’s eyes.
Not similar.
Hers.
The same heavy lashes.
Same straight brows.
Same small scar near the left temple.
I felt sick.
“That’s her.”
Luca looked at me.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
Marco asked:
“How old would she have been?”
“Twenty.”
The photograph looked right.
Pregnant.
With me?
No.
I was twenty-eight.
The photo looked at least thirty years old.
Maybe not me.
I counted.
My older brother Daniel was thirty-one.
But Mom always said he was adopted.
My stomach dropped.
No.
I took out my phone and called him.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
Luca watched.
“Brother?”
“Yes.”
“Name?”
“Daniel Carter.”
Vanessa made a small sound.
I turned.
“What?”
She looked at the floor.
“Nothing.”
Luca’s voice hardened.
“Vanessa.”
She closed her eyes.
“My father mentioned a Daniel Russo.”
My hands went cold.
“When?”
“Years ago.”
“What did he say?”
“That Michael Moretti hid him.”
Luca went still.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He said Daniel belonged to someone important.”
I laughed once.
“No.”
My brother sold insurance.
He lived in Milwaukee.
He had twin girls and a bad back.
Nothing about him belonged in this room.
Marco was already searching records.
My brother’s original birth certificate was sealed.
Adoption finalized when he was eleven months old.
Adoptive parents:
Thomas and Maria Carter.
My parents.
Birth mother:
Confidential.
Birth father:
Confidential.
Then Marco found something worse.
The attorney who handled the adoption.
Michael Moretti’s personal lawyer.
I sat down.
“No.”
Luca looked like he wanted to apologize for a fact he did not create.
Good that he didn’t.
I did not need comfort yet.
I needed truth.
“Where is Daniel?” I asked Marco.
He made calls.
Insurance office closed.
Wife said he left Chicago that afternoon for a client meeting.
No one had heard from him since 4:30.
My heart stopped.
Vale.
Luca reached for his phone.
“He called because he wants us moving.”
“For what?”
“The key.”
“But he says the rosary was empty.”
“Which means someone removed it before Vanessa stole it.”
Everyone looked at me.
My mother.
Maria Russo.
Former Moretti employee.
Patient Seventeen.
Maybe she had the key.
I stood.
“I need to go home.”
Luca said:
“We’re coming.”
“No.”
He blinked.
“It’s my family.”
“And Vale may have your brother.”
“That doesn’t make it your decision.”
Silence.
Marco almost smiled.
Luca nodded.
“Fair.”
Then:
“Do you want security?”
“Yes.”
Better.
We went to my mother’s old house in Oak Park.
I had not sold it after she died.
Couldn’t.
Daniel and I used it for storage and holidays.
The kitchen still smelled faintly like cinnamon in winter.
I walked directly to Mom’s bedroom.
She had one locked cedar box beneath the bed.
I knew the key location.
Sewing tin.
Inside the cedar box:
Birth records.
Old photographs.
A silver bracelet engraved MARIA R.
And one envelope.
GRACE — IF THE MORETTIS EVER COME.
My legs weakened.
I sat on the floor.
Luca stayed in the doorway.
Not entering.
Good.
I opened it.
Grace,
If you are reading this, then I failed to keep the past where I buried it.
Not encouraging.
Mom wrote that Maria Russo was not her original name.
She had been born Maria DeLuca.
At eighteen, she became involved with Antonio Moretti.
Luca’s uncle.
Not Michael.
Antonio was the family’s charming disaster.
Gambler.
Drug problem.
Dead at twenty-four from an overdose.
Officially.
Mom became pregnant.
Antonio disappeared before Daniel was born.
She went to St. Catherine’s under the surname Russo because she was afraid of the Morettis.
Michael found her anyway.
But instead of taking the baby, he helped her.
He arranged the adoption to Maria and Thomas Carter.
Then Maria Carter became my mother legally after marrying my father.
The adoption papers were strange because Mom had effectively adopted her own child under a new identity.
Daniel was not adopted from a stranger.
He was my mother’s biological son.
My half-brother.
And Antonio Moretti’s son.
Which made Daniel Luca’s cousin.
I stared at the page.
Everything I knew about my family tilted.
Mom continued.
Michael made me promise Daniel would grow up outside the Moretti name.
He said the family destroyed boys by calling inheritance duty.
I believed him.
Luca closed his eyes at that.
Then:
Years later Elena found out.
She did not try to take Daniel.
She did the opposite.
She created a trust to protect him.
There it was.
Another trust.
Of course.
The key was hidden in Elena’s rosary.
My mother removed it after Elena died.
Why?
Because Michael asked her to.
He believed Antonio’s old creditors would come looking if the trust became known.
Mom hid the key.
Where?
Her letter said:
Grace, you complained for years that I never let you touch the ugly ceramic rooster in the kitchen.
I stood so fast I nearly fell.
The rooster.
Hideous.
Yellow and green.
Mom loved it for no reason.
I ran downstairs.
It sat above the refrigerator.
I took it down.
Heavy.
Too heavy.
I broke the felt base.
Inside:
A brass key.
Stamped:
M-17.
Marco stared.
“Moretti hospital vault.”
Luca looked at me.
“Patient Seventeen.”
My mother.
The key was hers.
Then my phone rang.
Daniel.
I answered.
“Dan?”
Static.
Then his voice.
“Grace.”
He sounded frightened.
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
A man spoke behind him.
Daniel stopped.
Then whispered:
“Don’t bring the key.”
The line went dead.
Luca looked at me.
“Vale?”
I nodded.
Then the landline rang.
Mom’s old phone.
Nobody used that number.
I answered.
Daniel Vale.
“Grace Carter.”
My skin crawled.
“What do you want?”
“The key.”
“My brother first.”
“He’s not your brother.”
I froze.
“What?”
Vale laughed softly.
“Ask Luca who Antonio Moretti’s second child was.”
The line ended.
I turned toward Luca.
His face had gone pale.
“What second child?”
Luca whispered:
“I don’t know.”
Marco did.
I saw it.
“Marco.”
He looked away.
“Tell me.”
He swallowed.
“Antonio had a daughter too.”
My heart stopped.
“What happened to her?”
Marco looked at me.
“She was born three years after Daniel.”
No.
I could not breathe.
My birth year.
I stared at Luca.
Then at Mom’s letter.
She had written about Daniel.
May you like
Not me.
Because maybe I was the secret she could never put on paper.
