Chapter 10 - The Deceit of the Triplets
The entire cathedral seemed to hold its breath. Vanessa took a staggering step backward, her hand frantically reaching out to grasp the mahogany pew behind her for support.
"No..." Vanessa whimpered, the bravado completely draining from her posture. "No, please... Christian, don't look at it. It's a trap. She forged it... she wants to tear us apart!"
Christian frowned, looking between Vanessa's sudden, hysterical breakdown and the files resting on the altar. A cold dread, far more terrifying than the appearance of his four children, began to pool in the pit of his stomach. "Vanessa? Why are you shaking like that?"
"Read it, Christian," Althea said softly, stepping back to let the documents lie bare under the sacred light. "Or perhaps Don Roman would prefer to read the results of the heirs he spent two years celebrating?"
Don Roman snatched the second folder with trembling, age-spotted hands. His eyes scanned the cryptographic seal, the medical signatures, and then the stark, unforgiving lines of genomic sequencing printed beneath the photographs of Vanessa’s three boys.
The patriarch's jaw dropped. The paper fluttered in his grip.
*Subject: Triplets (Leo, Damian, Gabriel).*
*Alleged Paternity: Christian Montecillo.*
*Result: Paternity Excluded. Match: 0.00%.*
"Zero..." Don Roman rasped, his voice barely a breath. "Zero percent?"
"What?!" Christian roared, ripping the folder from his father's hands. His eyes tore through the black ink, his vision blurring with rage and disbelief. "Zero percent?! What is this?! Vanessa! What the hell is this?!"
"It's a lie!" Vanessa screamed, dropping her bouquet entirely. The white orchids scattered across the blood-red aisle carpet. "She bribed the lab! She has billions now, she could buy any doctor in Switzerland! Christian, they are yours! You know they are yours! Remember the clinic in Milan? Remember the treatments?!"
"Oh, I remember the clinic in Milan very well," Althea chimed in, her tone chillingly conversational. "Because The Valerius Group purchased that clinic six months ago. We acquired all the archived donor records, the private consultation logs, and the surveillance footage from the executive suites."
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Althea turned slightly, raising two fingers. High above the altar, the massive digital screens that had been installed to broadcast the nuptials flickered. The live footage of the wedding vanished, replaced by high-definition security logs, signed transfer slips, and genetic donor records bearing an unmistakable name.
"Christian wasn't the father, Vanessa," Althea said, her voice ringing out like a death knell. "He was merely the bank account."
