Chapter 176: I don’t need him

"Okay," Marcus said, already moving closer, his voice dropping into something more focused, more businesslike. "I know they visit St. Louis Hospital. They’ll have her records there."

"Great." Sienna dropped into her chair and powered on her machines. Three screens flickered to life around her, casting pale blue light across her face.

"What are you going to do with that?" Marcus asked, watching her fingers fly across the keyboard. "Just find out for sure whose daughter she really is," Sienna said, not looking up.

"But Don Konstantin isn’t here," Marcus pointed out. "Getting a sample from him would be impossible."

"I don’t need him." Sienna’s eyes stayed locked on the screen. "Don Capri is here. Getting his DNA will be easy."

Marcus shook his head slowly. "Yes, but rumors were going around years ago that Don Capri adopted Aliya. If that’s true, they might not be a match."

Sienna’s fingers paused mid-motion. She sat back slightly, thinking.

"I see," she said. "So matching their DNA would be useless." She exhaled, already recalculating. "Fine. I’ll find Aliya’s adoption records instead. See if there’s anything on her birth parents."

"That’ll be hard too," Marcus said. "Back then, a mob boss wouldn’t bother filing adoption papers for a child he took in. He’d just say, ’She is my daughter.’ And that would be it. No paperwork. No trail. She becomes his daughter, and the world simply agrees not to ask questions."

Sienna’s shoulders sagged slightly, frustration creeping into her expression. But underneath it, some small part of her was almost relieved it meant one less dead end to waste hours chasing.

"Well," she said, straightening up again, her jaw set with quiet determination, "I’ll start from the day she became his daughter. I’m sure we’ll find something."

She was trying hard, she told herself, not to go anywhere near Don Konstantin himself. Not yet. Not until she had no other choice.

"But if I find nothing on Aliya," she added, almost to herself, her hands already moving again across the keys, pulling up databases, hospital networks, old newspaper archives, "then I guess we’ll have to dig on him instead."

Her fingers moved first. Her mind was already three steps ahead.

—-

The estate stretched out beneath the pale morning sky like something imagined rather than built a private island in the middle of the Middle East, wrapped entirely in white. White walls rose smooth and gleaming against the horizon.

White cars sat parked in long, polished rows, their surfaces catching the early light. Even the guards patrolling the grounds wore white, and the maids drifting silently between rooms wore white as well. White followed everything here, an endless sea of it, the kind of place a person might imagine when picturing heaven.

Except it wasn’t heaven at all.

It was the private residence of the kingpin, Don Konstantin Ivanov.

Every powerful man has a story of how he rose, and the don was no exception. To become this wealthy, to hold this much power, this much influence over so many lives, it took more than ambition alone. It took something colder. Something hungrier. Greed had built as much of this empire as vision ever had.

The don stepped outside. It was still early, the air carrying that soft, gray stillness that comes before a place fully wakes.

A glass of whiskey rested in his hand, the amber liquid catching faint threads of morning light. He wore a white suit, tailored close to his frame, and heavy rings weighed down several of his fingers, each one a quiet symbol of some old victory or old debt collected.

He was a man in his early fifties. His gray hair had become something of a signature over the years, though anyone who looked closely would understand it had little to do with age and everything to do with how relentlessly he had used his mind over the decades. His body, too, defied the usual image people carried of men like him. There was no soft, round belly here, no lazy comfort of old age. He was built solid, disciplined, like a man who still expected, even now, that he might need to fight for what was his.

Carina waited by the car, holding the door open for him. She was twenty-five, dressed in her own white suit, her dark hair pulled back neatly from her face.

The don settled into the seat, unhurried, and continued sipping his whiskey as the car began to pull away from the house.

Carina glanced down at the tablet in her hands, then back up at him, the man she had called father for more than two decades now, ever since she had been brought into this house as a child, ever since his real daughter had vanished without a trace and left a hole in his life that nothing else had ever quite filled.

"Boss," she said carefully, "would you want me to go down to West Philadelphia? Bring Lady Katalia back myself. We should run the DNA test, just to be certain she really is Lady Katalia."

The don didn’t even turn to look at her. He swirled the whiskey once in his glass, watching the light move through it.

"No need," he said, his voice calm, almost bored. "Our men there are more than capable. And there’s no need for a DNA test." He took another slow sip. "She has the necklace. It must be her."

"But, Father, that alone cannot prove anything," Carina said, her voice careful, measured, the tone of someone who had learned long ago how far she could push before the air in the room changed. "We need to be certain it’s her."

"I said that is enough."

The words came sharp and final, cutting through whatever else she might have said. The don didn’t raise his voice. He never needed to.

"I already know," he continued, more evenly now. "And whatever else I need to confirm, I will confirm when I see my daughter."

He set the glass down against the small tray built into the door of the car, the ice inside it clinking softly.

"Now drop that," he said, "and tell me about the investor we are going to meet. Did you get a proper background check on them?"

Carina straightened in her seat, folding her hands over the tablet in her lap. "Yes, boss. And my apologies for crossing the line."

She drew a slow breath, steadying herself before continuing.

"Yes, I did. The head of the organization, the representative for the project, arrived with his wife and daughter." She glanced briefly at her screen, confirming the details before looking back up. "He is currently at the lab, as we speak."

"Great," the don said. "Let’s head to the lab first."

He reached for the glass again, but paused, his hand hovering just above it. Something had shifted behind his eyes a memory surfacing, unbidden, the way old memories often do, dragged up by nothing more than a single word. Daughter.

He was young again, suddenly, in his mind. A woman stood before him, blonde curls falling loose around her face, her arms wrapped tightly around a small girl, holding her close the way a mother holds something she is terrified of losing.

"She comes with me," young Konstantin had said, his voice hard, reaching for the five-year-old child.

"She is my daughter," the woman had cried, pulling the girl back against her. "Please. Keep my daughter out of your plans."

"You are mine now," he had told her, his grip closing around the child’s small wrist despite the woman’s screaming. "Don’t you understand that? And she will be our daughter. I promise I will treat her well. I will raise her to be just like me. Nothing like my weak twin brother."

He had dragged the child away as she screamed, as the woman screamed, both of their voices tangled together, desperate, reaching for each other across a distance that kept growing wider.

"Katalia! My baby!"

"Mummy! Mummy!" The memory shattered as quickly as it had come.

The white limo rolled to a stop in front of the lab, the tires settling gently against the pavement. The door was already open for him, a gloved hand holding it steady.

The don stepped out slowly, adjusting the brim of his hat, straightening his jacket with two firm tugs. Whatever had passed behind his eyes a moment ago was gone now, tucked away behind the same calm, controlled expression he always wore.

Carina fell into step behind him, silent, watchful, following her father into the building.