Chapter 50: Sinful lies and deceit
Alessia’s chest rose and fell rapidly, her eyes flicking between the two figures who stood beside her hospital bed.
Seraphina’s gaze burned with authority, a strange mixture of sisterly warmth and venomous secrecy.
Lorenzo, quiet and brooding, lingered behind her like a shadow. A man with a face so familiar yet wrapped in a fog Alessia couldn’t pierce.
Her voice came out broken, trembling. "Who... who are you?"
Seraphina stepped forward, her smile soft yet calculated. "I am Seraphina. Your elder sister. Blood of your blood. And Lorenzo..." she turned with a theatrical sweep of her hand, "is the man who stood by you when the world betrayed you.
He is your lover, the one who has always protected you."
Alessia’s lips parted, confusion swirling. Her temples throbbed as if nails were being driven inside. "Lover?" she repeated, her voice laced with disbelief. "But... my heart feels..... " She stopped, unsure. A hollow ache clawed at her chest, as though a name she couldn’t recall lived there, haunting her.
"Your wicked ex came to kill you, Alessia," Seraphina cut in sharply, her tone sliding like poison into Alessia’s ears. "Not only that... he kidnapped you, played with your trust, and left you half dead."
Alessia blinked, her lashes wet with unshed tears. "My... ex?" Her throat tightened. "Who was he?"
Seraphina’s lips curled, her eyes gleaming with a sinister satisfaction. "Luca. Luca Morano. A ruthless, cold devil who bathed in blood and called it love.
He fooled you, Alessia. He broke you. He doesn’t deserve your memory, not your tears, not your heart."
The name... "Luca" stabbed through Alessia’s chest like lightning.
She gripped the blanket, a chill racing down her spine.
For a fleeting second, a memory flickered strong arms wrapping around her, a voice whispering her name like a vow.
Her pulse surged, her chest ached. Luca... who are you to me?
Before she could reach for that fragile thread, her head split with searing pain.
She gasped, clutching her temples. The room spun, Seraphina’s voice echoing, twisting, choking.
"Stop... please..." Alessia’s cry broke as her knees buckled.
Her fragile body collapsed back into the bed.
The monitor beeped rapidly, the sound of her fragile heart straining under the weight of confusion.
A nurse rushed in, her expression grave. "Enough... Do you want her to lose everything?" She turned sharply to Seraphina and Lorenzo.
"Her mind is fragile. She cannot be forced into remembering. If you keep pressing her, she may never come back, she may lose it all forever. Let her heal, let her memory return naturally."
Seraphina lowered her head, masking her triumph with an obedient smile. "Of course. We only wanted to help her."
The nurse frowned, suspicion lingering, then adjusted Alessia’s IV before leaving.
The moment the door shut, Seraphina’s smile stretched wider, her eyes glinting like a viper ready to strike.
She reached out, brushing a strand of hair from Alessia’s damp forehead. "Rest, my sweet sister. Forget the devil who cursed you. When you wake, you’ll only see the ones who truly love you."
Lorenzo shifted uneasily, his hands clenched into fists. For the first time, his eyes softened as they landed on Alessia. There was something buried there. Regret, guilt, or perhaps a truth he dared not voice.
Alessia stirred faintly, her lips whispering in her unconsciousness. "Luca..."
The name slipped out like a prayer, fragile yet fierce.
Seraphina’s jaw tightened, rage flashing in her eyes. She leaned close, whispering so softly even Lorenzo barely caught it. "I’ll erase him from you, Alessia. Even if I have to tear your soul apart."
The room grew still. Alessia lay unconscious, caught between the war of memories she couldn’t yet claim. One heart cried out for her devil, while another hand sought to chain her to lies.
And Seraphina? She only smiled, playing the role of savior while sharpening her knife in the shadows.
*****
The air inside the Morano mansion was heavy, weighed down with silence that whispered of secrets and the shadows of choices past.
For days, Luca had walked the halls like a storm in human form, each step echoing with the fury of a man who had lost not only his wife, but perhaps even his sanity.
Alessia was still missing.
Every hour without her was like a knife pressed deeper into his chest.
His men searched tirelessly, yet the streets offered nothing but silence.
Then, fate arrived in the most unexpected form.
A boy, no older than fifteen, stood at the iron gates of the Morano estate. His clothes were plain, his shoes dusty from travel, but it wasn’t his appearance that stunned the guards.
it was the sharpness of his jaw, the piercing darkness of his eyes, and the cold authority in his voice that mirrored only one man.
"I need to see Luca Morano," he said, his voice steady despite the steel-barred gate before him.
When the guards hesitated, his next words froze them.
"Tell him... Gina sent me. She was my mother. She’s gone now. But she told me before she died.... "He is my father."
The words carried across the gates like the crack of thunder.
When Luca finally emerged, drawn by the commotion, he stopped in his tracks. His breath caught, his body stiffened. For a moment, he felt like he was staring into a mirror of his own youth.
The boy’s face bore Gina’s softness, but his eyes, his stare, his commanding presence, those were Luca’s.
"Your mother..." Luca’s voice broke, hoarse and unsteady, "was Gina?"
The boy nodded. His hands trembled, though he fought to stand tall. "She said you’d know. She said you loved her once and you were her first love at a very early age of her life. She never told you she was pregnant, but she made me promise, before she died, that I would come to you. That I would find my father."
Luca’s chest constricted, Gina.
His first lover. A girl who had carried pieces of his heart in a time before he became the devil everyone feared. He remembered the softness of her laughter, the warmth in her eyes. He had lost her to silence long ago, never knowing why she disappeared. And now.... now she had left him something far greater than memories.
"I need an official result before I will believe you are mine..." Luca said with Authority, his hand lifting but falling halfway, too stunned to touch the boy. "Are you really ... mine."
The boy’s eye narrowed. "My name is George Matteo, son of Gina. And now... son of Luca Morano."
The revelation shook the household. Whispers spread among the city.
A Morano heir, born of secrecy, surfacing in the midst of chaos. Some saw it as a sign of fate. Others, a dangerous distraction when Alessia’s disappearance remained unsolved.
But Luca, his heart warred with itself.
He had been betrayed, broken, and haunted by blood and loss. Now, to find out he had a son hidden from him for fifteen years. It was almost too much to grasp.
Yet even in that moment of discovery, duty gnawed at him. Alessia was still missing.
*******
Across the estate, Daisy moved like a shadow of her former self.
Since Alessia’s disappearance, she hadn’t slept properly, her eyes red from tears and worry. Luca’s pain was hers too. though she bore it differently. She clung to hope, to instinct, to scraps of information that might lead to her friend.
And it was instinct that led her to Romeo.....
She met with him near the outer grounds, the soldier leaning against a wall, his eyes darting as though thoughts plagued him.
Daisy, never one to hesitate, demanded answers.
"Romeo. You’ve been restless for days. What is it you’re not saying?"
Romeo hesitated, then exhaled sharply, running a hand over his face. "Because I think... I think my madam knows something."
Daisy’s brows furrowed. "Madam? You mean Seraphina?"
He nodded, "I caught her making calls late at night. Secretive calls and always stepping outside, always lowering her voice when I got close.
She’s careful, but not careful enough. Something in me says she’s hiding knowledge about Alessia. Maybe even where she is."
The words sent a jolt through Daisy. She had always distrusted Seraphina, her poisonous beauty masking a heart black as tar.
But to hear Rome, one of Luca’s trusted men speak it aloud gave her suspicions weight.
"If that’s true," Daisy whispered, fire flaring in her eyes, "then we follow her, Every step, Every call. She won’t hide from us."
Romeo gave a short nod. "Agreed. But we must be careful. If she senses we’re onto her, she’ll vanish or worse, we will expose her."
And so, an alliance formed in silence.
Daisy and Romeo prepared to shadow Seraphina , to unearth the truth buried beneath her carefully painted smiles.
****
Luca gathered his strength. The boy sat in the study, the shadow of a lost childhood clinging to him, but Luca had no time to process fatherhood fully.
His voice carried like a thunderclap when he addressed his men.
"Listen to me, Alessia is still out there. Every day she breathes in danger. Every second we waste is a second closer to losing her forever. So hear this well.... "
He strode to the balcony overlooking the city, the press and public already swarming with questions about his silence.
He stood tall, unyielding, his dark gaze cutting across the crowd like a blade.
"I will say this once. The offer still stands. The bounty remains open.
Ten million dollars cash for whoever brings me Alessia’s location,
every rat in this city will crawl from their holes for that kind of prize.
If anyone..... anyone, knows where she is, speak. Deliver her to me. And be rewarded beyond measure."
The declaration spread like wildfire. Phones rang across the city. Informants, mercenaries, even rival families, all who smelled blood and wealth were stirred into motion.
The hunt for Alessia was no longer a whisper in the shadows, it was a war cry heard across the underworld.
******
Far away from the Morano world, dawn spread its pale fingers across the horizon.
Princess Elowen stumbled through the misty forest, her breaths coming in ragged gasps.
Her gown was torn at the hem, streaked with mud and blood from thorns that clawed her skin. Yet she did not stop.
Run, Elowen.. Donato needs you alive.
She had been running since midnight, fleeing the whispers of betrayal that clung to Enzo, the traitor lurking at Donato’s side. Her steps slowed only when exhaustion clawed at her legs. At last, when the moon dipped low and the first rays of morning glimmered, she sank beneath a towering tree.
Her body trembled with fatigue, but just as she closed her eyes, something glimmered at the base of the trunk. A faint light, soft yet commanding.
Elowen’s heart skipped. Slowly, she crawled toward it.
The glow grew sharper, illuminating the mist like a hidden star. She brushed away the damp leaves, her fingers trembling.
And then she saw it.
A book Black as midnight, yet pulsing with a faint, eerie light. Its surface shimmered like it had been touched by the cosmos themselves.
Etched into the cover was an ancient sigil, one she had seen only once before, when her father placed the book into Donato’s hands.
"The Black Book..." Elowen whispered, awe and dread lacing her voice.
She hesitated, her hand hovering above it.
she screamed through her min, a curse for the soul that dares read its pages, a coin that must be paid in blood.
But destiny did not wait.
With a deep breath, she wiped the dirt from its surface, her reflection glimmering faintly across the cover. As her fingers closed around it, the air grew heavier, the forest trembling like it recognized the book’s awakening.
"Yes," she breathed, clutching it tightly to her chest. "It is indeed the black book... the one my father gave to Donato."
But as she stood, a shadow moved among the tree, Watching and Waiting.
The black book had found its way back into her hands but at what price?....