Chapter 163 99.97%
Chapter 163 99.97%
Dante‘s POV
"Soon."
"Understood. I'll have a courier pick up the sample within the hour."
I hung up and stared at that strand of hair.
Please be wrong. Please, God, let her be wrong.
---
Felix showed up twenty minutes later.
He knocked once and walked in without waiting for permission, which was very Felix.
"You look like shit," he said.
"Thanks. You look fantastic. We done?"
He pulled up a chair and sat down, studying my face with that particular intensity he had. "What happened with Lorelei?"
"Nothing."
"Dante—"
"I said nothing happened." My voice came out harder than I'd intended. "She's fine. I'm fine. Everyone's fucking fine."
"Bullshit."
I turned my head to stare at the wall. "Drop it, Felix."
Silence.
Then: "The wedding is tomorrow. I know you can't come, obviously, but—"
"I'm happy for you both," I interrupted. Flat. Mechanical. "You and Cynthia. I'm sorry I can't be there."
"I'm not asking you to apologize." He paused. "She's marrying Julian, Dante. You almost died saving her, and she still walked away. It's time to let go completely." He patted my shoulder gently. "Focus on recovering."
He left.
I sat alone in that hospital room and waited for the DNA results that would either confirm my worst nightmare or prove that the woman I loved was a liar.
Either way, I'd lost her.
The thought was strangely clarifying.
---
The results came back four days later.
I was home by then—discharged against medical advice because I couldn't stand another minute in that sterile room.
Adrian showed up at my apartment at 7 PM with a manila folder.
He didn't say anything. Just set it on my desk and stepped back.
I stared at it for a full minute before I could make myself reach for it.
Opened it.
Read the first line.
Probability of paternity: 99.97%
The folder slipped from my hands.
She'd been telling the truth.
My hand found my thigh. Started tapping. Faster and faster until the rhythm was just noise.
"Sir?" Adrian's voice, careful and distant. "Are you—"
"Get out."
"Sir—"
"Get. The fuck. Out."
He left.
And I sat alone in my apartment and felt something inside me break.
---
The next seventy-two hours were a blur.
I didn't sleep. Didn't eat. Just sat in the dark and tried to understand how I'd been so catastrophically wrong about everything.
I was attracted to my own sister.
The thought arrived with sickening clarity.
That scent. The way my body responded to her. It wasn't love. It was—
I couldn't even finish the thought.
The nausea hit suddenly. I barely made it to the bathroom before I was throwing up, my body rejecting the truth even as my mind was forced to accept it.
---
My grandfather came by on day twelve.
He let himself in with the spare key I'd forgotten he had and found me on the couch where I'd been for the past seventy-two hours.
"Get up," he said.
I didn't move.
"Dante Ashford, get the hell up."
"No." I yelled.
He grabbed my good arm and hauled me upright with surprising strength for an eighty-year-old man.
"You look like shit. You smell worse. And I'm not leaving until you explain what the hell is going on."
"Nothing's going on."
"Bullshit." His eyes were sharp, assessing. "Richard called me. Said you haven't been answering his calls. What happened?"
I laughed. Bitter. Harsh. "Did you know? About Lorelei. About her mother. Did you know Richard had a daughter?"
The silence that followed told me everything.
"You knew." My voice was flat. "You fucking knew and you said nothing."
Grandfather sat down heavily. "I didn't know who she was. I knew Richard had an affair twenty-seven years ago. I knew there might have been a child. But I didn't know it was her until—" He stopped. "Until you told me just now."
"You knew there was a child and you never—"
"What was I supposed to do? Ruin your father's marriage? Destroy our family reputation?" He paused. "The woman—Vivian Bennett—she took a settlement and disappeared. We thought that was the end of it."
"It wasn't the end of it." My hands were shaking. "Because that child grew up and I—" I couldn't finish.
Grandfather looked at me for a long moment. "You need to move on."
"I know."
"I mean it, Dante. This—whatever you're doing—it can't continue." His voice hardened. "You have responsibilities. But your shoulder needs time to heal properly. The doctor said at least six weeks before you can return to work. Use that time to get your head straight."
"And if I don't?"
"Then I'll remove you from the CEO position."
He left.
---
My father showed up on day twenty-three.
Richard Ashford walked into my apartment like he owned it—which, technically, he did.
"You look terrible," he said.
"Genetics." The word came out sharp.
He didn't flinch this time. Just sat down across from me with that expression I'd seen a thousand times—cold assessment mixed with barely concealed contempt.
"Your grandfather told me. About the girl."
"Her name is Lorelei."
"I know her name." He leaned back. "I also know you've been lying in this apartment for three weeks, wallowing like some lovesick teenager. Over a woman you can't have."
"You don't understand—"
"I understand perfectly." His voice went hard. "You're pathetic. Falling apart over a girl. My son—falling apart over a girl."
The emphasis on the last word made something cold crawl up my spine.
"What's really pathetic," he continued, his lips curling into something that wasn't quite a smile, "is that you managed to get involved with your own half-sister. My illegitimate daughter, no less. There's a certain poetic justice to it, don't you think?"
I stared at him. "What?"
"Karma. Fate. Whatever you want to call it." He stood up, straightening his jacket. "I had an affair. Created a child I never acknowledged. And now my son—" He paused, and something flickered in his eyes. Something I couldn't quite read. "—falls in love with her. Maybe it's the universe's way of balancing the scales."
"That's sick."
"That's life." He moved toward the door. "And speaking of life—I have another son. In California. From a different affair. He's twenty-three. Very ambitious. If you're going to continue this spiral, I'm prepared to bring him into the company."
The casual way he said it—like he was discussing stock options instead of replacing me—made my hand find my thigh. Start tapping.
"You know what's interesting?" Richard paused at the door. "He doesn't look like me at all. Takes after his mother completely. Whereas you—" He turned back, his eyes scanning my face with that same unreadable expression. "You've always been the spitting image of—well. Genetics are funny that way."
He left.