Page 21 of Devil Among Men

It was everything.

I draw him back into a kiss and then tuck myself against his chest.

“Tutto,” I murmur softly.

Everything.

My phone rings just after midnight, jolting both of us awake.

“Renee,” I whisper, sliding out of bed to answer, Rafael sitting up carefully behind me, alert despite the late hour.

“Portia, hey, sorry it’s so late. I found some of what you were asking about. The old shell company records, the investors from back when it was first set up. Took longer than I expected, honestly. Some of this stuff was buried pretty deep, filed under names I don’t obviously connect to anything.”

“I appreciate you digging.” I press the phone tighter against my ear, glancing back at Rafael, who watches me with quiet focus, tracking every shift in my expression. “What did you find?”

“A few names I recognized. Mostly lawyers, accountants, the usual people who help set these things up without asking too many questions.” A pause goes by, papers shuffling on her end. “One name actually stood out. Early investor, way back before I even started working there. Guy named Jerrod James.”

The floor seems to shift under my feet.

“Portia, you still there?”

“I’m here. Can you send me what you have on him? Everything please.”

“Sure, give me a few minutes to scan it over. Everything okay? You sound weird.”

“I’m fine. Just tired. Thank you, Renee. Seriously. This helps more than you know.”

I end the call and stand there, phone clutched too tightly in my hand, staring at nothing while the full weight of what I just heard settles over me.

“Portia, what is it?”

“Jerrod James. That’s my father, Rafael. My adoptive father. He’s listed as an early investor in one of the Bellucci shell companies.”

Rafael’s expression cycles through confusion, understanding, then a darkness settles in behind his eyes. He sets the water glass down slowly, like sudden movement might shatter whatever fragile thing is happening between us right now.

“Portia,” he says slowly, “how long ago was that company set up?”

I already know where this is going before he finishes the question, my stomach dropping straight through the floor.

“I need to check the dates.” My hands shake as I reach for my old files, spreading them across the bed with a sudden, desperate urgency. “I need to check exactly when.”

I find the incorporation date buried in my old notes; the same notes I carried through book two without ever noticing what was sitting right in front of me the whole time.

The company was formed the same year Jayla and I were adopted.

I stare at the page, unable to breathe, unable to process the sudden possibility unfolding in front of me, sickening in its clarity, that my entire life since losing my birth parents might be connected to the very family that destroyed it in the first place.

“Dolcezza, talk to me.”

I can’t really.

…not yet.

I simply stare at the date on the page, my whole understanding of my own life quietly rewriting itself in real time. Every FaceTime call, every holiday, every ordinary kindness my parents ever showed Jayla and me, replays behind my eyes, now with a different, uglier context attached to it, and I don’t know yet which version of my childhood was real. The one I remember, or whatever this document is trying to tell me instead.

I have no idea how I’m supposed to face Mom and Dad.

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