The blood drained from Denis’s face. His knees wobbled as dread coiled like a stone in his stomach. "What do you an? This—this is a big hospital. How could you say that?"
"At his age, the attack was too much for him to withstand," the doctor explained with regret. "His body is far too weak to undergo surgery. We tried stabilizing him to see if a procedure was possible, but... it isn’t. In this condition, we couldn’t operate."
He put a hand on Denis’s shoulder, a sympathetic look on his face. "These are his final monts. Go to him. There isn’t much ti left."
The world tilted under Denis’s feet. His chest ached as if knives were driving into it, tears blurring his vision. He pushed past the others and stumbled into the operating room.
The sight froze him in place.
His grandfather lay frail beneath the green surgical covers, an oxygen mask strapped to his face. The old man looked smaller, more fragile than Denis had ever imagined. The steady beeping of the monitor filled the room, each sound like a countdown.
"Grandpa," Denis choked.
Slowly, Dimitri’s eyelids fluttered open. "Denis..." His lips moved weakly. He tried to lift his hand, but it trembled helplessly.
Denis rushed forward, clasping that wrinkled hand, pressing it against his damp cheek. "I’m here," he sobbed, tears streaming down uncontrollably. "I’m right here."
He had already lost his mother now faced another unbearable loss. His heart felt as though it were being torn apart, piece by piece.
Dimitri forced his words past the weakness stealing his breath. "Listen to carefully...Don’t fight Augustine. He... is not your enemy. He is your brother."
Denis didn’t protest. Deep down, he knew his grandfather’s words weren’t entirely wrong. Augustine was his cousin. They should have stood by each other like brothers, not beco bitter enemies. If this were truly his grandfather’s final wish, he would honor it wholeheartedly. He would set aside his grudges against Augustine and choose peace over rivalry.
"I won’t fight him," Denis vowed softly. "I give you my word." He leaned closer, clutching his grandfather’s cold hand, his eyes red and swollen from crying.
Dimitri humd softly. His lips curved in the faintest smile of relief, as though a weight had lifted from his weary soul. "I made many mistakes back then," he rasped. "Separated you from your real family and turned you against your own brother. I am sorry."
Denis blinked, confusion clouding his grief. "What are you talking about? The Beaumont family is my real family. I am with my family."
To him, it sounded like a delirium spilling from a dying man’s lips. His chest ached, tears clinging to his lashes.
"You are definitely a Beaumont, but..." Dimitri struggled to breathe, his chest tightening.
"But what?" Denis grew intrigued.
"Your parents..." Dimitri stumbled with his words, the surrounding blurring. "Jeanne and Gabriel are not your...biological parents..."
The revelation had ripped the ground from beneath him. Denis felt as though he had been plunged into the bottomless pit. His knees shook, and he collapsed on the floor.
The room blurred at the edges as his mind reeled. Jeanne and Gabriel—not his parents? The thought burned like acid in his chest.
He had loved them, fought for them, carried their na with pride. But this old man, who he had thought was his grandfather throughout his life, had claid that they weren’t his parents.
"If they are not my biological parents, then who?" he wondered. "Am I an orphan? Did the Beaumonts adopt ?" His eyes were wide, wet with panic, searching Dimitri’s face for truth, for answers.
It felt as if his chest had been ripped apart. His entire world collapsed in an instant, the revelation striking him like a thunderbolt. The truth shattered everything he had ever known.
In that mont, he felt like a helpless child abandoned in a crowded street, searching desperately yet unable to find anyone he could truly call his own, anyone he could call family.
"Who are my parents?" he managed. "Where are they?"
"They..." Dimitri’s lips parted, but his words faltered, strangled by the pain constricting his chest. His trembling hand tightened slightly in Denis’s grip, but his strength was draining away quickly.
"No!" Denis cried, leaning closer, tears blurring his vision. His fingers clutched tighter as if sheer will could anchor his grandfather to life. "Grandpa... please, don’t leave now. You have to tell ... you can’t go without telling ..."
Dimitri’s lips parted, a faint rasp escaping as though he were fighting his failing body to speak. His cloudy eyes fixed on Denis, heavy with sorrow and sothing unsaid. "Augustine is...your twin..." he whispered, the words fragnted, nearly swallowed by the rattling in his chest.
Denis leaned in further, trying to hear what he was saying. "Please say it again...I can’t hear you...Please!"
The monitor’s beeping quickened. Dimitri’s lips trembled with one final attempt to force out the truth, but no sound followed. His chest rose one last ti before falling still.
"No, no, no..." Denis’s cry tore through the room. He shook his grandfather’s hand, refusing to believe what his eyes saw. "Grandpa... you can’t go without telling the truth..."
But silence answered him. Dimitri lay motionless, leaving Denis shattered, lost in a storm of unanswered questions.
Inside Augustine’s car...
Anne sat stiffly in the passenger seat, anger simring beneath her skin. She couldn’t understand how Augustine had walked away from the hospital without giving Denis an explanation. Could he leave things like that? Worse, he had even stopped her from speaking up.
She turned to him, eyes sharp. "Why did you stop ?"
He said nothing, eyes fixed on the road.
"He accused you in front of everyone," Anne pressed. "He called you the cause of everything—and even struck you. And still, you said nothing. Don’t you think he deserves the truth?"
Still silence.
"You’ve done so much for him," Anne said, her voice breaking with emotion. "You took control of the Beaumont Group only to place it in his hands. You even gave him all your shares. And yet, in his blindness, he continues to hold you responsible for his family’s downfall."
Her voice sharpened, fury flaring. "And what family is he defending? The one that destroyed his own? I wanted to tell him then and there what kind of man his so-called father really is. But you stopped . You just let him hurl accusations. Why? Are you going to keep this secret forever?"
When his silence stretched too long, her restraint finally broke. "Are you even listening to ?"
At last, Augustine released a quiet sigh. "Calm down, Anne. Everything will work itself out."
Anne stared at him, hardly able to believe he still maintained his composure in the face of such injustice. How could he be so calm?
"After all the humiliation he threw at you, you can still stay silent? What are you planning to do?"
"Don’t worry," he said evenly. "Denis will learn the truth soon."
At those words, Anne finally allowed herself a breath of relief. If the truth ca to light, then surely Denis’s misconceptions would vanish at last.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gabriel ca back to himself slowly, the world returning in jagged pieces. He realized he was lying on a bed, not on the cold floor in the hall, where he rembered he had lost consciousness. As a flash of mory of Tania feeding him sothing hit him, his gut flipped with panic.
’I need to talk to Denis,’ he thought, and tried to get out of bed. But his chest tightened in dread when he couldn’t move his legs.
He forced himself up onto his elbows, heart thudding. "Why can’t I move my legs?"
"You are finally awake. Took you long enough," Tania said from the sofa. She was half-turned toward the window, a file in her lap.
Gabriel’s face twisted. "What did you do to ?" he demanded, anger trying to shove past the terror. He pushed harder to sit up, but the weakness in his limbs forced him back to his place. He had never felt so helpless.
Tania smiled. "Don’t worry. You are not dead yet. You should be grateful."
"You bitch— I’ll kill you," he spat, fury bubbling inside him.
She folded the paper and rose with languid composure, amusent in her eyes. "You can’t even move. How exactly are you planning to kill ?"
She reached the bed and leaned over him. "In this state, you can’t even go to the bathroom alone." She sneered mockingly.
Tania extended the file she had been reading toward him. "I have people to look after you. But I need sothing in return. I need your signature."
Gabriel snatched the file and flung it away without bothering to read. "I won’t sign anything," he snarled.
The file slid across the floor, papers fanning out.
Tania didn’t lose her temper. She picked the scattered papers off the floor with a slow, deliberate motion.
"You know how difficult it will be for you to lie in bed like that," she said evenly. "If you want to live a normal life again, you’ll obey . Otherwise, the poison I gave you will continue to eat away at your nervous system until you are permanently paralyzed."
Gabriel recoiled in horror. "What? You actually poisoned ?" he choked.
Tania nodded. There was no remorse in her eyes. "And I have the antidote. You’ll get one dose a day as long as you do what I tell you. Miss one dose, and your recovery stalls — the nervous system breaks down further. Do you still want to fight ?"
Cold ran through Gabriel like ice. He had no clear idea what was in those docunts, and he no longer trusted her a sliver. Maybe she was bluffing; maybe it was another of her manipulations. Yet the tremor in his legs and the weakness in his hands argued otherwise.
Part of him wanted to give in to her demands and secure his survival. But the other wary part of him refused to believe her. She was a deceitful woman. What if she didn’t keep her word after he fulfilled her demands?
Tania stepped closer. "If you refuse to sign, I will make sure your life becos a living misery," she threatened.
"What docunts?" Gabriel asked warily
She smiled. "You will surrender all your shares to my child and transfer all your property to ."
"What?" he exclaid with a mix of incredulity and dawning dread.
"I will marry you and take care of you, while you live," she said. "You only have to fulfill my wish."
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