Alia wracked her brain to rember the hectic scene outside of the operating theater.
"I think... I think she said that she had blood type O? But then again, so does 50% of the population, and that blood type is a universal donor so it wouldn’t be weird if Catherine volunteered to donate her blood... But..."
Her eyes drifted down to the diary. Within the yellowed pages contained secrets to a scandal that might possibly tear two families apart.
"A blood type O parent paired with a blood type A parent... it would be possible to have a child with blood type O, no matter how little the chance. But everything we have now is still conjecture," Alia added quickly, even as her heart raced at the possible picture hinted by the puzzle pieces.
"Sure, now we know that my uncle and Catherine were exes, but jumping from exes to substituting a baby with one of their own is a massive leap of logic," Alia continued, and she didn’t want to know if she was convincing herself or Matteo.
"I agree, but you’re forgetting one important factor," Matteo said. "That blood test result. All we need to do is find out where Aiden got the blood from, and we’ll know who Emline’s real mother is. I have a very strong feeling that he simply went back ho to take his own mother’s blood to substitute for Emline’s," Matteo added grimly.
Alia’s heart sank at the reminder. She didn’t want to think the worst of Aiden, that he would still be willing to lie to them after they gave him a second chance.
"It could just be that the blood test matched because she’s, well, Aiden’s mother... right?" Alia asked hopefully. However, with the newfound evidence, that was no longer the only possibility. "I an, if Aiden really took Catherine’s blood."
Matteo caught the subtle devastation in her eyes and reached out to embrace her.
"There’s no proof yet, but I can ask Isaac for Aiden’s alibi," Matteo offered. "If he’s still living with him, then the chances of him getting his mother’s blood is a lot lower."
Alia nodded, but she saw Matteo’s words as what they were, a paltry consolation offered to her aching heart. Even Matteo himself did not believe his own words.
After all, extracting blood took barely a minute― even if Aiden was completely terrible at it, it wouldn’t have taken more than half an hour to resolve the entire issue. The only problem he would have was explaining himself.
Matteo highly doubted Catherine Laine would agree for her son to extract her blood, no matter how much she loved him, and especially not if she found out what it was going to be used for!
Still, he owed it to Alia to ask. He dialed Isaac’s phone number, and the man picked up after a few rings.
"Hey Matteo, is sothing the matter?" Isaac asked, his voice warm with concern. "Does Alia need dical attention?"
"No, no, she’s fine," Matteo hastily reassured him. "I would like to clarify sothing with you. Has my brother moved out of your apartnt yet?"
"Oh, he moved out nearly a week ago back ho to his fancy mansion since Emline wasn’t going to be there! Didn’t he tell you?" Isaac exclaid. "He said he would be back to take his knick-knacks, but he hasn’t returned yet. But after all I heard from Ronan, I’m guessing he feels too ashad to return." Isaac sighed.
He then added, "Can you tell him to co back soon? His things are still all over the shelf."
Matteo snorted. Aiden? Ashad? The sun would rise from the west.
"Thanks, Isaac. But you’d better tell him yourself. More importantly, I heard you provided him with certain... materials."
Isaac coughed. "Well. He did buy them from . Am I going to be in trouble for illegal selling?"
"Only if you didn’t fleece him dry," Matteo said rcilessly.
Isaac spluttered, not expecting such a reply. Matteo then said a quick goodbye and hung up.
"He moved out, didn’t he?" Alia asked.
Matteo nodded. "He moved out back to the Montgory mansion the mont you found out about his actions. Alia―"
"You don’t need to comfort ..." Alia sighed, as her face twisted with faint hurt. Aiden lying to her again shouldn’t be anything new, but...
"I know what this looks like. It’s a lot easier to draw his mother’s blood than it is to sneak into Emline’s ward where Annalise is practically keeping watch 24/7 to take her blood."
"But now we have another problem." Alia shook her head. "If Catherine is definitely Emline’s mother, and that’s a pretty big ’if’, then where is Annalise’s baby? Did my uncle switch out his child for another one of his own? Was he aware of this?"
Then her face paled as she thought further.
"Matteo, if Catherine is Emline’s mom, wouldn’t that an that her sleeping with Aiden technically counts as incest?" Just the very thought threatened to make her hurl in a way that had nothing to do with morning sickness.
Matteo was similarly horrified. He hadn’t thought that far, but now that Alia had brought up the point, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. Emline and Aiden would technically be half-siblings sharing a mother!
"Their baby needs to be aborted imdiately." He spat out in disgust. "Who knows what kind of genetic diseases they might inherit?"
"Let’s not go that far yet," Alia said quickly. "First, we need to prove that Aiden did take his mother’s blood. Should we call him?"
"What’s the point? That man isn’t capable of telling us the truth, even if we ask for it," Matteo said bitterly. "If he had, we wouldn’t be in this ss to begin with. If you ask Aiden, you’ll make him believe that there’s sothing wrong with the blood he took― and if he lets it slip to his mother, things could be dangerous."
Catherine Laine couldn’t be oblivious that her own daughter was sequestered firmly in the Hawthorne household, like a cuckoo egg in a bird’s nest. If she knew others even suspected the truth, Matteo had no doubt she would silence them without hesitation.
After all, he was a kid when he had been faced with her fury. If not for Alia, his bones would have long decomposed in the ground.
"Then I’ll pretend I don’t know anything about his wrongdoing," Alia said simply. "I’ll befriend him again. We’ll claim that the blood sample is the sa, and I have forgiven him after being angry. Who knows, he might let sothing else slip through his mouth?"
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