Chapter 126

Chapter 126:

Elia looked at Cailin. Cailin gave the smallest possible nod. Elia looked at Ashely, and in that moment remembered the game — the Mommy Ash game.

“Mommy Ash,” Elia said clearly, pointing one sticky finger at Ashely.

Charla stamped her foot against the hardwood floor. “She is lying! Look at her eyes — they are Holloway green p>

“Lots of people have green eyes, you idiot,” Ashely snapped. “My ex-husband had green eyes. Are you going to claim every green-eyed child in New York is a Holloway p>

Hilliard looked down at Elia — at the curls, the shape of her face. Every instinct he had was screaming that this was his daughter. He had seen the birthmark. He knew.

But then he looked at Cailin. He saw the terror behind her eyes. He saw the phone trembling in her hand, a desperate bluff that could detonate everything but was the only weapon she had left. And he saw the way his mother was looking at Elia — not as a child to be loved, but as a specimen, an asset to be acquired and controlled.

𝗗𝗼𝘄𝗻𝗹𝗼𝗮𝗱 𝗣𝗗𝗙𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗼𝗻

If he spoke the truth now, Jeraldine would file for custody within the hour. She would tear Elia away. She would send her to boarding schools. She would mold her into another cold, hollowed-out Holloway.

He made his choice.

“I already tested her, Mother,” Hilliard said quietly.

The lawyers stopped rummaging. Cailin’s thumb hovered motionless over the Go Live button.

“What?” Jeraldine stared at him. “When p>

“Weeks ago.” His mind moved quickly. He knew Cailin had likely tampered with the results, but that fabricated failure was now his greatest shield. The sting of reading that cold, clinical report came back to him — but the document that had wounded him was now a weapon he could use to protect this little girl from the very woman claiming to be her grandmother. “I had my doubts. I took a sample and ran it through the lab p>

“And?” Charla leaned forward, her eyes sharp with hunger.

“Negative,” Hilliard said. He looked directly at Cailin as he said it. “Zero percent match. She is not my daughter p>

Cailin exhaled. The air left her lungs so fast the room tilted. He was using the fabricated results to save them. He was choosing to hold the lie in place, to protect them with it.

“You tested her behind my back?” Cailin shifted into outrage, playing her part. “You took genetic material from a child without consent p>

“I had to know,” Hilliard said, dropping his gaze to the floor. He managed to look genuinely ashamed of it.

“Get out!” Ashely swept her hand toward the door. “All of you! You are out of your minds! Get out before I call the real police p>

Jeraldine looked deflated. Her eyes moved from Hilliard to Elia and back again, searching for a foothold. “Negative? The lab was certain p>

“I reviewed the report myself. It is conclusive,” Hilliard said. He walked to the door and held it open. “Now leave. You are trespassing p>