Celia’s eyes welled with tears as she clutched her hands together, unable to meet my gaze. The silence in the room was suffocating.
“Your mother… the woman who raised you,” Celia began, her voice barely audible, “she wasn’t your biological mother. She was my twin sister.”
The ground seemed to disappear beneath my feet. I stumbled back against the heavy mahogany dresser, the air suddenly stripped from my lungs. “What are you talking about? That’s impossible. My mother died ten years ago—”
“Because she was running from the same people who are guarding this estate right now,” Celia interrupted, her posture suddenly rigid, terrified. “Thirty years ago, our family was embroiled in a syndicate war. My sister fled with you when you were just a baby to save your life. I stayed behind to draw the crosshairs onto myself.”
She reached for the thick envelope on the table and pulled
