Chapter 1

The old engine coughed, sputtered, and finally settled into a low, steady rumble.

A deep satisfaction settled in Alex Stone' s chest. He wiped a grease-stained hand across his forehead, leaving a dark smudge on his skin. Here, in the quiet of his late grandfather' s dusty garage, surrounded by the smell of oil and old metal, he felt more at home than anywhere else. This was his sanctuary, the place where a kind old mechanic named Joe had raised him.

He had just flown back to this small, forgotten town yesterday. No private jet, no fanfare. He took a commercial flight and then a bus, carrying a single, worn-out duffel bag. Down the street, his company, Stone Dynamics, was changing the world, but here, he was just Alex, the boy who liked to fix things.

Suddenly, the low rumble of the engine was drowned out by the purr of a much newer, much more expensive car. A sleek, black Bentley rolled to a stop in front of the open garage door, looking completely out of place against the backdrop of peeling paint and overgrown weeds.

Two figures, a man and a woman in their late fifties, stepped out. They were dressed in expensive, tailored clothes that screamed wealth and status. They looked around at the humble workshop with a mixture of confusion and distaste.

The woman' s eyes, a pale, watery blue, landed on Alex. They widened, and a hand flew to her mouth.

"Is that... is that him?" she whispered, her voice trembling.

The man, Richard Davies, straightened his tie, his face a mask of practiced solemnity. He strode forward, his polished shoes crunching on the gravel.

"Alex Stone?" he asked, his voice a little too loud for the quiet space.

Alex stayed where he was, leaning against the workbench. He didn' t bother to wipe the grease from his hands. He just watched them, his expression unreadable. He had known this day would come. He had known for three years, ever since his private investigator had confirmed the DNA match. Three years they had known, and they had chosen to do nothing.

"That' s me," Alex said, his voice calm.

The woman, his biological mother, Catherine Davies, rushed forward. She stopped just short of him, her eyes scanning his face, his simple clothes, the dirt under his fingernails.

"Oh, my boy," she breathed, tears welling up. "My dear boy. We' ve finally found you."

She reached out, as if to touch his cheek, but hesitated, her gaze fixed on the grime.

Alex didn' t move. He didn' t offer a hand. He just watched her performance. The tears, the trembling voice, the pained expression. It was all very convincing, but he saw the calculation behind it. He saw the desperation.

"You found me," he repeated, his tone flat. It wasn' t a question.

Richard stepped up beside his wife, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Son, we know this is a shock. We... we made a terrible mistake all those years ago. A mistake we' ve regretted every single day."

Regretted it for three years in silence, Alex thought. He wondered what had changed. What fire was finally licking at their heels?

Catherine' s eyes fell on his hands. They were strong hands, capable, but also covered in small, faded scars and fresh calluses from years of working with tools and machinery, first with his grandfather, and later in the labs where he built his first prototypes.

She gasped, a sharp, theatrical sound.

"Your hands!" she cried, grabbing one of them. Her touch was soft, foreign. "Oh, Richard, look at his hands! What have you been through? All these years... you must have suffered so much."

The tears she had been holding back now flowed freely, dripping onto his grease-stained skin. She held his hand as if it were a broken-winged bird, her face a picture of maternal agony.

Alex felt nothing. He looked down at their joined hands. Her perfectly manicured fingers against his rough, scarred ones. It felt like a scene from a bad movie. They saw scars and imagined a life of poverty and hardship. They didn't see the love and the lessons that came with each one. They didn't see Grandpa Joe, patiently showing him how to rebuild a carburetor, his own hands just as calloused.

He slowly pulled his hand away from her grasp.

"I' ve had a good life," he said simply.

The statement hung in the air, completely at odds with the scene they were trying to create. Richard and Catherine exchanged a quick, uncertain look. This wasn't going according to their script.

"Of course, son, of course," Richard said, recovering quickly. "But you belong with us. In your real home. We' re here to take you back. Back to the Davies family."

Alex looked past them, at the gleaming Bentley. He looked at their expensive clothes and their carefully constructed expressions of grief. He knew what this was. It wasn't a rescue. It was a recruitment.

Still, a part of him, a small, foolish part he thought he had buried long ago, was curious. He wanted to see them. He wanted to understand the people who could give him away and then show up decades later with tears in their eyes.

He let out a slow breath.

He nodded once. "Alright."

He didn' t know it then, but accepting their offer was a test. A test he was giving them. A test he already knew they would fail.