My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 738

Chapter 738

Only then did I turn toward the remaining screens.

Arthur Vance.

The name appeared in the search bar. I didn’t search the public internet first. That would’ve been useless. Men like Giovanni buried the truth long before newspapers ever saw it.

Instead, I started with medical licensing archives. Old university records, state licensing boards, hospital employment databases, conference attendance, research papers.

Everything.

Lines of code rolled across one screen while another quietly copied decades of archived files into

temporary storage.

Nothing.

It was too clean, far too clean.

Doctors left trails, publications, photographs, medical journals, interviews, grants. Arthur Vance barely existed.

That wasn’t normal.

I leaned back. I opened another terminal. This time I searched for Giovanni Toricelli, business photographs, political fundraisers, charity galas, hospital donations, hundreds of pictures flooded the screen.

Most were useless.

I wrote a quick facial-recognition script and let it isolate recurring faces standing near Giovanni over the years.

The program worked in silence.

Then, a folder appeared.

MATCH FOUND.

I opened it.

The first photograph looked almost thirty years old. Giovanni stood outside a hospital during a ribbon- cutting ceremony. Beside him, was a man in a white coat-dark hair, round glasses, stupid fucking smile.

Caption:

Dr. Arthur Vance.

I opened another.

Five years later, the same man was standing beside Giovanni again. Then another, another and another.

For almost twenty-five years…

The same doctor appeared beside Giovanni and no one else. Meetings, fundraisers, private dinners, medical conferences.

Always there.

Always close.

I enlarged the newest photograph but something about it felt wrong. I placed the oldest picture beside the newest one. It had the same height, same hairline, same beard, same smile.

Twenty-five years and not a wrinkle worth mentioning, not the natural aging I’d expect.

I zoomed in, then again, skin texture, ear shape, jawline, eyes. The algorithm highlighted differences, tiny ones that were almost invisible, like someone trying very hard to become another person.

My fingers started moving faster now. I searched for death certificates, burial records, historical archives, hospital obituaries.

But there was nothing.

What the fuck?

Then, one corrupted county archive surfaced, deleted… and that made me smile. I recovered it but it was partially damaged and then I repaired it.

Thirty seconds passed.

Then forty.

My eyes drifted back to Gianna.

opened the execution records. The Death sentence had been carried out. He was officially deceased, no surviving identity, no appeals, no release.

Executed.

Officially.

I looked back at the photographs beside Giovanni, then at the execution file, then back again.

My jaw tightened.

Someone had disappeared from history and another man had appeared wearing a dead doctor’s name.

I overlaid the execution photograph with Giovanni’s “Arthur Vance.”

The software processed facial structure, bone measurements, eye spacing, nasal bridge, and jaw proportions.

99.4% MATCH

I stared at the screen, the executed serial killer and Giovanni’s trusted doctor were the same man.

Only the name had changed.

Every public record insisted the killer had died. Every private photograph proved otherwise. Giovanni

hadn’t simply hidden a criminal. He had erased one man and resurrected him as someone else.

I looked toward Gianna’s sleeping face.

“Jesus Christ.”

I sat there for a full minute because I couldn’t make it make sense.

Why?

What possible reason did Giovanni Toricelli have for risking everything to save a serial killer?