Sophia stood at the police station entrance, squinting against the harsh sunlight.

"Why are we here for DNA collection?" Her fingers trembled slightly as she clutched Ethan's sleeve.

He turned his hand to envelop her icy fingers. "Trust me."

Their intertwined reflections shimmered in the glass door of the forensics division. When the officer handed her a form, Sophia's breath hitched at the bold letters: National Anti-Trafficking DNA Database.

"Was I... kidnapped?" Her lashes cast fractured shadows as she jerked her head up.

Ethan took the pen, his knuckles whitening as he signed for her. "Let's wait for the results."

Outside, plane tree leaves spiraled onto Sophia's shoulder. Ethan suddenly gripped her shoulders. "There's something you need to know."

Her heartbeat stuttered at the tension in his jawline.

"You were abandoned by a hospital flowerbed." His quiet words struck like thunder.

Sophia staggered back against the station's stone pillar. Two decades of certainty crumbled. A broken laugh escaped her. "Mom remembered I loved sweet fermented rice during her postpartum confinement..."

"Precisely because you're not biologically hers, she loved you harder." Ethan wrapped his coat around her shaking form. "I've checked the old surveillance footage. You were left outside maternity wards, swaddled in a blanket embroidered with wisteria."

Wisteria. The flower that kept appearing in the ancient paintings she'd restored.

Three days later, Dominic's DNA results arrived first. Sophia photographed the report and posted it with nine stark words: Not my father. No obligation. No forgiveness.

When vicious comments flooded in, she uninstalled the app without hesitation.

"Got them." Ethan entered late that night, chilled night air clinging to him as he played Darren's interrogation video. "The Valentines paid them a million."

On screen, Darren smirked while gesturing: "That Miss Valentine promised the rest once we planted the USB in the banquet hall computer..."

Ethan's eyes turned glacial as he grabbed his car keys.

"Wait." Sophia caught his arm. "Let me handle this."

The next day at Valentine Group's boardroom, Sophia slammed a recorder onto the table. Isabella's manicured fingers curled like talons. "What's this about, sister?"

"Either apologize publicly, or I submit this to the police." Sophia watched the color drain from Isabella's face. "Bribing someone for defamation is prosecutable."

Isabella suddenly hurled her teacup. Sophia sidestepped, toppling a potted plant behind her. Amid flying soil, the door burst open.

"Enough!" Adrian entered with a face like storm clouds, board members recording the scene behind him. Isabella instantly transformed, weeping into his arms. "She's framing me—"

Adrian shoved her aside and called PR on speakerphone. "Draft an apology under Miss Valentine's name. Now."

By afternoon, Isabella's forced apology topped trending searches. As Sophia tapped the notification, an unknown number flashed on her screen.

"Miss Laurent?" An officer's hesitant voice crackled. "A Mr. Laurent... He's brought a thirty-year-old missing person report. Says you might be his daughter."

Paper rustled before a deep, trembling voice spoke: "The swaddle... had a twin-fish jade pendant..."

Sophia's phone clattered onto the carpet. Her most cherished childhood toy had been half of an ancient fish-shaped jade.