Chapter 9 - THE LAST TESTCharles had prepared for everything.
Others rearrange your understanding of the past.
Rebecca had been my friend since college.
She held my hair after cheap tequila.
She slept on my couch after my mother’s funeral anniversary because she knew I hated being alone.
She stood beside me at my wedding.
She held Theo hours after his birth.
And she had been paid to watch me.
I pressed the phone against my ear.
“If you hurt him—”
Charles laughed.
“Such predictable words.”
“Where is my son?”
“Safe.”
“Let me hear him.”
A pause.
Then Theo cried.
My knees nearly failed.
Nathaniel caught my elbow.
Charles returned.
“Satisfied?”
“No.”
“You want the child.”
“He is my child.”
“And my heir.”
“He isn’t property.”
“Everyone says that until property is worth billions.”
“Tell me where you are.”
“Eventually.”
I closed my eyes.
Think.
Julian had used Rebecca as an investigator.
But Charles had her now.
Had she switched sides?
Or always belonged to him?
“What did Rebecca tell you?”
“Almost everything.”
“Then why do you need me?”
Charles paused.
Good.
The question mattered.
“The trust.”
“You need my consent.”
“No.”
Nathaniel whispered, “He needs my DNA.”
Charles heard.
“Nathaniel.”
My father took the phone.
“Let Theo go.”
“You disappeared with my company.”
“I protected it from you.”
“You stole it.”
“It was mine.”
“You were my son.”
“I stopped being your son the first time you put profit above dead children.”
Charles went silent.
Then:
“Bring yourself to Alexandria.”
“Where?”
“I’ll send coordinates.”
“And Claire?”
“She comes.”
“No.”
“She comes or the child leaves the country.”
The call ended.
I turned toward Melissa.
“Track it.”
“Already trying.”
“Can you?”
“Burner routed through multiple relays.”
I wanted to scream.
Instead I looked through the glass at Julian.
He was speaking to an agent.
I entered his room.
“Rebecca.”
His face changed.
“What happened?”
“She took Theo.”
“No.”
“You paid her.”
“To watch you.”
“For what?”
“To tell me if my mother approached you.”
“Did Rebecca work for Charles?”
“I don’t know.”
“You paid someone you didn’t know?”
“She came recommended by—”
He stopped.
“Who?”
“My mother.”
Of course.
Eleanor.
Every road returned to her.
Federal agents brought Eleanor from custody for questioning.
She looked calm.
Too calm.
“Where did Charles take my son?”
“I don’t know.”
Nathaniel slammed both hands onto the interrogation table.
“You recruited Rebecca.”
“Yes.”
“For Charles?”
“For me.”
“What did she do?”
“Observed Claire.”
“Why?”
“To know when she became pregnant.”
I felt nauseated.
“You knew before Julian?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Rebecca photographed the pregnancy test box in your trash.”
I closed my eyes.
Privacy had never existed.
“Did Rebecca know what this was really about?”
“No.”
A tiny thread of hope.
“She believed Julian feared for your safety.”
“So she thought she was protecting me?”
“At first.”
“What changed?”
Eleanor looked toward the one-way glass.
“Charles offered more.”
“How much?”
“Two million.”
Nathaniel muttered a curse.
“And she took Theo.”
“Apparently.”
I stared at Eleanor.
“You destroyed everyone around Julian and called it love.”
Her expression cracked.
“You know nothing about being powerless.”
“I know exactly what powerlessness feels like.”
I leaned closer.
“You trained your son to mistake fear for loyalty.”
Eleanor’s eyes flickered.
“That is why he abandoned me.”
“No.”
For the first time, I understood Julian with painful clarity.
“He abandoned me because he chose cowardice.”
She looked surprised.
“I’m not excusing him.”
I stood.
“But you taught him how.”
Melissa entered.
“We have coordinates.”
An abandoned Vance Biomedical distribution center in Alexandria.
Federal tactical teams moved first.
I was ordered to remain miles away.
I refused.
We compromised.
Nathaniel and I stayed inside a command vehicle several blocks from the site.
Julian arrived against medical advice.
His shoulder was immobilized.
“You should be in bed.”
“So should you.”
“I’m not the one with a bullet wound.”
“You gave birth three days ago.”
We stared at each other.
Then both looked away.
The facility had been empty for years.
Thermal imaging showed four people inside.
Charles.
Rebecca.
Theo.
One unknown male.
Agents prepared entry.
Then Rebecca called me.
I answered.
“Claire.”
Her voice sounded broken.
“Why?”
“I can explain.”
“Where is my baby?”
“With me.”
“Did Charles hurt him?”
“No.”
“You?”
“No!”
The horror in her voice sounded real.
“Then bring him outside.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“He has a gun.”
“Agents are outside.”
“I know.”
“You know?”
“Charles knows too.”
My stomach dropped.
A trap.
Rebecca whispered:
“He wants Nathaniel inside.”
I looked at my father.
“He’s not getting him.”
“Claire, listen to me. I made a terrible mistake.”
“You sold us.”
“I thought Julian wanted protection reports. Then Charles contacted me. He knew about debt.”
“What debt?”
“My brother.”
I remembered.
Rebecca’s younger brother had disappeared from our lives two years earlier.
“He owed people money. Charles paid it.”
“For access to me.”
“Yes.”
“Then two million?”
Silence.
That answer destroyed the remaining sympathy.
“You took it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I told myself I’d leave. Start over. No one would get hurt.”
“You took my newborn.”
“He said he only wanted a DNA sample.”
“Rebecca.”
“I know.”
Theo cried.
She began crying too.
“I’m sorry.”
“Bring him out.”
“I’m going to try.”
A gunshot cracked through the phone.
I screamed.
The line dropped.
Agents stormed the building.
Gunfire echoed.
Then silence.
One minute.
Two.
Three.
Longest minutes of my life.
Melissa listened to her earpiece.
Her face changed.
“What?”
She looked at me.
“They found Rebecca.”
“And Theo?”
She hesitated.
“Not with her.”
The world disappeared.
“What?”
“Charles escaped through a service tunnel.”
Nathaniel punched the side of the vehicle.
I stared at Melissa.
“Rebecca?”
“Alive. Shot in the leg.”
“Where is my son?”
“We’re searching.”
Then Julian spoke from behind us.
“I know where Charles went.”
Everyone turned.
“How?”
“That building used to connect to the original Vance research campus.”
Melissa frowned.
“That campus was demolished.”
“The surface buildings were.”
Nathaniel understood first.
“The underground laboratory.”
Julian nodded.
Charles had taken my son beneath the place where the entire nightmare began.
A laboratory connected to unauthorized genetic research.
We drove.
By the time agents opened the sealed underground entrance, sunrise had reached Alexandria.
We descended.
Empty laboratories stretched beneath us.
Dust.
Broken glass.
Old equipment.
Then a baby cried.
“Theo!”
I ran.
Agents shouted for me to stop.
I didn’t.
I reached a laboratory.
Charles stood behind a glass partition holding Theo.
A pistol rested against my baby’s blanket.
I stopped.
Nathaniel came beside me.
Charles smiled.
“Look at us.”
Three generations.
Four, counting Theo.
“You wanted my DNA,” Nathaniel said.
“Yes.”
“Take it.”
Charles shook his head.
“I no longer need it.”
He held up a collection tube.
Theo’s blood.
I nearly attacked the glass.
“What did you do?”
“A heel stick. Nothing more.”
Theo screamed.
Charles smiled.
“Now I have proof.”
“Proof of what?”
“That the boy carries my line.”
Nathaniel whispered, “You cannot activate the trust without me.”
Charles’s smile widened.
“That is why I brought someone else.”
A door opened behind him.
A man stepped into the laboratory.
Older.
Thin.
Wearing medical scrubs.
Dr. Samuel Reeves.
I stared in disbelief.
He would not look at me.
Charles said:
“Dr. Reeves has agreed to certify the lineage.”
My voice broke.
“Why?”
Dr. Reeves finally looked up.
May you like
His eyes filled with shame.
“Because Charles has my daughter.”
