Chapter 10 - Garrett’s Last Bargain
Garrett waited in a federal interview room wearing an orange detention uniform.
Without his tuxedo, staff, and family name surrounding him, he looked smaller.
Nora sat across from him behind a steel table.
An agent watched through one-way glass.
“This is not private,” Nora said.
“It is private enough.”
“What proof do you have about the plane crash?”
Garrett leaned back.
“You look tired.”
“You look imprisoned.”
His mouth tightened.
“I deserve that.”
“You deserve worse.”
“I know you hate me.”
“Hate would require energy I need for my daughter.”
For the first time, shame appeared in his eyes.
“How is Mia?”
“You lost the right to ask.”
“I am still her father.”
“You treated her like medical property.”
“I believed the procedure would be safe.”
“You forged my consent.”
“My mother said—”
Nora struck the table with her palm.
“Stop hiding behind her.”
Garrett fell silent.
Nora leaned closer.
“You made choices. You married me knowing who I was. You married Emily while still married to me. You built files on our daughter. You planned to declare me mentally unfit.”
“I was trapped.”
“So were we. We did not become you.”
Garrett looked toward the glass.
“My father arranged the accident that killed your parents.”
“Proof.”
“There is a recording in a safety deposit box.”
“Where?”
“I want protection.”
“For whom?”
He hesitated.
“Sloan.”
Nora almost laughed.
“She assaulted your child.”
“She is pregnant.”
The words landed heavily.
Nora stared at him.
“With your child?”
“Yes.”
“How far along?”
“Four months.”
Sloan had struck Mia while carrying Mia’s half-sibling.
Nora felt no jealousy.
Only disgust.
“You want me to protect her?”
“My mother will have her killed if she believes Sloan can testify.”
“Beatrice is under guard.”
“She still has people.”
“What does Sloan know?”
“She managed donations routed through shell companies.”
“Then she is not an innocent witness.”
“No.”
“Why should I help her?”
“Because the child is innocent.”
Garrett knew exactly where to aim.
Nora looked away.
“What is in the deposit box?”
“A cassette recorded by Judge Avery. My father confessed that the plane was sabotaged to kill Elias. Avery kept it as insurance.”
“Why would you have it?”
“I stole it after my father died.”
“Why keep it?”
“To control my mother.”
“Did you ever use it?”
“No.”
“Then it controlled you.”
Garrett flinched.
Nora stood.
“Give the location to the agents.”
“I need your word about Sloan.”
“I will not interfere with lawful prosecution.”
“Nora.”
“I will make sure she receives medical protection and that her child is safe. Nothing more.”
Garrett nodded slowly.
The deposit box was located in a private bank beneath a corporate identity linked to Whitcomb Legal Holdings.
Inside, agents found the cassette, original flight maintenance records, and photographs showing Charles Whitcomb meeting with the mechanic who sabotaged the plane.
The recording confirmed that Elias had been the target.
Charles feared Elias would expose the illegal medical network and destroy several powerful families.
Nora listened once.
She could not bear a second time.
Her parents had died because they borrowed the wrong plane.
Her entire life had been shaped by a murder meant for someone else.
Elias stood alone by the hospital window after hearing the recording.
Nora joined him.
“I should have been on that plane,” he said.
“No.”
“They died because of me.”
“They died because Charles Whitcomb chose murder.”
“I created the conditions.”
“You did not plant the device.”
Elias’s eyes filled.
“I sent you away after the funeral. I thought I was saving you. Instead, I left you vulnerable to the same family.”
Nora took his hand.
“We cannot repair the past by blaming ourselves more accurately.”
He looked at her.
“That sounds like something your adoptive mother would say.”
“She taught me well.”
The investigation expanded.
Judge Avery began cooperating after learning Garrett had surrendered the cassette.
Dr. Harlan provided access codes and patient histories.
Across the country, four Project Aster sites were raided.
Twenty-three children were rescued.
But records suggested five more remained missing.
One file listed Hope as a “failed donor” scheduled for disposal.
Nora could not sleep after reading it.
She spent nights beside Hope’s hospital bed while doctors helped the child recover.
Mia visited daily.
Lucy stayed with Emily in a secure apartment nearby.
The girls became inseparable.
One afternoon, Mia showed Hope how to draw a rabbit.
“You make the ears too long,” Hope said.
“There’s no such thing as too long.”
Hope smiled.
It was the first time Nora had seen her smile.
Then a nurse entered carrying an envelope.
“It was left at the front desk for you.”
There was no return address.
Inside was a photograph of five children standing beside a lake.
On the back, someone had written:
THE LAST FIVE ARE NOT IN AMERICA.
Below the message was a date.
Three days from now.
And a set of coordinates leading to a private airfield in northern Canada.
Emily recognized the handwriting.
“It belongs to the doctor who helped me escape.”
Nora frowned.
“You said he was killed.”
“I believed he was.”
“What was his name?”
“Jonathan Reed.”
Elias went pale.
“Jonathan Reed was your father’s research partner.”
Emily looked at him.
“He told me he was only a physician.”
“He helped create the original therapy.”
Nora turned the photograph over.
“Then he may be the person who restarted Project Aster.”
Emily shook her head.
“He saved me.”
“So did Garrett, according to you.”
The painful comparison landed.
Three days later, Nora and Emily boarded Elias’s plane for Canada.
Before leaving, Nora promised Mia she would return.
Mia placed the repaired black bracelet around her mother’s wrist.
“For recording bad people,” she said.
Nora kissed her.
“For remembering the truth.”
At the Canadian airfield, snow covered the runway.
A single hangar stood open.
Inside waited a small plane, five empty child-sized seats, and Jonathan Reed.
May you like
He was alive.
And beside him stood Nora’s adoptive mother, whom Nora had believed had died six months earlier.
