CHAPTER 5: THE CHILD THEY COULDN'T LET BE BORN
CHAPTER 5: THE CHILD THEY COULDN'T LET BE BORN
Marcus Vale's private jet disappeared from radar less than an hour after leaving the airport.
Not because it crashed.
Because someone had deliberately switched off every civilian tracking system.
Agent Naomi Brooks stood in my hospital room, staring at the live intelligence feed.
"They've gone dark."
Daniel Mercer didn't look surprised.
"They knew we'd be watching."
He turned toward me.
"Sarah, there's something we should have told you much sooner."
My throat tightened.
"What?"
He hesitated only a second.
"Your baby wasn't simply collateral damage."
The room fell silent.
"What do you mean?"
Mercer placed another classified file on the bed.
Unlike the red folder from court, this one bore a black security stripe across the top.
Inside was a photograph.
It showed Marcus entering a private fertility clinic almost two years earlier.
Another photo.
Marcus meeting with a genetic research executive.
Then another.
A laboratory.
Medical contracts.
Financial transfers totaling hundreds of millions of dollars.
"I don't understand."
"You conceived naturally," Mercer said.
"But Marcus didn't marry you because he loved you."
Every word felt like another knife.
"He married you because of your family."
"My family?"
"You've never questioned why your mother insisted your medical records remain private?"
I frowned.
"My mother died when I was nineteen."
Mercer nodded.
"And before she died, she worked for one of the country's leading genetic research programs."
My pulse quickened.
"I thought she was a nurse."
"That's what everyone believed."
He slid another page across the bed.
My mother's personnel file.
Her real title made my breath catch.
Senior Genetic Security Specialist.
Nothing about my life suddenly felt real anymore.
"Your mother discovered something twenty-five years ago," Mercer continued.
"Something several corporations have spent billions trying to recover."
I looked at him in disbelief.
"What does that have to do with my baby?"
He met my eyes.
"According to Marcus's communications..."
"...he believed your unborn child inherited the one thing they could never recreate."
I stared.
"I don't even know what that means."
"Neither do we."
"But whatever Marcus believed..."
"...he was willing to kill you before allowing another organization to reach your child first."
A cold wave swept through me.
The truck.
The courthouse.
The assassin.
None of it had been about a divorce.
It had always been about the baby.
Before anyone could speak again, every monitor in my hospital room suddenly went black.
The lights flickered once.
Twice.
Then the emergency generators activated.
Red backup lights bathed the room.
A nurse screamed somewhere down the hallway.
"Power failure!"
Agent Brooks immediately reached for her radio.
Only static answered.
"No signal."
Mercer looked toward the ceiling.
"They're inside the network."
The electronic door lock clicked open by itself.
Very slowly.
The door began to swing inward.
Every federal agent raised their weapon.
A shadow appeared in the doorway.
Then another.
But instead of armed men...
A frightened young nurse stumbled inside, shaking uncontrollably.
"They're here," she whispered.
"Who?"
"They're dressed like doctors."
"They already reached the maternity floor."
Mercer reacted instantly.
"They're not after Sarah."
Everyone looked at him.
"They're after the nursery."
My heart nearly stopped.
Dozens of unborn children.
Newborn babies.
Panic exploded through the hospital.
May you like
The attackers had created chaos to hide one objective.
Find my child before it was even born.
