Chapter 4 - The Woman Who Called Him Brother
The hospital lobby became silent before Isabel entered the trauma floor.
Adrian stood in the center of the corridor with four men behind him.
I remained beside Ethan’s room.
Elena stood near Mercer.
No one knew whether we were waiting for a sister or an assassin.
The elevator opened.
A woman stepped out alone.
She looked about thirty-six.
Dark auburn hair.
Pale skin.
Elegant black coat.
And Adrian’s eyes.
Not similar.
The same.
Adrian’s entire body stiffened.
The woman stopped ten feet away.
For a long moment neither spoke.
Then she said, “You got taller.”
Adrian did not smile.
“Isabel?”
Her eyes filled.
“Hello, Addy.”
The nickname broke something.
I saw it.
Adrian’s shoulders shifted.
A memory arriving before reason could stop it.
“No one calls me that.”
“You used to let me.”
“You were eight.”
“So were you, practically.”
“I was twelve.”
“You were annoying.”
Adrian stared.
“You’re alive.”
“Yes.”
“My father told everyone you died.”
“To keep me alive.”
“Did you poison my son?”
The emotion vanished.
Isabel looked toward Ethan’s room.
“No.”
“He says you gave him the drink.”
“I gave him a bottle.”
I stepped forward.
“That bottle nearly killed him.”
“I didn’t put the compound in it.”
“Then who did?”
“I don’t know.”
Adrian moved closer.
“Wrong answer.”
Isabel stared back.
“You always were dramatic.”
“My son is bleeding.”
Her face softened.
“I know.”
“You knew he existed.”
“Yes.”
My stomach dropped.
Adrian turned toward me.
I stared at Isabel.
“How?”
“I found Claire three years ago.”
“What?”
Adrian’s voice carried across the corridor.
I felt trapped.
“I never met her.”
Isabel nodded.
“That’s true.”
“Then how did you find us?”
“Victor.”
Adrian’s eyes narrowed.
“Our father was dead.”
“He planned farther ahead than you think.”
She reached into her coat.
Every guard moved.
She stopped.
“It’s paper.”
Adrian nodded once.
She removed an envelope.
Old.
Yellowed.
Adrian took it.
His name was written across the front.
He opened it.
I watched his eyes move across the page.
“What does it say?” I asked.
He handed it to me.
Adrian,
If Isabel reaches you, then the second archive has opened.
Do not punish Claire for running.
She was made to believe you were the threat.
Find the person who convinced her.
That person killed more than your trust.
—Father
My hands shook.
Adrian looked at me.
“Dominic.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Isabel shook her head.
“No.”
Adrian turned.
“What?”
“Dominic followed orders.”
“Whose?”
She hesitated.
“Your mother’s.”
Adrian’s face changed.
“Our mother died ten years ago.”
“Yes.”
“You’re saying she forced Claire out?”
“She ordered Dominic to keep any pregnant woman away from you.”
“Why?”
Isabel looked at Ethan.
“Because she knew Helix was watching.”
I stared.
“She was protecting us?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“My mother could protect someone and destroy them at the same time.”
Adrian gave a humorless laugh.
“That sounds like her.”
Isabel approached Ethan’s room.
I stepped in front of her.
“Not yet.”
She stopped.
“I understand.”
“Did you know someone was targeting him?”
“I knew someone had found him.”
“When?”
“Three days ago.”
“Why didn’t you warn me?”
“I tried.”
“The knocking?”
“Yes.”
“You were outside my apartment?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t open.”
“No.”
“Why not call?”
“Because your phone was compromised.”
Adrian frowned.
“How?”
Isabel glanced at his security chief.
“Her landlord installed smart locks six months ago.”
I felt sick.
“Yes.”
“The software vendor is owned by a Helix shell company.”
Adrian turned.
“Verify that.”
His man began typing.
Isabel continued.
“I went to Ethan’s school this morning because I needed to get him away before Helix reached him.”
“You handed him the bottle.”
“Yes.”
“Where did you get it?”
“School cafeteria refrigerator.”
Mercer looked at Adrian.
“If the bottle was already injected—”
“Then she didn’t poison him,” I whispered.
Isabel’s eyes filled with guilt.
“I gave it to him.”
“You didn’t know.”
“I should have checked.”
Adrian studied her.
“You’ve been hiding from Helix for almost thirty years and you hand a child an unsealed drink?”
“It was sealed.”
Mercer lifted the bottle.
“It was punctured through the foil and resealed under the cap. Easy to miss.”
Adrian looked away.
The anger had nowhere clean to go.
That made it worse.
“Why does Helix want the archive?”
Isabel answered immediately.
“Because Victor collected evidence against them.”
“What kind?”
“Illegal trials. Political bribery. Assassinations disguised as medical deaths. Children selected for genetic research.”
My stomach turned.
“Children?”
“Yes.”
“Like you?”
Isabel nodded.
“And Ethan.”
Adrian’s eyes became lethal.
“What does the second archive contain?”
“The identities of everyone who funded Helix.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know all of them.”
“Give me one.”
She looked at him.
“You won’t like it.”
“I stopped liking today hours ago.”
“Marcus Vale.”
Adrian stared.
I knew the name.
Everyone did.
Marcus Vale was the chairman of one of the largest medical technology companies in the country.
A philanthropist.
Donor.
Adviser to hospitals.
And—
My eyes moved toward the wall.
SAN GABRIEL MEDICAL CENTER — VALE HEALTH NETWORK.
“We brought Ethan into his hospital.”
Isabel nodded.
Adrian turned slowly toward Mercer.
Mercer looked horrified.
“I didn’t know.”
Adrian looked around at the cameras.
The locked doors.
The medical systems.
The blood lab.
“We’ve been inside their building the entire time.”
His security chief cursed under his breath.
“Sir, we need to move Ethan.”
Mercer shook his head.
“He isn’t stable enough.”
“Then secure the floor manually.”
“We have twenty men downstairs.”
“Bring them up.”
Isabel spoke.
“That won’t be enough.”
Adrian looked at her.
“What do you suggest?”
She removed a small drive.
“The archive.”
“You said opening it tells Helix where Ethan is.”
“They already know.”
“Then why not open it?”
“Because once opened, it sends Victor’s evidence to multiple destinations.”
“Good.”
“Some of those destinations are Helix-controlled.”
Adrian frowned.
“Victor wouldn’t design it that badly.”
“He didn’t.”
“Then?”
“The archive chooses where to send the files based on the biological key.”
I stared.
“What does that mean?”
Isabel looked toward Ethan.
“It doesn’t only need his blood.”
“What else?”
“His choice.”
Adrian’s expression tightened.
“He’s seven.”
“Victor believed the heir had to choose whether the truth was worth the danger.”
“That’s insane.”
“Yes.”
“My father built a moral test into a child’s DNA?”
“Essentially.”
Adrian laughed once.
Coldly.
“I’m going to kill a dead man.”
Despite everything, Isabel almost smiled.
“He expected that reaction.”
A sudden alarm sounded.
Not Ethan’s monitor.
The building alarm.
Red lights flashed.
A voice announced:
“Fire emergency. Evacuate immediately.”
Adrian’s security chief looked at his phone.
“No fire reported.”
Isabel’s face changed.
“They’re coming.”
The elevators shut down.
Emergency doors opened.
People began flooding the stairwells.
Chaos.
Exactly what Helix needed.
Adrian moved.
“Claire, stay with Ethan.”
“I’m not leaving him.”
“I know.”
He pointed at two guards.
“With her.”
Isabel grabbed his arm.
“They’ll come through medical access, not public corridors.”
“How do you know?”
“Because that’s how they took me.”
He froze.
“Show me.”
They moved toward the service corridor.
I stayed beside Ethan.
Mercer prepared a portable transfusion kit.
“Can he be moved?”
“Not safely.”
“What if we have no choice?”
Mercer looked at me.
“Then we choose the risk we can see.”
Gunshots echoed faintly somewhere below.
Not many.
Suppressed.
Controlled.
My breath stopped.
Ethan opened his eyes.
“Mom?”
“I’m here.”
“Why are the lights red?”
“Hospital problem.”
“Are we leaving?”
“Maybe.”
He looked toward the door.
“Where’s Dad?”
The word hit me differently this time.
Dad.
“He’s making sure we’re safe.”
Ethan nodded.
As if that answer made perfect sense.
Then the overhead lights went out.
Emergency lighting remained.
Mercer cursed.
The monitor switched to battery.
One guard looked through the corridor.
“Movement.”
“Who?”
He raised his weapon.
A woman in scrubs appeared.
“Doctor!”
“Stop!”
She stopped.
Hands raised.
“I’m from ICU.”
“Stay there.”
Behind her, something moved.
The guard barely turned before a suppressed shot cracked.
He fell.
I screamed.
The second guard pulled me behind the bed.
Mercer dragged Ethan’s IV stand.
A masked man entered.
Then another.
The second guard fired.
Glass shattered.
Ethan cried out.
I covered him with my body.
The first masked man dropped.
The second disappeared behind the wall.
Then someone attacked from the opposite side.
A blur.
A body hitting tile.
Adrian appeared.
He pulled the attacker down and kicked the weapon away.
“Move Ethan!”
Mercer unlocked the bed.
“We have to go.”
Adrian took one side.
I took the other.
We pushed Ethan through the service corridor.
Isabel appeared from a doorway.
“This way.”
We followed her.
Stairs.
A service elevator.
A basement level I had never seen.
Adrian’s men surrounded us.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Old surgical wing,” Isabel said. “Disconnected from the main network.”
We reached a steel door.
She entered a code.
The door opened.
Inside was an abandoned medical suite.
Dusty equipment.
Old cabinets.
No cameras.
Mercer moved Ethan onto a functioning emergency bed.
Adrian closed the door.
For the first time, we had silence.
Temporary silence.
Isabel walked toward a cabinet.
She opened it.
Inside was an old Blackwood insignia.
Adrian stared.
“You’ve been here before.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“The night Victor hid me.”
The room changed.
This was not just a forgotten hospital wing.
It was where Adrian’s sister had disappeared.
Isabel reached behind the cabinet and removed a metal box.
“I left something here.”
Adrian watched as she opened it.
Inside lay a photograph.
Victor.
A younger Isabel.
And another man.
Adrian took the photograph.
His face changed.
I stepped closer.
The third man looked familiar.
Not to me.
To Adrian.
“Who is that?” I asked.
He did not answer.
Isabel did.
“Marcus Vale.”
Adrian stared at the photograph.
Vale had his arm around Victor’s shoulder.
They were smiling.
Friends.
Brothers almost.
On the back, Victor had written one sentence.
TO THE MAN I TRUST WITH MY CHILDREN.
Adrian looked at Isabel.
“You said Vale funded Helix.”
“He did.”
“Our father trusted him.”
“Yes.”
“Then why would he—”
Isabel’s phone vibrated.
She looked at the screen.
Her face drained.
“What?”
She handed it to Adrian.
A live video feed showed Ethan’s hospital room upstairs.
Empty.
Then the camera shifted.
Someone stood beside the bed.
An older man in an immaculate gray suit.
Marcus Vale.
He looked directly into the camera.
And smiled.
“I know you’re watching, Adrian.”
The feed zoomed in.
May you like
Vale held a second photograph.
In it, my seven-year-old son stood beside him outside our apartment three weeks earlier.
