Chapter 3 - The Dead Woman's Warning
"Don't call anyone," Serena said.
Elias stepped forward.
"You stay away from Lily."
Serena's expression broke.
"She's my daughter."
"You've been dead for three years."
"No. I've been hiding for three years."
Adelaide instinctively positioned herself between Serena and the door.
Not because she trusted Serena.
Because Lily was behind her.
"Did you cause the crash?" Adelaide asked.
Serena looked genuinely horrified.
"No."
"Someone put a note in Lily's coat saying it wasn't an accident."
"I put the note there."
Elias stared.
"You approached her at school."
"Yes."
"As Claire?"
"I couldn't tell a six-year-old that her dead mother was alive."
"You had no problem terrifying her?"
"I was trying to save her."
"From what?"
Serena held up Adelaide's file.
"From the same people watching Dr. Morgan."
Adelaide's patience vanished.
"Stop speaking in riddles."
Serena studied her.
"You're carrying Elias's son."
"Apparently everyone knows."
"They know because your pregnancy was flagged."
"Flagged where?"
"Carter Biomedical."
Adelaide frowned.
"Why would a medical technology company have access to my prenatal records?"
"They shouldn't."
The implication landed heavily.
Serena handed her the file.
Adelaide opened it.
Copies.
Prenatal appointments.
Ultrasound dates.
Lab results.
Her home address.
Even emergency-contact information.
At the bottom of one page was an internal Carter Biomedical case code.
CB-71.
"What is this?"
Serena's voice dropped.
"The same code assigned to Lily before she was born."
Elias looked confused.
"Assigned for what?"
Serena glanced toward Lily.
"Not in front of her."
Lily was crying silently.
Elias crossed to her.
Serena took one involuntary step forward.
Then stopped herself.
Adelaide saw the pain.
Whatever Serena had done, whatever she had become, her love for Lily was real.
Elias sat on the bed.
"It's okay."
"No, it isn't," Lily whispered. "That's Mommy."
Elias closed his eyes.
"Yes."
"Why did you say she was in heaven?"
Serena covered her mouth.
Adelaide turned away, suddenly feeling like an intruder in a family wound too deep for strangers.
"I'm sorry," Elias said.
Lily looked at Serena.
"Did you leave me?"
Serena broke.
"No, baby."
One sob escaped before she controlled herself.
"I ran because bad people said they'd hurt you if I stayed."
"Like the car?"
Serena's face changed.
"Yes."
Elias looked at Adelaide.
The same realization passed between them.
Lily understood more than they wanted.
Adelaide crouched beside the bed.
"Sweetheart, your job right now is to rest. The grown-ups are going to figure everything else out."
Lily looked at Adelaide's stomach.
"And my brother?"
Adelaide smiled gently.
"He needs me to rest too."
That earned the smallest smile.
Twenty minutes later, Detective Hale arrived.
Serena agreed to speak only after Elias promised she wouldn't be arrested in front of Lily.
They gathered in a locked conference room.
Serena began with Carter Biomedical.
Twelve years earlier, she had worked there as a regulatory analyst.
Grant Carter, Elias's father, had been expanding aggressively into prenatal diagnostic technologies.
One division developed predictive screening for hereditary disorders.
Officially.
Unofficially, Serena said, a private research team had crossed lines.
"They collected maternal genetic information without proper consent."
Adelaide stared.
"From hospital databases?"
"Some."
"That's impossible."
"Not if hospital systems were compromised by software Carter supplied."
Adelaide felt cold.
Mercy West used Carter Biomedical systems.
Elias leaned forward.
"What does this have to do with Lily?"
"Your father wanted longitudinal family data."
"My father?"
"He authorized it."
"You have proof?"
"I did."
"Did?"
"The files were hidden."
"Where?"
"Claire had part of them."
Detective Hale interrupted.
"Your sister died eighteen months ago."
Serena's eyes filled.
"I know."
"You believe that was connected?"
"I know it was."
"How?"
"Because she called me the night before the fire."
Serena's fingers tightened together.
"She said someone found her."
Adelaide remembered the bracelet.
"What about this?"
She placed it on the table.
Serena looked at it.
"Claire's."
"No. It has my initials."
"Those aren't your initials."
Serena rotated the clasp.
A.M.
"Authorization Marker."
Adelaide frowned.
Serena pressed her thumbnail beneath the clasp.
It opened.
Inside was a tiny micro-storage chip.
Everyone stared.
Detective Hale immediately put on gloves.
"Nobody touches that."
Serena sat back.
"Claire must have gotten it to Lily before she died."
Elias looked furious.
"How?"
"She visited Lily's school once, pretending to be part of a children's charity. I didn't know she gave Lily anything."
"You've been watching Lily all this time?"
"From a distance."
"Why didn't you come home?"
"Because the people who wanted me dead believed I was dead."
"And now?"
"Now they know I'm alive."
Adelaide asked, "Why reveal yourself?"
Serena looked directly at her.
"Because of your baby."
Adelaide stiffened.
"What about him?"
"When your pregnancy appeared in the monitoring system, I knew the program was still active."
"What program?"
Serena hesitated.
Elias slammed his palm against the table.
"Enough."
Detective Hale stood.
"Mr. Carter."
"My daughter was almost killed. Adelaide is being watched. My son isn't even born and someone already has a file on him. Stop protecting secrets."
Serena whispered, "The program tracks biological descendants of specific families."
"Why?"
"Because of a genetic marker."
Adelaide's medical mind immediately engaged.
"What marker?"
"I don't know exactly. I'm not a geneticist."
"Then what do you know?"
"Grant believed children in certain family lines could become exceptionally valuable to his research."
Elias looked sick.
"My father treated Lily like research material?"
"Without your knowledge."
"And Adelaide's baby?"
"Same paternal line."
Silence.
Detective Hale collected the chip as evidence.
"We'll get this analyzed."
Serena shook her head.
"If you put it into a police network, they'll know."
"Who's they?"
"Grant."
Elias stood.
"My father is seventy-one years old."
"He's also still chairman of Carter Biomedical."
"He stepped back."
"Publicly."
Elias stared at her.
"You expect me to believe he tried to kill Lily?"
"I believe whoever is running the program considers every person in this room expendable."
Adelaide's phone buzzed.
Maya.
Her best friend.
She answered.
"Maya?"
No voice.
Only breathing.
Then a man spoke.
"Dr. Morgan?"
Everyone in the room looked toward Adelaide.
"Who is this?"
"You should come home."
Her blood froze.
"Why?"
"Your friend is here."
Adelaide stood.
"What did you do to her?"
Maya's voice erupted in the background.
"Addie, don't—"
The call cut.
Elias was already moving.
"Where does Maya live?"
"With me."
"Then they're at your apartment."
Detective Hale called units.
"No one goes anywhere alone."
Serena grabbed Adelaide's arm.
"This is how they force you into the open."
Adelaide pulled free.
"Maya is there because I asked her to stay at my apartment."
"And if you walk in, you'll give them exactly what they want."
"What do they want?"
Serena looked toward her stomach.
"Your son."
Everything inside Adelaide went still.
Elias stepped beside her.
"They're not getting near her."
Serena's eyes moved between them.
"Then listen carefully. Grant has private medical facilities outside Baltimore. One of them isn't listed publicly."
"Where?"
"I don't know."
Elias took out his phone.
"I might."
He called someone.
"Daniel? I need every property held by Carter Biomedical subsidiaries. Especially anything medical. Don't ask why."
He hung up.
Adelaide stared.
"Who's Daniel?"
"My company's attorney."
"You own a company?"
"Small investment firm."
"Of course you do."
Under any other circumstances, he might have smiled.
He didn't.
Forty minutes later, police entered Adelaide's apartment.
Empty.
Maya was gone.
But there was blood on the kitchen floor.
Not much.
Enough.
On Adelaide's dining table lay a sonogram photograph.
Her son.
Taken from her bedroom drawer.
A black circle had been drawn around the baby's face.
Below it, someone had written:
BRING SERENA.
Detective Hale photographed everything.
Elias stood beside Adelaide.
"We'll get Maya back."
She stared at the photograph.
"You don't know that."
"No."
His voice softened.
"But you aren't doing this alone."
Adelaide looked at him.
Seven months ago, those words would have meant everything.
Tonight, she wanted to believe them.
That frightened her.
Her phone rang.
Unknown number.
Hale motioned for her to answer on speaker.
"Hello?"
Maya's voice came through.
Weak.
"Addie..."
"I'm here."
"I'm okay."
Adelaide nearly collapsed.
"Where are you?"
"I don't know."
A male voice replaced hers.
"Dr. Morgan, you've been given instructions."
"What do you want with Serena?"
"She stole something."
"The chip?"
A pause.
So small most people would miss it.
Adelaide didn't.
"Interesting," the man said.
"We have it."
Detective Hale silently shook his head.
Adelaide continued.
"If you hurt Maya, you'll never see it."
Another pause.
Then laughter.
"You really are as intelligent as your profile suggested."
Her profile.
The word turned her stomach.
"Let her go."
"Tomorrow. Midnight. Come alone."
"Where?"
"We'll send the address."
"What about Serena?"
"Bring her."
The call ended.
Hale immediately began tracing.
Adelaide turned to Serena.
"You aren't going."
Serena laughed bitterly.
"They won't release Maya unless I do."
"We don't negotiate by giving kidnappers exactly what they ask for."
Serena's eyes hardened.
"You think this is my first negotiation with these people?"
Elias stepped between them.
"No one makes a move until we have a plan."
His phone buzzed.
Daniel.
He opened an email attachment.
Property records.
Pages of subsidiaries.
One address highlighted.
Ravenswood Maternal Research Center.
Closed eleven years earlier.
Adelaide stared at the location.
She knew it.
Not personally.
Professionally.
"That's where I was born."
Everyone turned toward her.
Elias frowned.
"What?"
"My mother told me the hospital closed years ago."
Serena looked terrified.
"Adelaide, what was your mother's maiden name?"
"Why?"
"Tell me."
"Monroe."
Serena went completely still.
Elias saw it.
"What does that mean?"
Serena whispered, "Your father didn't choose Adelaide by accident."
Elias stared at her.
"What are you talking about?"
Before Serena could answer, Detective Hale's phone rang.
He listened.
His expression shifted.
"When?"
He hung up.
"There's been another incident."
"What?"
"Grant Carter's security detail found his bedroom empty twenty minutes ago."
Elias frowned.
"Where is he?"
"We don't know."
Hale looked directly at Adelaide.
"But they found a message on his wall."
He held up a photograph.
May you like
Written in black marker were five words.
THE MONROE CHILD COMES HOME TOMORROW.
