Chapter 7 - EMMA WAS NEVER AN ACCIDENT
Emma woke to the sound of a baby crying.
Not Caleb.
A higher cry.
Sharper.
She opened her eyes.
Her hands were not tied.
That worried her more than restraints would have.
People tied prisoners when they feared escape.
They left doors unlocked when escape was impossible.
Emma sat up.
She was in a small bedroom.
Old wallpaper.
A wooden rocking chair.
Rain against a window.
No bars.
She tried the door.
Unlocked.
Outside was a hallway she recognized from childhood.
Katherine’s aunt’s house.
Vermont.
Emma stopped.
Impossible.
Then the crying came again.
She followed it.
At the end of the hallway, Katherine stood beside a crib.
Older than Emma remembered.
Thinner.
A healing cut near her temple.
Alive.
Emma whispered her name.
Katherine turned.
For several seconds neither sister moved.
Then Emma crossed the room.
They collided in an embrace.
Twenty years disappeared.
Katherine cried into her shoulder.
“I’m sorry.”
Emma held her tighter.
“You’re alive.”
“I’m sorry.”
Emma pulled back.
“Lucy?”
Katherine looked toward the crib.
Emma’s entire body trembled.
She approached.
A baby girl lay beneath a pale blanket.
Dark soft hair.
Gray-blue eyes.
A red string around one ankle.
Silver compass charm.
Emma covered her mouth.
“Hi.”
Lucy blinked at her.
Emma began crying before she could stop.
She lifted her.
Lucy settled against her chest.
Something ancient and painful moved through Emma.
Recognition without memory.
Love without introduction.
“She has your mouth,” Katherine whispered.
Emma kissed Lucy’s forehead.
“Where’s Caleb?”
Katherine’s expression changed.
“You don’t have him?”
Emma froze.
“He disappeared from Roman’s penthouse with me.”
“I didn’t take him.”
“Then who did?”
Katherine’s fear was real.
“Shaw.”
Emma clutched Lucy tighter.
“How did I get here?”
“Thomas’s people.”
“Thomas Vale?”
Katherine nodded.
“He ordered them to bring you after someone broke into the penthouse.”
“Where is he?”
A door opened behind them.
Thomas Vale entered.
Roman’s father looked much older than in the video.
Thin.
Cane.
Oxygen tube beneath his nose.
But alive.
Emma’s anger arrived immediately.
“You stole my embryos.”
Thomas nodded.
“Yes.”
“You let Roman believe I betrayed him.”
“Yes.”
“You staged your death.”
“Yes.”
“You created a system that destroyed families.”
Thomas’s eyes lowered.
“Yes.”
Emma almost hated his willingness to confess.
It made shouting harder.
“Where is Caleb?”
“I don’t know.”
She stepped toward him.
“If he dies—”
“I know.”
“No. You don’t get to say that.”
Thomas looked at Lucy.
“You’re right.”
Emma held his gaze.
“Why was I chosen?”
Thomas went still.
Emma repeated the message from Roman’s wall.
“Why was I chosen before I met Roman?”
Thomas sat.
“That requires going back thirty years.”
Emma remained standing.
Thomas told her that Emma’s father, Daniel Carter, had been a biomedical researcher.
Not simply a rural family physician as Emma had always believed.
He had worked with Leonard Shaw.
Emma shook her head.
“My father hated hospitals.”
“He hated what he did in them.”
Thomas explained that Daniel Carter had helped identify genetic markers used in early embryo screening.
Shaw wanted to commercialize the work.
Daniel objected.
He took records.
Then disappeared from research.
Years later, Shaw found him.
Found his daughters.
Emma whispered, “Me and Katherine.”
“Yes.”
“Why us?”
“Your mother carried the same rare immune marker Shaw later wanted.”
Emma’s blood went cold.
“So this began with my family.”
Thomas nodded.
“Before you met Roman.”
Emma stared.
“Did you arrange that too?”
“No.”
He almost smiled sadly.
“That part really was an accident.”
Emma and Roman had met at a hospital charity gala when Roman cut his hand on a broken glass and refused stitches.
Emma had been a resident.
She told him he was being an idiot.
Roman had fallen in love before he knew what happened.
Thomas continued.
“When Shaw learned you were engaged to Roman, he became interested in the combination of your genetics and Vale access.”
Emma looked sick.
“Our relationship became an opportunity.”
“To him.”
“And to you?”
Thomas did not answer quickly enough.
Emma understood.
“You watched us.”
“I tried to keep Shaw away.”
“You preserved our embryos.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t preserve people’s children without permission to keep them safe.”
“I know that now.”
Emma laughed bitterly.
“Convenient.”
Lucy stirred.
Emma immediately softened.
Thomas watched her.
“She knows you.”
“She’s six months old.”
“She knows your heartbeat.”
Emma frowned.
“Katherine carried her.”
“Yes.”
“But during the final weeks, Katherine was hospitalized here. You visited every day.”
Emma stared at him.
“I was in Vermont?”
“Not three years ago. Six months ago.”
Emma shook her head.
“No.”
Thomas looked devastated.
“You don’t remember.”
“What?”
“Emma, you came here before the twins were born.”
She couldn’t breathe.
“I did not.”
“You did.”
“How?”
“Katherine contacted you anonymously through the hospital.”
Emma remembered receiving strange emails.
A request to review unusual pediatric records.
A trip she believed had been a medical conference.
Two missing days she had blamed on exhaustion.
Thomas said, “You discovered Katherine was pregnant with your children.”
Emma nearly dropped into the chair.
“No.”
“You became hysterical. You wanted Roman told immediately.”
“As I should have.”
“Shaw’s people followed you.”
Emma’s face lost color.
Thomas continued.
“They intercepted you leaving Vermont.”
“What did they do?”
“A drug called midazolam. Then another agent. You woke in Boston believing the trip had been routine.”
Emma touched her temple.
Memory gaps.
Headaches.
A train ticket she couldn’t explain.
“Oh God.”
Thomas said, “Katherine delivered four days later.”
Emma began crying.
“I already met my babies.”
“You held both of them.”
Emma looked at Lucy.
Thomas reached into a drawer.
He handed her a photograph.
Emma sat in this same rocking chair six months earlier.
Caleb in one arm.
Lucy in the other.
Tears streamed down present Emma’s face.
She remembered.
Not fully.
A smell.
Baby shampoo.
Katherine laughing.
Her own voice saying:
Roman has to know.
Then a man entering the room.
Leonard Shaw.
Emma stood.
“Shaw was here.”
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
“Separated the twins.”
Emma looked at Thomas.
“You let him.”
Thomas’s face hardened.
“I tried to stop him.”
“You failed.”
“Yes.”
Again that infuriating answer.
A phone rang.
Thomas answered.
His expression changed.
“What?”
He listened.
Then looked at Emma.
“Roman found Shaw.”
“Is he alive?”
“Yes.”
Relief hit her.
“And Caleb?”
Thomas’s silence destroyed it.
“They found a vehicle outside Boston.”
Emma stood.
“Caleb?”
“His blanket was inside.”
“No.”
“No blood.”
Emma held Lucy tightly.
Thomas spoke into the phone.
“Trace every toll camera.”
Then another sound came from downstairs.
The front door opened.
Katherine froze.
“We’re not expecting anyone.”
Thomas reached under his jacket.
Emma almost laughed.
“Of course you have a gun.”
Thomas ignored her.
Footsteps moved through the house.
Slow.
Deliberate.
A man appeared in the doorway.
Daniel Carter.
Emma’s father.
The man she had buried twelve years earlier.
Her knees nearly gave out.
“Dad?”
Daniel looked older.
But alive.
Katherine whispered, “Emma…”
Emma stared at Thomas.
“How many dead people are alive in this family?”
Daniel’s eyes filled with tears.
“Em.”
She backed away.
“No.”
“Please.”
“You died.”
“I had to disappear.”
“Everyone says that.”
Daniel looked at Lucy.
Then at Thomas.
“You shouldn’t have brought Emma here.”
Thomas raised the gun.
Daniel did not flinch.
“Put that down.”
“You’re working with Shaw.”
Emma looked between them.
Daniel said, “No.”
Thomas snapped:
“You’re the reason Shaw knew where the twins were born.”
Emma froze.
Daniel looked at her.
“Thomas is lying.”
Thomas raised his weapon higher.
“Then explain the tracker in Katherine’s medical bracelet.”
Katherine stared at her wrist.
Daniel went pale.
Emma saw it.
The tiny reaction.
Recognition.
She whispered:
“Dad?”
Daniel slowly lowered his head.
And downstairs, a baby began crying.
Emma’s heart stopped.
May you like
Caleb.
She ran.
