# Chapter 10: The Trap Beneath the River
Lady Beatrice did not even glance toward the ventilation grate.
She simply smiled.
"I've been expecting you, Adrian."
The words froze everyone in the laboratory.
Rose instinctively stepped in front of Oliver's bed.
Charles slowly lifted his head.
Even Gideon Mercer frowned.
For the first time that night, he looked genuinely surprised.
"You knew?" he asked.
Lady Beatrice never took her eyes off the ceiling.
"I knew the moment Victor Sloane disappeared from the control room."
"He was always too sentimental."
Adrian realized they had lost the advantage.
If they stayed hidden any longer, Oliver would disappear again.
He looked toward Dr. Hayes.
Hayes gave a single nod.
No more waiting.
Adrian kicked the ventilation grate outward.
The heavy metal panel crashed onto the laboratory floor.
Every head snapped upward.
Before the guards could react, Adrian jumped.
He landed on the nearest security officer, driving him into a stainless-steel instrument cart.
The crash echoed through the chamber.
The second guard raised his rifle.
Vivienne hurled a steel oxygen cylinder across the room.
It struck the man's legs.
He fell hard onto the polished concrete.
Hayes rushed straight toward Oliver instead of the fight.
His only concern was the child.
Rose's eyes filled with relief.
"He's alive!"
Hayes reached the bedside.
Oliver's skin felt cold.
Too cold.
His pulse was weak.
He glanced at the IV bag hanging beside the bed.
The label had already been removed.
Hayes disconnected it immediately.
"This wasn't saline."
Rose looked horrified.
"What was it?"
"I don't know."
"But whatever it is..."
"...he cannot receive another drop."
Across the laboratory, gunfire erupted.
Adrian shoved another guard into a row of monitors.
Glass exploded.
Screens filled with static.
The overhead lights flickered.
Gideon calmly drew a second pistol from beneath his jacket.
He had expected to lose the first one.
He fired once.
The bullet narrowly missed Adrian and shattered a glass cabinet.
Liquid-filled specimen jars crashed across the floor.
Cold preservation fluid spread everywhere.
Inside the broken jars...
Small hospital bracelets floated across the tiles.
Every bracelet carried only a number.
No names.
No identities.
Adrian stared for half a heartbeat.
Then anger overwhelmed him.
"They were children..."
Lady Beatrice answered without emotion.
"They were assets."
Charles closed his eyes.
"I warned you this would happen."
"You warned no one," Beatrice replied.
"You disappeared."
"I disappeared because you tried to kill me."
The room fell silent.
Even Gideon turned toward her.
For years he had believed Charles had betrayed everyone.
Now another possibility emerged.
Lady Beatrice sighed.
"It was supposed to look like an accident."
Charles laughed bitterly.
"You hired professionals."
"They failed."
"They only killed the wrong driver."
Rose looked at Adrian.
"You never knew?"
He slowly shook his head.
"My father was declared dead."
"My mother identified the body."
Charles smiled sadly.
"She identified the body she paid for."
The truth struck Adrian harder than any punch.
Eight years.
Eight years built upon a lie.
A sharp alarm suddenly echoed throughout the laboratory.
Hayes looked toward the monitors that were still functioning.
One screen displayed a flashing warning.
RIVER CHAMBER FLOODGATE ACTIVATING.
Sloane's face turned white.
"No..."
Hayes looked at him.
"What does that mean?"
Sloane struggled to his feet despite his wound.
"It means she intends to destroy the evidence."
Lady Beatrice calmly straightened her coat.
"The river will reach this level in six minutes."
Vivienne stared at her.
"There are children down here."
"There were children," Lady Beatrice corrected.
"The survivors have already been relocated."
Adrian grabbed one unconscious guard's keycard.
"Where?"
Lady Beatrice smiled.
"You'll never find them."
A metallic boom echoed beneath the floor.
The entire laboratory trembled.
Water began rushing through drainage channels.
Not much.
Just enough to prove Sloane was telling the truth.
Hayes looked toward Oliver.
"He can't be moved quickly."
Rose immediately lifted Oliver into her arms.
"I'll carry him."
"You're exhausted."
"I'll carry him."
Her voice left no room for argument.
Oliver's head rested against her shoulder.
Even unconscious, he instinctively curled closer to her heartbeat.
Hayes noticed.
His expression softened.
"The memory conditioning failed."
Rose looked down at her son.
"It never had a chance."
Across the room, Celeste finally reached the rear emergency controls.
Her wounded shoulder shook violently.
She could barely keep standing.
She found the manual release lever.
Large.
Rust-covered.
She pulled.
Nothing happened.
Again.
Nothing.
She used both hands.
The lever suddenly moved.
With a deafening roar, the rear blast doors began opening.
Fresh air rushed into the laboratory.
Beyond them lay an underground vehicle tunnel.
Adrian saw daylight far in the distance.
An escape route.
Lady Beatrice saw it too.
Her calm expression finally cracked.
"Gideon!"
He immediately fired toward Celeste.
Adrian reacted instinctively.
He threw himself between them.
The bullet tore through his upper arm.
Pain exploded through his shoulder.
Rose screamed.
"Adrian!"
Ignoring the wound, Adrian tackled Gideon.
Both men crashed through a rolling equipment table.
Metal instruments scattered across the floor.
Gideon struck Adrian across the jaw.
Adrian answered with a brutal punch to the ribs.
Neither man noticed the rising water.
It had already reached their ankles.
Charles struggled against the ropes binding his wrists.
Vivienne grabbed a broken scalpel from the floor.
She cut through them.
Charles immediately stood despite his injuries.
He looked at Lady Beatrice.
For a long moment, neither of them spoke.
Then he quietly asked,
"Was any of it real?"
She understood exactly what he meant.
Their marriage.
Their family.
Their son.
Everything.
Lady Beatrice looked at him with eyes colder than the river filling the chamber.
"I loved power."
"I convinced myself that included you."
Charles nodded slowly.
"I spent thirty years hoping I was wrong about you."
"And now?"
"I wish I had been."
The floodwater reached everyone's knees.
Hayes shouted,
"We have to leave now!"
Adrian finally disarmed Gideon, sending the pistol sliding beneath a hospital bed.
Before he could secure him, Gideon laughed.
"You think this place is the secret?"
Adrian grabbed his collar.
"What are you talking about?"
Gideon looked toward Lady Beatrice.
She smiled again.
The confidence had returned.
"You've spent all night chasing Saint Ormond."
She glanced at Oliver.
"But Oliver was never brought here because of this laboratory."
Adrian's heartbeat slowed.
A terrible realization formed.
"What did you do to him?"
Lady Beatrice answered almost gently.
"The treatments ended months ago."
"The reason we needed Oliver tonight..."
"...was because only one Blackwood can open the final vault."
Silence swallowed the room.
Charles' face drained of color.
"No..."
Lady Beatrice finally looked at him.
"You buried it beneath the original estate."
"You thought no one would ever discover the biometric lock."
Charles whispered,
"You found the vault."
"I found the entrance."
She smiled.
"But I still need his blood."
Rose tightened her grip on Oliver.
"No."
Lady Beatrice nodded toward Gideon.
"Take the boy."
Before anyone could react, explosions shook the tunnel behind the laboratory.
The concrete ceiling cracked.
Dust poured down.
One of the support columns split with a deafening crack.
The underground chamber began collapsing.
Hayes shouted over the noise.
"The river is breaking through!"
A wall of black water burst through the far end of the laboratory.
It raced toward them with terrifying force.
Adrian looked at Rose.
She looked back.
Neither of them spoke.
There was only one choice.
May you like
Save Oliver.
No matter who had to be left behind.
