Chapter 14 - THE FATHER ELI NEVER KNEW
Claire dropped beside James.
“James.”
No response.
She pressed her fingers to his neck.
Nothing.
Ortiz unlocked one of Daniel’s cuffs and secured him to a steel support beam.
Then she ran to James.
“Start compressions.”
Claire pushed against his chest.
Sophie stood frozen.
“Is he dead?”
“No,” Claire said.
She did not know whether it was true.
“Get the emergency kit,” Ortiz ordered.
Edward found it beneath the conference table.
Ortiz attached defibrillator pads.
“Clear.”
James’s body jolted.
No rhythm.
Claire resumed compressions.
“One, two, three…”
Her arms burned.
Rain blew through the shattered windows.
Daniel watched from the support column.
His face revealed nothing.
Julian stood near James’s feet.
The elderly man looked as though he had aged another decade in minutes.
“My son.”
Claire kept pressing.
“Do not say goodbye yet.”
Ortiz charged the defibrillator again.
“Clear.”
Another shock.
The monitor flickered.
A weak rhythm appeared.
Then vanished.
Sophie covered her mouth.
Claire continued.
James had been taken from them once.
She would not accept it again.
“Come back.”
Another shock.
The monitor beeped.
Once.
Twice.
A slow rhythm appeared.
Ortiz checked his neck.
“I have a pulse.”
Claire nearly collapsed.
Sophie dropped beside James and gripped his hand.
“You broke your promise.”
His eyes remained closed.
“But you can fix it.”
Emergency workers finally reached the fiftieth floor.
Medics rushed in with equipment.
They transferred James onto a stretcher.
Claire followed until one medic stopped her.
“We need to move quickly.”
“Where are you taking him?”
“Rooftop extraction.”
“The wind—”
“The tower is stable enough now.”
Julian stood near the stretcher.
“I’m going.”
The medic nodded.
Claire looked at James’s pale face.
“Tell him Eli is waiting.”
Julian’s expression softened.
“I will.”
The stretcher disappeared through the service passage.
Sophie started to follow.
Claire caught her.
“We have to evacuate separately.”
“But James—”
“He has help.”
“You said Eli had help too, and the helicopter crashed.”
Claire knelt.
“You’re right to be scared.”
Sophie’s eyes filled.
“I’m tired of people almost dying.”
Claire held her close.
“So am I.”
Behind them, Daniel spoke.
“This is touching.”
Claire stood slowly.
Ortiz moved toward him.
“Save your breath.”
Daniel looked at Claire.
“James will never be a father.”
She stepped closer.
“He already is.”
“He knows nothing about raising a child.”
“And you knew nothing about loving one.”
Daniel smiled faintly.
“You think Eli will choose him?”
“This is not a contest.”
“It will become one.”
Claire stared at him.
Even in handcuffs, Daniel needed to plant fear.
Division.
Doubt.
He had survived by making people question each other.
She refused.
“Eli will decide what relationship he wants.”
Daniel looked toward Sophie.
“And her?”
“She decides too.”
Sophie stepped beside Claire.
“I already did.”
Daniel’s face hardened.
Federal agents led him toward the stairs.
This time, he did not resist.
He looked back once.
Not at Claire.
At Sophie.
She did not wave.
They began the slow evacuation.
The rescue elevators carried injured workers and board members first.
Claire, Sophie, Edward, Helen, and Ortiz descended through the emergency stairwell.
At floor thirty-eight, bomb technicians moved past them.
At floor twenty-nine, employees sat crying against the walls.
At floor seventeen, firefighters carried a woman who had broken her ankle.
Every floor revealed another person Daniel had been willing to sacrifice.
Claire looked at the company logo on the walls.
Bennett Industries had always seemed larger than human life.
Today, it looked like what it truly was.
An institution built by people.
Destroyed by one man’s fear.
When they reached the street, cameras surrounded them.
Reporters shouted.
Police lights flashed across the tower.
Daniel was placed into an armored vehicle.
He turned as the door closed.
Claire stood with Sophie in her arms.
For the first time, Daniel had no glass, wealth, employees, or lawyers between himself and consequences.
The vehicle drove away.
A medic approached Claire.
“Mrs. Bennett?”
“Yes.”
“Your brother-in-law has been transported to Mercy Central.”
“Is he alive?”
“He was alive when the helicopter left.”
“And Eli?”
Edward handed her a phone.
Thomas was on the line.
Claire answered.
“Thomas?”
“Eli is awake.”
Claire’s knees weakened.
“Is he stable?”
“For now. The device is working.”
“Tell him I’m coming.”
“He already knows.”
“How?”
Thomas sounded almost amused.
“He watched the tower evacuation on television.”
Claire looked at Sophie.
“Did he see what happened?”
“Enough.”
She closed her eyes.
Children should not have to see their families break apart on television.
“Claire,” Thomas continued, “there’s something else.”
Her relief tightened into fear.
“What?”
“The independent DNA team arrived.”
“And?”
“They confirmed he is your biological son.”
Claire pressed one hand to her mouth.
She had known.
Every part of her had known.
But the official truth still struck her with breathtaking force.
Thomas continued.
“They also confirmed James is his biological father.”
Claire looked toward the sky where the medical helicopter had disappeared.
“Does Eli know?”
“No.”
“Don’t tell him yet.”
“He asked.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“What did you say?”
“That the answer belonged to you and James.”
She nodded.
“Thank you.”
Thomas’s voice became more serious.
“There’s another match.”
Claire’s heart tightened.
“What match?”
“The cardiac mutation.”
“What about it?”
“It did not come from James.”
Claire frowned.
“Then from me?”
“No.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Not if the sample was contaminated or the mutation was introduced another way.”
Claire felt cold.
“Introduced?”
Thomas hesitated.
“There are indications Eli was exposed to an experimental gene therapy as an infant.”
Claire stared at the city around her.
“Who would do that?”
“Someone testing a treatment.”
Her mind went to the clinic.
The hidden medical files.
The repeated tests Daniel ordered.
“Daniel.”
“Maybe.”
“Why?”
“To see if the mutation could be triggered, suppressed, or inherited.”
Claire’s voice dropped.
“He used my son as an experiment.”
“There’s more.”
“What?”
“The therapy code belongs to a research division of Bennett Industries.”
Edward overheard.
His face changed.
“Project Lazarus.”
Claire turned toward him.
“What is that?”
Edward looked at Helen.
Neither answered.
Claire’s voice sharpened.
“What is Project Lazarus?”
Helen looked shaken.
“It was designed to preserve cardiac function after clinical death.”
Claire stared.
“To bring people back?”
“Not exactly.”
Edward spoke.
“To keep the body viable long enough for resuscitation.”
Claire thought of Eli.
Drugged until he appeared dead.
Declared dead.
Then revived.
His staged death had not only hidden him.
It had been a test.
Daniel had used his own family’s secret research on an infant.
Claire looked toward the armored vehicle carrying him away.
“What else did he do?”
Edward’s silence told her the answer would be worse.
A black sedan pulled up beside them.
Ortiz opened the door.
“We need to get you to the hospital.”
Claire climbed inside with Sophie.
Edward and Helen joined them.
As they drove, Claire looked back at Bennett Tower.
The lights still flashed red through the rain.
The building stood.
Barely.
Like the family Daniel had tried to destroy.
At Mercy Central, Claire rushed through the emergency wing.
She found James in surgery.
Julian waited outside.
Blood stained his shirt.
Not his own.
“How is he?”
Julian looked at the operating-room doors.
“The bullet damaged his lung.”
“Will he live?”
“The surgeon would not promise.”
Sophie sat beside Julian.
For the first time, the old man looked directly at his granddaughter.
“You saved him on the roof.”
Sophie shook her head.
“Mom did.”
Claire looked through the glass.
Machines surrounded James.
A surgeon worked beneath bright lights.
“He saved us first.”
Julian nodded.
“He has always done that.”
Claire looked at him.
“You knew he was alive for years.”
“Yes.”
“You helped him hide.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t either of you tell me?”
Julian’s eyes lowered.
“Because Daniel had people watching every message, account, and visitor around you.”
“You could have risked it.”
“We did.”
“When?”
“James returned to the city three years ago.”
Claire stared.
“He came to my house?”
“Twice.”
She remembered security incidents Daniel had dismissed.
A broken gate sensor.
A man seen near the east wall.
A letter intercepted by staff.
“Daniel found him.”
Julian nodded.
“He nearly killed him.”
Claire looked through the glass again.
James had spent years trying to return.
Daniel had spent years making him seem absent.
A nurse approached.
“Mrs. Bennett?”
“Yes.”
“Your son is asking for you.”
Claire’s breath caught.
She looked toward Sophie.
“Come with me.”
They followed the nurse to the pediatric cardiac unit.
Eli lay propped against white pillows.
Fresh clothes replaced his torn jacket.
The locket rested on the table beside him.
He looked impossibly small in the hospital bed.
But his eyes were open.
Alive.
Claire moved to him.
Eli watched her carefully.
“You came back.”
She sat beside him.
“I did.”
Sophie climbed onto the chair near the bed.
“And I helped stop a bomb.”
Eli blinked.
“What?”
Claire looked at her.
“Later.”
Sophie smiled.
“It was cool.”
“It was not cool.”
“A little.”
Eli almost smiled.
Then he looked past Claire.
“Where’s James?”
The question silenced the room.
Claire took his hand.
“He was hurt.”
“By Daniel?”
“Yes.”
“Is he dead?”
“No.”
She forced herself not to add I hope.
“He is in surgery.”
Eli stared at their joined hands.
“Is he really my father?”
Claire took a slow breath.
“Yes.”
He looked at her.
“Did you know?”
“Not when you were born.”
“Did he?”
“Not at first.”
“Did you love him?”
The question was too direct to escape.
Claire thought of James at the gala.
His guilt.
His silence.
His years of trying to return.
“I cared about him.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Sophie whispered, “He does that.”
Claire almost laughed.
Then she looked into Eli’s eyes.
“I don’t know what I felt then. Everything around that night was manipulated.”
“By Daniel.”
“Yes.”
Eli’s expression tightened.
“Does that make me bad?”
Claire felt her heart break.
“No.”
“I came from something bad.”
“No.”
She held his face gently.
“You came from me. You came from a moment neither James nor I fully understood. But you are not what was done to us.”
His eyes filled.
“Then what am I?”
Claire leaned closer.
“My son.”
Sophie touched his arm.
“And my brother.”
Eli looked at her.
“Even if we don’t get the dog?”
“We’re getting the dog.”
Claire sighed.
“We will discuss it.”
Sophie smiled.
“That means yes.”
Eli’s mouth curved slightly.
Then the heart monitor changed.
A rapid alarm sounded.
Thomas rushed into the room.
Claire stood.
“What is it?”
Thomas checked the device.
“The implanted defibrillator is detecting another signal.”
“What kind?”
He looked toward the hospital computer.
“An external command.”
Claire felt cold.
“Someone is trying to access his heart device.”
Daniel was in custody.
But Project Lazarus was still alive.
The screen flashed.
REMOTE SHUTDOWN REQUEST RECEIVED
Thomas stared at Claire.
May you like
“Someone is trying to turn it off.”
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