CHAPTER 10 — THE WOMAN WHO WORE THEIR MOTHER’S FACE
Olivia’s wound closed enough to stop the bleeding.
Not completely.
The skin remained torn.
The tissue beneath it looked raw.
But the bullet had passed through without striking bone.
Gabriel lifted her carefully.
“We need to move.”
Clara kept the gun aimed at William.
“Where is Margaret?”
William wiped blood from his mouth.
“You’re still calling her that.”
Clara stepped closer.
“Answer me.”
“Would you believe me?”
“No.”
“Then why ask?”
Gabriel’s voice hardened.
“Because if you lie, I’ll know.”
William looked at him.
“You always overestimated that connection.”
Gabriel met his gaze.
“You always feared it.”
The two men stared at one another.
Father and son.
Creator and subject.
Victim and architect.
Clara saw the hatred between them.
But also something more dangerous.
Recognition.
William knew Gabriel’s mind.
Gabriel knew William’s cruelty.
Each understood how the other would move.
Mercer remained on the floor near Clara’s room, one hand pressed against his injured wrist.
Clara pointed the weapon toward him.
“Where did they take the woman from the lab?”
Mercer looked at William.
Clara fired into the floor beside his hand.
The shot echoed through the white rooms.
Mercer flinched.
“North wing.”
“Who took her?”
“Daniel.”
“The young doctor?”
“He isn’t a doctor.”
“What is he?”
Mercer hesitated.
William answered for him.
“Another survivor.”
Gabriel’s face changed.
“From which batch?”
“Twenty-three.”
Mercer snapped, “You said all later male subjects died.”
“I said they were unusable.”
William looked toward the security camera.
“Daniel proved useful in other ways.”
Clara’s anger deepened.
“How many children did you experiment on?”
William shrugged.
“Enough to learn.”
Olivia leaned against Gabriel.
Her face was pale.
“Where is Noah?”
William looked toward her.
“Daniel took him.”
Gabriel’s grip tightened around Olivia.
“Why?”
“Because Noah responds to him.”
“Noah responds to anyone he believes will take him to me.”
William smiled.
“Exactly.”
Clara motioned toward the corridor.
“You’re coming with us.”
William looked at the gun.
“You still don’t know how to use that.”
“I know which direction the bullet travels.”
“Clara,” Gabriel warned.
A low mechanical hum filled the room.
Steel shutters began descending over the exits.
Mercer had reached the control panel with his uninjured hand.
Gabriel moved first.
He threw a metal tray across the room.
It struck Mercer in the temple.
Mercer collapsed.
The shutters kept lowering.
Clara, Gabriel, and Olivia reached the main exit seconds before it sealed.
William remained on the other side.
He did not try to escape.
He simply watched them through the narrowing gap.
Clara aimed at him.
“Open it.”
William smiled.
“Find Mother.”
The shutter slammed shut.
The north corridor was colder than the rest of the facility.
Old pipes ran along the ceiling.
Several lights had burned out.
Gabriel carried Olivia until she insisted on walking.
“I’m slowing you down.”
“You were shot ten minutes ago.”
“And I’m still standing.”
“You are not invincible.”
“Neither are you.”
Gabriel looked at her.
For a moment, the laboratory disappeared from his face.
He looked like a brother hearing his sister argue for the first time.
Then he nodded.
They moved on.
Clara stayed ahead with the gun.
Voices drifted through her mind.
Not words.
Fragments.
Olivia’s pain.
Gabriel’s fear.
Both pressed against her consciousness.
She tried to block them.
Couldn’t.
“How do I turn it off?” she whispered.
Gabriel heard her anyway.
“You don’t.”
“That’s not helpful.”
“You learn which thoughts belong to you.”
“And until then?”
“You suffer.”
Clara glanced at him.
He was not being cruel.
He was telling the truth.
They reached a junction.
Three corridors.
No signs.
Clara closed her eyes.
Somewhere ahead, a child was crying.
Noah.
Not through the walls.
Inside her head.
A faint pulse of fear.
She pointed left.
“That way.”
Gabriel studied her.
“You feel him?”
“I think so.”
“Then go.”
They followed the left corridor to a set of double doors.
One stood open.
Inside was a nursery.
Rows of empty cribs.
Old mobile toys hung from the ceiling.
Painted clouds covered the walls.
A single orange candy sat on every pillow.
Olivia stopped.
“No.”
Clara turned.
Olivia’s face had become blank.
“Liv?”
“I remember this.”
Gabriel looked around.
“This was built after I escaped.”
Olivia stepped toward one crib.
Her hand brushed the wooden rail.
“I was here more than once.”
“You were five,” Clara said.
“No.”
Olivia looked at her.
“Later.”
Clara’s stomach tightened.
“What do you mean later?”
Olivia closed her eyes.
Images moved behind them.
“I came back.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
Gabriel watched her carefully.
“After Mother’s funeral?”
Olivia’s eyes opened.
“Yes.”
Clara stared at her.
“You came here twelve years ago?”
“I didn’t know where I was.”
“Who brought you?”
Olivia’s lips trembled.
“Ethan.”
The betrayal landed harder because it was no longer surprising.
Clara’s voice went cold.
“What happened?”
“He said we were meeting a specialist about my migraines.”
“And you believed him.”
“He was my husband.”
Gabriel’s face hardened.
“What did they do?”
Olivia touched her abdomen.
“I signed forms.”
Clara remembered the frozen eggs.
The fertility clinic.
The transfer rights.
“What forms?”
“I thought they were treatment consent.”
“Olivia.”
Her sister looked at her with dawning horror.
“They took eggs.”
Clara felt sick.
“How many?”
“I don’t know.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“Did they fertilize them?”
Olivia covered her mouth.
Before anyone could answer, a monitor mounted above the nursery door turned on.
Ethan appeared on-screen.
He stood in a narrow storage room.
His hands were free.
Ryan was beside him, holding a weapon.
“Clara,” Ethan said.
She looked upward.
“He can see us.”
A camera rotated toward them.
Ryan spoke.
“We’re in the western records wing. We got out when the gas system reset.”
“Where is Noah?” Clara asked.
“We don’t know.”
Olivia stepped beneath the camera.
“Ethan.”
His face broke when he saw the blood on her gown.
“Liv.”
“You brought me here twelve years ago.”
He went silent.
“You told me it was a migraine clinic.”
“I didn’t know what they planned.”
“You always say that.”
“I didn’t.”
“Did they take my eggs?”
Ethan looked away.
Olivia’s answer arrived before he spoke.
“Yes.”
“Did you know?”
“Not until afterward.”
“How many?”
“Sixteen.”
Olivia closed her eyes.
Clara fought the urge to shoot the screen.
“What happened to them?” Gabriel asked.
Ethan looked at him for the first time.
Shock crossed his face.
“You’re alive.”
Gabriel ignored it.
“What happened to the embryos?”
Ethan swallowed.
“Eight failed.”
“And the others?”
“Five were destroyed during development.”
“That leaves three.”
Ethan said nothing.
Olivia’s knees nearly buckled.
“No.”
Ryan stepped toward Ethan.
“Tell her.”
Ethan looked directly into the camera.
“One became Noah.”
Clara stared.
“Noah is Olivia’s son?”
“Biologically.”
Olivia made a sound that was almost a sob and almost a gasp.
Gabriel went completely still.
Noah had called Gabriel his father.
Because he was.
Gabriel and Olivia.
Brother and sister.
Clara felt horror move through the nursery.
Olivia shook her head repeatedly.
“No.”
“They used your egg and Gabriel’s stored material,” Ethan said.
“I never consented.”
“I know.”
“You knew Noah was mine?”
“Not at first.”
“When did you find out?”
“Two years ago.”
“And you called him your son.”
“I needed Blackridge to believe I would cooperate.”
“You let me think we couldn’t have children.”
Ethan’s voice cracked.
“I was trying to keep him alive.”
“You kept him from me.”
“I didn’t know where they held him.”
“But you knew he existed.”
“Yes.”
Olivia turned away from the screen.
Her body shook.
Gabriel stared at the empty cribs.
The truth hit him differently.
Not only had Blackridge used his blood.
They had made him a father without his knowledge.
With his own sister’s stolen egg.
Clara stepped beside him.
“Gabriel.”
He did not look at her.
“What were the other two embryos?” he asked.
Ethan’s silence deepened.
Gabriel looked up at the screen.
“What were they?”
“One was listed nonviable.”
“And the last?”
Ethan’s face turned pale.
“I don’t know.”
“Lie again,” Gabriel said quietly, “and I will find you before Blackridge does.”
Ryan looked at Ethan.
“Tell them.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
“The final embryo was carried to term.”
Olivia slowly turned back.
“By whom?”
“Lena Mercer.”
Noah’s presumed mother.
Clara understood.
Lena had not been Noah’s biological mother.
She had carried him.
But there had been another child.
“What happened to the baby?” Clara asked.
Ethan’s voice dropped.
“Female. Born seven years ago.”
“Where is she?”
“I never found out.”
Gabriel’s fear entered Clara’s mind like ice.
A daughter.
His daughter.
Olivia’s daughter.
A child neither knew existed.
The monitor suddenly flickered.
Daniel’s face replaced Ethan’s.
Young.
Calm.
Sharp features.
A crescent scar ran from his ear down the side of his neck.
He looked directly into the camera.
“Her name is Lily.”
Clara froze.
“Where is she?”
Daniel smiled.
“With the woman you believe is Margaret.”
The screen went black.
They found the north medical suite two corridors later.
The door had been left open.
Inside, a woman sat in a wheelchair facing away from them.
White hair fell over her shoulders.
A little girl stood beside her.
Seven years old.
Thin.
Dark curls.
Large hazel eyes.
A crescent-shaped scar behind her left ear.
The girl held the woman’s hand.
Clara lowered the gun slightly.
“Lily?”
The child turned.
She looked first at Olivia.
Then Gabriel.
Her eyes filled with recognition that should have been impossible.
“Mom?”
Olivia stopped moving.
The single word nearly destroyed her.
Lily released the woman’s hand.
She took one hesitant step toward Olivia.
Then another.
Olivia knelt despite the pain from her wound.
“I’m here.”
Lily ran into her arms.
Olivia held her tightly.
No questions.
No hesitation.
Some part of her body recognized what her memory could not.
Gabriel remained several feet away.
His face had gone empty.
Lily looked over Olivia’s shoulder.
She saw him.
Her expression changed.
“Dad?”
Gabriel turned away.
Clara caught his arm.
“Don’t.”
“She should not exist.”
“That isn’t her fault.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand exactly enough.”
Gabriel looked at Lily again.
The child stared at him with fear and hope.
He knelt slowly.
Lily did not run to him.
She only watched.
Gabriel held out one hand.
“I’m Gabriel.”
She looked at the scars across his knuckles.
“Daniel said you were dangerous.”
“He was right.”
Clara felt his shame.
Lily asked, “Will you hurt me?”
Gabriel’s eyes filled.
“Never.”
The woman in the wheelchair made a weak sound.
Clara turned toward her.
“Mom?”
She stepped closer.
The woman looked older than Margaret had looked in the laboratory.
Her face had the same bone structure.
The same mouth.
The same small line between the eyebrows.
But her eyes were wrong.
Empty.
Drugged.
Clara knelt before her.
“Margaret?”
The woman stared through her.
Then whispered, “Clara.”
Clara’s breath caught.
“Mom.”
The woman raised one shaking hand and touched Clara’s cheek.
“My brave girl.”
Clara began to cry.
For one second, she believed completely.
Then the woman’s fingers moved behind Clara’s ear.
Touched the scar.
And pressed.
A sharp electrical pain exploded through Clara’s skull.
She fell backward.
The woman surged out of the wheelchair with unnatural strength.
A blade appeared in her hand.
She grabbed Lily by the hair and pulled her against her body.
Olivia screamed.
Gabriel stepped forward.
The woman pressed the blade to Lily’s throat.
“Don’t.”
Her voice had changed.
No weakness.
No confusion.
Clara pushed herself upright.
“Who are you?”
The woman smiled.
“Margaret Bennett died eleven years ago.”
Olivia went pale.
“No.”
“You buried an empty coffin because William needed you to believe she might still be alive.”
Clara looked at the woman’s face.
Surgery.
Drugs.
Training.
A manufactured copy.
“Daniel made you look like her.”
“No.”
The woman’s smile widened.
“Margaret made me look like herself.”
Gabriel froze.
The woman continued.
“She knew Blackridge would never stop hunting her children.”
Clara’s pulse hammered.
“Then where is she?”
“Dead.”
“Where is the body?”
“Gone.”
Olivia held Lily’s gaze.
“Let her go.”
The woman ignored her.
“She chose me to protect the children.”
“By holding a knife to one?”
“Because you led William here.”
Gabriel took another step.
The blade pressed tighter.
A thin line of blood appeared on Lily’s neck.
Gabriel stopped instantly.
The woman looked at him.
“She is not your daughter.”
Olivia stared.
“What?”
The woman’s eyes shifted toward Clara.
“She is Clara’s.”
The room went silent.
Clara shook her head.
“No.”
“Your rejected eggs were not destroyed.”
“I never had eggs collected.”
“You had surgery at nineteen.”
Clara remembered an emergency procedure.
A ruptured ovarian cyst.
Ethan had helped Olivia recommend the surgeon.
Blackridge had been there long before she knew.
The woman smiled at Clara’s horror.
“Lily was created from Clara’s egg and Gabriel’s genetic material.”
Gabriel’s face twisted.
Clara felt bile rise in her throat.
William had designed every child to bind the siblings together through horror.
Noah was Olivia and Gabriel’s son.
Lily was Clara and Gabriel’s daughter.
The woman tightened her hold on Lily.
“Now tell me.”
May you like
Her gaze moved between the three siblings.
“Which child do you save first?”
