For most of my life, my mother existed in three photographs.
Elizabeth Vale laughing beside a lake.
Elizabeth holding me on my third birthday.
Elizabeth standing beside my father with one hand resting on my shoulder.
I remembered almost nothing else.
A perfume.
A song.
The feeling of fingers brushing my hair while I fell asleep.
And a funeral.
I remembered that clearly.
The black dress.
The flowers.
My father holding my hand while a coffin disappeared into the ground.
I had been six years old.
Now I stared at a medical photograph of the woman I had buried twenty-nine years earlier.
Alive.
Older.
Unconscious.
“Where is she?”
Adrian did not answer quickly enough.
I grabbed his shirt.
“WHERE IS MY MOTHER?”
“Alexander’s facility.”
“The same place as Lily?”
“Yes.”
I released him.
Rebecca moved toward the computer.
“What condition does Elizabeth have?”
My father sat down.
“It started before Brooke was born.”
“What started?”
“A degenerative genetic disorder.”
“Name?”
“They never gave it one.”
I stared at him.
“That makes no sense.”
“It wasn’t naturally occurring.”
The church became silent.
“What?”
My father looked at me.
“Your mother worked at Mercer Biotech.”
“I know.”
“She discovered Alexander was conducting unauthorized genetic experiments.”
“And?”
“She threatened to expose him.”
I already knew where this was going.
“What did he do to her?”
“During what she believed was a routine fertility treatment, Alexander’s team introduced an experimental vector.”
Rebecca whispered:
“He experimented on Elizabeth?”
“Yes.”
“Without consent?”
“Yes.”
My stomach turned.
“What happened?”
“For several years, nothing.”
“And then?”
“Neurological deterioration.”
I looked at the photograph.
My mother surrounded by machines.
“She became sick.”
“Yes.”
“You told me she died.”
“I thought hiding you was the only way to keep Alexander from using you too.”
“You held a funeral.”
“Yes.”
“There was a coffin.”
“Empty.”
I wanted to scream.
Instead, my voice became frighteningly calm.
“You let a six-year-old bury an empty coffin.”
My father began crying.
“Yes.”
“You watched me put flowers on it.”
“Yes.”
“You watched me talk to her grave every birthday.”
His face collapsed.
“Yes.”
I stepped away because I no longer trusted myself near him.
Caleb stood across the room watching us.
For the first time, I understood something about him.
Adults had always called deception protection.
My father had protected me with an empty coffin.
Marianne had protected Lily with a false identity.
Lawrence had protected his ambition with lies.
Helena had protected a dynasty by destroying mothers.
Alexander had protected a bloodline by creating children.
Everyone had a noble word for what they did.
The children were the ones who paid for it.
“Why create twenty-six children to save her?”
Rebecca asked.
Adrian wiped his face.
“Because Elizabeth’s condition affects multiple systems.”
“Organs?”
“Eventually.”
“Bone marrow?”
“Yes.”
“Nervous tissue?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca looked sick.
“You can’t simply transplant your way out of a degenerative genetic disorder.”
“No.”
“Then why the children?”
“Alexander wasn’t looking for ordinary donors.”
My father looked at the Project Eve file.
“He was looking for genetically compatible test subjects.”
I understood.
“Children similar enough to my mother biologically that he could test treatments on them first.”
“Yes.”
My stomach twisted.
“And Grace?”
Adrian closed his eyes.
“Grace was supposed to be the final version.”
“Stop calling her that.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What makes her different?”
“I don’t know everything.”
“Then tell me what you do know.”
My father looked toward Caleb.
Caleb opened another document.
PROJECT EVE — TERMINAL PROTOCOL.
Most of it was encrypted.
One line was visible.
FINAL SUBJECT MUST DEMONSTRATE CORRECTED EXPRESSION OF EVE MUTATION.
Rebecca leaned closer.
“Eve mutation?”
Caleb nodded.
“That’s what Marianne was talking about.”
The unauthorized modification.
“Grace carries a corrected version of whatever Alexander did to my mother?”
“That’s our theory.”
“And he needs Grace for treatment?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
Caleb looked at me.
“Or he needs her to reproduce the correction.”
My entire body tightened.
“No one touches her.”
“No one here wants that.”
I looked at Caleb.
“Do you?”
He held my gaze.
“No.”
“Even if Grace could save Elizabeth?”
“No.”
The answer came immediately.
I had expected anger.
Instead, I felt relief.
“Why?”
Caleb’s voice hardened.
“Because I know what it feels like when adults decide one child’s body belongs to someone else.”
No one spoke.
Then Noah stepped forward.
“There’s something you haven’t seen.”
Caleb turned.
“Noah.”
“You keep saying that.”
“What?”
“That there are things she shouldn’t see.”
He looked at me.
“That’s how all of this started.”
Caleb said nothing.
Noah walked to the laptop.
He opened a hidden directory.
SUBJECT 17 — PRIVATE ARCHIVE.
“What is this?” I asked.
“Something I stole before I escaped.”
He entered a password.
A video appeared.
Marianne.
She was younger.
Maybe fifteen years younger.
She sat alone in a laboratory.
“This recording is for Brooke Vale.”
My heart stopped.
The date was two weeks after Lily’s birth.
Marianne looked directly into the camera.
“If you are watching this, then Adrian failed to keep Project Eve buried.”
My father closed his eyes.
Marianne continued.
“Brooke, there is something you must understand before anyone tells you that these children were created to save Elizabeth.”
She paused.
“That was the justification.”
Not the purpose.
I knew it before she said it.
“Alexander Mercer does not care about saving your mother.”
My father looked up.
“What?”
“He never did.”
Adrian moved toward the screen.
“No.”
Marianne continued.
“Elizabeth’s illness became useful because it gave Alexander permission to pursue research no ethics board would approve.”
Rebecca whispered:
“A pretext.”
“Yes,” Caleb said.
The video continued.
“The twenty-six children are not donor candidates.”
I stared at the screen.
“They are proof-of-concept subjects for inheritable human genetic modification.”
My father looked stunned.
“Alexander told me—”
Marianne’s recording continued as if answering him.
“Adrian believes Project Eve exists to cure Elizabeth. Let him believe it. His guilt makes him useful.”
I turned toward my father.
He looked shattered.
Marianne continued.
“Lawrence believes Project Eve exists to control corporate succession.”
Another lie.
“Helena believes it will restore Alexander’s bloodline.”
Another.
“Every person involved has been given a different reason.”
Rebecca whispered:
“So nobody understands the whole project.”
Exactly.
“Only Alexander knows the final objective.”
Marianne looked down.
When she looked back at the camera, she was crying.
“But I discovered it.”
The recording glitched.
Noah moved closer.
“Come on.”
Static.
Then Marianne returned.
“Alexander does not want to create healthier humans.”
The video distorted again.
“He wants to create humans who can be—”
The audio vanished.
“No.”
Noah hit the keyboard.
Nothing.
“What did she say?”
“I never recovered that section.”
The video jumped forward.
Marianne was still crying.
“Lily was the first success.”
Caleb looked toward me.
“Success at what?”
Marianne continued.
“But she was incomplete.”
Then another sentence.
“Subject Two showed the trait more strongly.”
Caleb froze.
Subject Two.
Him.
Everyone looked at Caleb.
“What trait?”
“I don’t know.”
He sounded frightened now.
The recording continued.
“By Subject Seventeen, Alexander had achieved—”
Static.
Noah.
Then:
“Grace may represent the first complete expression.”
I stared.
Again that phrase.
Complete expression.
Expression of what?
Marianne leaned toward the camera.
“If Grace is born, Alexander will come for her.”
Then the final sentence:
“And if he succeeds, what happens to Grace will not end with Grace.”
The recording stopped.
Nobody moved.
Caleb whispered:
“What the hell did they put inside us?”
That was when Eva collapsed.
Her body hit the floor.
“EVA!”
Caleb ran to her.
She was conscious.
Barely.
Her muscles were spasming.
“Call an ambulance!”
“No hospitals!” Caleb shouted.
“She needs help!”
“This has happened before.”
I froze.
“What?”
Caleb lifted Eva.
“Three of us have episodes.”
“What kind?”
“Seizures. Fevers. Sometimes hallucinations.”
Rebecca looked at Noah.
“You too?”
He nodded.
“Since I was thirteen.”
“How often?”
“More lately.”
I remembered Lawrence.
Immune response.
Metabolism.
Neurological development.
These children were not merely being observed.
Their bodies were changing.
Caleb carried Eva toward the back room.
I followed.
He placed her on a mattress.
She grabbed my wrist.
Her eyes opened.
“Brooke.”
“I’m here.”
“I saw her.”
“Who?”
“Your mother.”
My blood went cold.
“What?”
Eva’s eyes were unfocused.
“She talks to us.”
Caleb looked at me.
“Hallucination.”
But Eva tightened her grip.
“No.”
She looked directly into my eyes.
“She says your name.”
“How would Eva know Elizabeth?” Rebecca asked.
Nobody answered.
Eva whispered:
“She says she’s sorry.”
I crouched beside her.
“Eva, where do you see her?”
“In the white room.”
“What white room?”
“When I sleep.”
Caleb shook his head.
“Don’t encourage it.”
But Noah was staring at Eva.
“You see the room too?”
Everyone stopped.
Eva looked at him.
“Yes.”
Noah went pale.
“So do I.”
Then another girl spoke from the doorway.
“Me too.”
Hannah.
Caleb slowly stood.
“What?”
Hannah looked terrified.
“The white room.”
Another boy raised his hand.
Then another.
Five children.
Same dream.
Same woman.
My mother.
Rebecca whispered:
“That’s impossible.”
Noah shook his head.
“It isn’t a dream.”
“How do you know?”
“Because sometimes we remember things afterward.”
“What things?”
“Numbers.”
“What numbers?”
“Codes.”
Caleb stared at him.
“What codes?”
Noah went to the computer.
He typed a sequence.
A locked Project Eve directory opened.
Everyone froze.
“How did you know that password?”
“I saw it in the white room.”
My skin prickled.
“Noah.”
He looked at me.
“Your mother gave it to me.”
No.
There had to be another explanation.
Conditioning.
Hidden messages.
Something.
Anything.
Rebecca seemed to reach the same conclusion.
“Somebody may have implanted information through audiovisual conditioning.”
Caleb nodded.
“Exactly.”
Noah opened the newly unlocked folder.
Inside were neurological scans.
Implant records.
I stared.
“Implants?”
Caleb whispered:
“Oh my God.”
The children had tiny experimental neural devices.
Not all of them.
Subjects 17 through 26.
Including Grace.
I stopped breathing.
“Grace has an implant?”
The file said:
SUBJECT 26 — PRENATAL BIOINTERFACE SUCCESSFUL.
“No.”
I called Grace’s doctor.
“Get imaging immediately.”
Rebecca grabbed my arm.
“Brooke.”
“What?”
She pointed at the screen.
Another file had opened.
NETWORK STATUS.
Ten subjects.
Ten signals.
Nine active.
One dormant.
Grace.
Then the dormant signal changed.
ACTIVE.
My phone rang.
Grace’s security team.
I answered.
“What happened?”
The agent sounded panicked.
“Ms. Vale, Grace started crying.”
“What’s wrong?”
“We don’t know.”
“Is she breathing?”
“Yes.”
“Fever?”
“No.”
Then I heard Grace screaming through the phone.
A sound no mother should ever hear.
“Take her to the hospital.”
“We’re moving.”
Suddenly the screaming stopped.
Complete silence.
“Grace?”
The agent shouted.
Then whispered:
“What the hell?”
“What?”
“Every electronic device in the room just turned on.”
I looked at the Project Eve screen.
The ten active signals began synchronizing.
Noah grabbed his head.
Eva screamed.
Caleb fell to one knee.
Around the church, children began collapsing.
“CALEB!”
He looked at me.
His eyes were filled with terror.
Then all nine children spoke.
At exactly the same time.
The same words.
The same rhythm.
The same voice.
Not theirs.
A woman’s voice.
My mother’s.
“Brooke, if you can hear me, do not bring Grace to Alexander.”
My blood turned to ice.
The children continued together:
“Bring her to me.”
PART 12 — THE VOICE INSIDE THE CHILDREN
Nobody moved.
Nine children lay scattered across the abandoned church, their bodies trembling as the same impossible sentence hung in the air.
“Bring her to me.”
Then silence.
Caleb collapsed completely.
“CALEB!”
Connor reached him first.
I dropped beside Noah.
His eyes were open, but he wasn’t responding.
“Can you hear me?”
Nothing.
Rebecca checked his pulse.
“Strong.”
Eva suddenly gasped.
Then Noah.
Then Hannah.
One after another, the children began waking.
Caleb opened his eyes last.
Connor helped him sit up.
“What happened?”
Caleb stared at him.
“You don’t remember?”
“Remember what?”
“You spoke.”
“I didn’t.”
“All of you did.”
Caleb looked around.
“About what?”
My phone was still connected to Grace’s security team.
The agent spoke.
“Ms. Vale?”
“Yes.”
“Grace is stable.”
Relief hit me so hard I almost fell.
“Get her scanned immediately.”
“We’re six minutes from the hospital.”
“Do not let anyone separate her from the security team.”
“Understood.”
I ended the call.
Rebecca was already examining the Project Eve files.
“This wasn’t telepathy.”
“Obviously.”
“Then somebody triggered the implants remotely.”
“Elizabeth?”
“Maybe.”
“My mother has supposedly been unconscious for decades.”
“Supposedly.”
That word had become poisonous.
Caleb stood unsteadily.
“What did we say?”
I looked at him.
“You told me not to bring Grace to Alexander.”
“And?”
“You said to bring her to Elizabeth.”
Caleb went still.
“I didn’t say that.”
“I know.”
Noah whispered:
“I remember something.”
We turned.
“What?”
“The white room.”
His hands shook.
“It wasn’t a dream this time.”
“What did you see?”
“A woman.”
“Elizabeth?”
He nodded.
“She was awake.”
My heart pounded.
“What did she say?”
Noah looked at me.
“She said Alexander is coming.”
A vehicle engine roared outside.
Everyone froze.
Rebecca drew her weapon.
Headlights swept across the boarded windows.
Then another engine.
Then another.
Caleb shouted:
“Positions!”
The teenagers moved with terrifying efficiency.
Tables overturned.
Doors locked.
Computers disappeared into hidden compartments.
These were children.
But they had learned to survive like soldiers.
I hated every adult responsible for that.
Someone pounded on the church door.
Three times.
Pause.
Twice.
Caleb lowered his weapon.
“That’s ours.”
The door opened.
A young man stumbled inside.
Blood covered one side of his jacket.
Caleb ran toward him.
“Ethan?”
Subject Four.
Ethan collapsed into his arms.
“They moved them.”
“Who?”
“Alexander.”
“Lily?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Ethan shook his head.
“Not the mountain facility.”
“Then where?”
“He knew we found it.”
Caleb cursed.
Ethan looked at me.
“You’re Brooke.”
“Yes.”
He reached into his jacket.
“Lily told me to give you this.”
A small memory card.
Rebecca inserted it into an isolated laptop.
One video.
Lily appeared.
Her hands were restrained.
Her face was bruised.
But her voice was steady.
“Brooke, if you’re watching this, don’t come for me.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course she would say that.
“Alexander wants Grace. He keeps saying Grace is the key to waking Eve.”
Eve.
Elizabeth.
My mother.
Lily continued.
“Marianne says he’s lying. She says Elizabeth has been awake before.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
The video continued.
“Marianne says the coma isn’t constant. Elizabeth wakes for short periods, sometimes hours, sometimes days.”
Rebecca looked at Adrian.
“You knew?”
“No.”
Lily continued.
“She also says the implants aren’t for controlling us.”
Caleb leaned closer.
“Then what are they for?”
Lily answered from the recording.
“They’re for communication.”
I stared at the screen.
“Communication between whom?”
Lily swallowed.
“Us.”
The room became silent.
“Marianne says Alexander discovered something in Subject Seventeen—Noah. When two implanted subjects were close together, their devices synchronized.”
Noah touched the back of his head.
“Then they expanded the system.”
Lily nodded as though she could hear him.
“Grace’s prenatal interface was designed to connect all compatible subjects simultaneously.”
Caleb whispered:
“A network.”
Rebecca looked horrified.
“A human neural network.”
Lily continued.
“But Marianne changed Grace’s interface.”
The unauthorized modification.
“What did she do?”
“She made Grace the only subject who could terminate the network.”
Caleb stared at me.
That was the secret.
Grace wasn’t the final weapon.
She was the kill switch.
Lily continued.
“Alexander needs Grace because the network activated before he was ready.”
I remembered the children speaking together.
Elizabeth’s voice.
“Something else is controlling it.”
Lily nodded on-screen.
“Elizabeth.”
My heart stopped.
“She found a way into the network years ago.”
“How?”
“Her treatment system uses the same interface architecture.”
Rebecca whispered:
“That’s why they see her.”
The white room.
The codes.
The shared dreams.
Not dreams.
Fragments of communication.
Lily’s eyes filled with tears.
“Brooke, Marianne says Elizabeth has been trying to reach you through us.”
I stepped closer to the screen.
My mother had been trapped somewhere for twenty-nine years.
And somehow she had been whispering through children I never knew existed.
Then Lily said:
“But there’s a problem.”
Of course there was.
“There is always a problem,” Rebecca muttered.
Lily looked over her shoulder.
“Alexander discovered Elizabeth was communicating with us.”
My stomach tightened.
“What did he do?”
“He disconnected her.”
The video glitched.
Then Lily returned.
“She has less than seventy-two hours.”
“Until what?”
Lily started crying.
“Until they terminate life support.”
My knees weakened.
“No.”
“Alexander says Grace can stabilize her.”
There it was.
The trap.
Save Lily.
Save fourteen children.
Save my mother.
Just bring Grace.
Lily shook her head violently.
“Don’t do it.”
I whispered:
“I won’t.”
“Even if they hurt me.”
My throat closed.
“Lily…”
“Even if they kill me.”
“No.”
“Brooke, listen.”
Her voice became stronger.
“I spent sixteen years wondering why my biological mother didn’t want me.”
Tears blurred my vision.
“Then I learned you never had a choice.”
She swallowed.
“So I’m giving you one.”
I covered my mouth.
“Choose Grace.”
The video ended.
Nobody spoke.
Then Caleb turned toward me.
“We’re getting Lily ourselves.”
“No.”
He stared.
“No?”
“You’re seventeen.”
“So?”
“So Alexander has already stolen enough of your childhood.”
“He has my sister.”
“And I’m going to help get her back.”
“You?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t even know how to fight.”
Rebecca cleared her throat.
“I do.”
Caleb looked at her.
She continued.
“And unlike all of you, I’m old enough to have developed healthy fear.”
That almost produced a smile.
Almost.
Then Adrian stepped forward.
“I know where Alexander moved them.”
Everyone turned.
“How?”
“He has one facility nobody else knows about.”
Rebecca stared.
“You said the mountain complex was his last facility.”
“I lied.”
I laughed without humor.
“Of course you did.”
Adrian accepted it.
“Where?”
He looked at me.
“Under Vale Global headquarters.”
I thought I had misheard him.
“What?”
“The original building was constructed over Mercer Biotech’s first laboratory.”
“My office was above it?”
“Yes.”
“For years?”
“Yes.”
“You let me work there?”
“I believed it was sealed.”
“You believe many convenient things.”
“Yes.”
Caleb approached the computer.
“Blueprints?”
My father nodded.
“I have partial plans.”
“Partial?”
“Alexander redesigned the lower levels.”
Rebecca asked:
“Entrances?”
“Three.”
“Security?”
“Unknown.”
“Ventilation?”
“Independent.”
“Power?”
“Independent.”
Caleb looked at me.
“He could keep people underground indefinitely.”
My mother.
Lily.
Marianne.
Fourteen children.
Perhaps more.
All beneath the company whose shares people had spent decades murdering each other to control.
The empire had literally been built on top of them.
Then my phone rang.
The hospital.
I answered immediately.
“Grace?”
The doctor’s voice was tight.
“Ms. Vale, the scan found something.”
I closed my eyes.
“The implant.”
“Yes.”
“Can you remove it?”
Silence.
“Doctor?”
“Not safely.”
“Why?”
“It isn’t simply an implant.”
“What does that mean?”
“It appears integrated with surrounding tissue.”
My stomach dropped.
“How?”
“We don’t know.”
“Is Grace in danger?”
“Not immediately.”
“Then what?”
“There’s something else.”
I hated those words.
“What?”
“Her scan produced a signal.”
“A signal to where?”
“We traced the frequency.”
Rebecca moved closer.
“And?”
The doctor hesitated.
“It’s transmitting to another device approximately eleven miles away.”
Vale Global headquarters was eleven miles from the hospital.
My blood froze.
“Can you tell whether something is transmitting back?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“We can’t decode it.”
Then Grace began crying in the background.
At the same moment, every computer in the church turned on.
Noah grabbed his head.
Caleb stumbled.
Eva screamed.
A single message appeared across every screen.
BROOKE.
Then:
HE IS LYING.
I stared.
“Who?”
Another message appeared.
ADRIAN.
I slowly turned toward my father.
His face went white.
“No.”
The screens changed.
ASK HIM WHO AUTHORIZED SUBJECT 26.
Grace.
I looked at Adrian.
“Who authorized Grace?”
He backed away.
“Brooke—”
“WHO?”
“I can explain.”
Caleb moved between him and the exit.
My father looked around.
Trapped.
Finally he whispered:
“I did.”
Everything inside me stopped.
“You authorized the embryo?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“The final protocol.”
My voice shook.
“You knew Grace would be modified?”
“I knew Alexander needed a final subject.”
“And you let him use me?”
“I thought I could control the outcome.”
I slapped him again.
This time he fell.
Connor caught my arm before I could hit him twice.
“Brooke.”
“LET ME GO.”
Adrian remained on the floor.
Blood touched his lip.
“I deserve it.”
“Stop saying that!”
I was screaming now.
“Stop confessing after the damage is done and calling that accountability!”
The screens changed again.
ADRIAN DID NOT AUTHORIZE ME.
I froze.
Me?
The next message appeared.
I DID.
Nobody breathed.
Then two words.
ELIZABETH VALE.
My mother.
I stared at the screen.
“No.”
Another message.
I CHOSE GRACE.
My stomach turned.
The woman I had spent the last hour believing was Alexander’s prisoner had authorized the final experiment herself.
“Why?”
The answer appeared slowly.
BECAUSE I NEEDED SOMEONE STRONG ENOUGH TO END PROJECT EVE.
Then:
GRACE WAS NEVER CREATED TO SAVE ME.
A pause.
SHE WAS CREATED TO KILL THE NETWORK.
Rebecca whispered:
“Then why hasn’t Elizabeth terminated it herself?”
The answer appeared.
BECAUSE ALEXANDER CONNECTED THE NETWORK TO THE CHILDREN’S AUTONOMIC FUNCTIONS.
Caleb went pale.
“What does that mean?”
Rebecca understood first.
“If the network is shut down incorrectly…”
She looked around at the teenagers.
“…their hearts could stop.”
The next message confirmed it.
TWENTY-TWO SURVIVING SUBJECTS ARE CURRENTLY LINKED.
Twenty-two.
Not twenty-three.
Three had died.
Grace made twenty-six.
One number was missing.
I counted again.
“Wait.”
Caleb understood too.
“Twenty-two surviving subjects?”
“Yes.”
“Three dead.”
“Yes.”
“Grace.”
“Yes.”
“That totals twenty-six.”
He stared at the screen.
“But Lily and I thought twenty-four others were alive.”
The screen changed.
INCORRECT.
Then:
SUBJECT 25 WAS NEVER A CHILD.
Silence.
“What?”
Another message appeared.
SUBJECT 25 WAS THE CONTROL.
Rebecca whispered:
“What control?”
Then a photograph filled every screen.
A newborn baby.
The label beneath it read:
SUBJECT 25 — CONTROL GENOME.
Biological mother:
ELIZABETH VALE.
I stopped breathing.
Not me.
Elizabeth.
Biological father:
ALEXANDER MERCER.
My mother.
Alexander.
A child.
The date of birth was thirty-five years ago.
One year before I was born.
I looked at Adrian.
He was crying.
“You knew.”
“Yes.”
“Who is Subject Twenty-Five?”
He shook his head.
“Brooke…”
“WHO?”
The photograph changed.
Newborn.
Child.
Teenager.
Adult.
I watched the face age across the screens.
Then the final photograph appeared.
A man I knew.
A man who had manipulated Helena.
Created Grace.
Destroyed my marriage.
Held a newborn hostage.
And claimed Alexander Mercer was his father.
Lawrence.
My blood turned cold.
Lawrence was not simply Alexander’s secret son.
He was Elizabeth’s son too.
My mother’s first child.
My half-brother.
And Grace’s biological father.
Which meant the truth was even more horrifying than I had imagined.
Grace had been created using genetic material from two people who shared the same biological mother.
Me.
And Lawrence.
The screens went black.
Then one final message appeared.
BROOKE, GET GRACE OUT NOW.
My phone rang.
The hospital security chief was screaming.
“Ms. Vale!”
“What happened?”
“Someone breached the maternity floor.”
“Who?”
“We don’t know.”
“Where is Grace?”
A gunshot exploded through the phone.
Then another.
I heard the doctor scream.
And through the chaos, a familiar male voice came onto the line.
Alexander Mercer.
“Brooke.”
I couldn’t breathe.
“You have something that belongs to me.”
“No.”
Alexander laughed.
“I’m not talking about Grace.”
Silence.
“Then what?”
He answered:
“My son.”
Lawrence.
And suddenly I understood.
The prison attack.
The escape.
The lies.
Alexander had never been trying to kill Lawrence.
He had been trying to retrieve Subject Twenty-Five.
The control.
The only living person who might reveal exactly what Project Eve had done to all of us.
