Chapter 6 - What Julian Built Beneath the Foundation
The motorboat moved directly toward us.
Rosie clung to my neck, coughing and crying as the freezing water dragged at our clothes. My arms were already losing strength.
Julian stood behind the steering wheel with the gun pointed toward the lake.
“Move away from her!” he shouted.
I tightened my hold on the child.
“You’ll have to kill me first.”
His face twisted.
“You think I won’t?”
A second gunshot shattered the air.
The bullet struck the boat’s windshield.
Julian ducked.
Agent Bell and two officers appeared on the dock behind us.
“Drop the weapon!”
Julian turned the boat sharply.
The movement threw him sideways.
Evan dove from the dock into the water and swam toward us. He reached Rosie first, helping support her weight while I struggled to remain conscious.
The cold had reached my bones.
My fingers no longer felt attached to my hands.
“Take her,” I gasped.
“I’ve got both of you.”
The police fired again, this time into the boat’s engine.
Smoke burst from the rear.
Julian aimed toward the dock.
Before he could shoot, the boat struck a submerged post.
The impact threw him over the side.
The gun disappeared beneath the water.
Officers pulled us from the lake.
I collapsed on the dock beside Rosie.
She was shivering violently, her wet hair plastered across her face. A paramedic wrapped her in heated blankets while she cried for Mrs. Vale.
“Where is she?” Rosie asked. “Where’s Mama Lydia?”
Agent Bell crouched beside her.
“We’re looking for her.”
“She was in the house.”
The flames had spread across the upper floor.
Firefighters entered through the rear while tactical officers searched the tunnel beneath the property.
I was placed inside an ambulance with Rosie.
She watched me through frightened eyes.
“You said your name is Clara.”
“Yes.”
“Julian has your picture.”
My pulse accelerated.
“What picture?”
“In his office. You’re wearing a blue dress.”
I remembered the photograph.
It had been taken at the foundation’s first gala, six years earlier. I wore a midnight-blue dress my mother had helped me choose before she died.
“What did Julian tell you about me?”
Rosie looked down at the blanket.
“He said you were sick.”
“Sick how?”
“He said you wanted to hurt children.”
Pain pressed behind my ribs.
“He lied.”
“He said you gave me away.”
“I didn’t know you existed.”
She studied my face.
“Why do we have the same eyes?”
The paramedic looked away, giving us privacy.
I swallowed hard.
“Because I may be your biological mother.”
Rosie’s eyebrows pulled together.
“What’s biological?”
“It means part of you came from me before you were born.”
“Like a seed?”
The simplicity of the question nearly broke me.
“Yes. Like a seed.”
“Then Mama Lydia grew me?”
“She may have helped take care of you.”
“No. She’s my mama.”
“I understand.”
“You can’t take her place.”
“I won’t try.”
Rosie’s lips trembled.
“Julian said you would.”
“Julian said many things because he wanted you to be afraid of me.”
“Why?”
“Because scared people are easier to control.”
She was silent.
Then she reached from beneath the blanket and touched the dimple in my cheek.
“I have one there.”
“I know.”
The ambulance doors opened.
Agent Bell climbed inside.
“They found Lydia Vale.”
“Alive?”
“Yes. Smoke inhalation, but she’s alive.”
Rosie cried with relief.
Bell looked at me.
“Julian is in custody.”
I exhaled for what felt like the first time in hours.
“Dr. Keene?”
“No sign of him.”
“Was he at the house?”
“We found recent medical equipment and documents bearing his signature.”
“What was he doing there?”
Bell’s expression hardened.
“Monitoring the child.”
Rosie pressed closer to me without seeming to realize it.
“Why?”
“We don’t know yet.”
At the hospital in Albany, doctors treated Rosie for hypothermia. Lydia Vale was admitted to a different floor under guard.
Her real name was Helen Ward.
She had worked as a nurse at Halston Women’s Institute during my fertility treatments.
I remembered her.
She was the woman who held my hand after the first failed procedure.
She had stroked my hair and whispered that some women were simply not meant to become mothers.
Now I knew she had already helped steal my eggs.
When I entered her guarded hospital room, Helen was breathing through an oxygen tube.
Her gray hair spread across the pillow. Her eyes opened when she heard me approach.
“You saved her,” she whispered.
“You knew who I was.”
“Yes.”
“You knew Rosie was my child.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“Yes.”
I stood at the foot of the bed.
“Why?”
“Dr. Keene said the program would help infertile families.”
“I was the infertile family.”
“At first, I believed your embryos had been donated.”
“Without my consent?”
“He said your husband authorized it.”
“My husband did not own my body.”
Helen closed her eyes.
“I know that now.”
“No. You knew it then.”
She began coughing.
A guard stepped closer, but I raised my hand.
“Where did Rosie come from?”
“One of your embryos.”
“Created with Julian?”
Helen nodded.
My stomach tightened.
Julian was her genetic father.
The man who had kidnapped her, lied to her, and used her as leverage was also biologically connected to her.
“Why was she hidden?”
“Because she was part of the inheritance project.”
“What project?”
Helen looked toward the door.
“He’ll kill me.”
“Julian is in custody.”
“Not Julian.”
“Dr. Keene?”
She shook her head.
“Keene worked for someone else.”
“Who?”
Helen’s fingers trembled beneath the blanket.
“The foundation board.”
I stared at her.
“My foundation?”
“Not everyone. Three members.”
“Names.”
“I only knew one.”
“Tell me.”
She hesitated.
“Charles Whitmore.”
I knew the name.
Charles Whitmore was the foundation’s vice chairman, Julian’s longtime mentor, and the man who introduced us at a charity event eleven years ago.
He was also the attorney who drafted the succession clause.
The discovery struck deeper than Julian’s betrayal.
Charles had known my mother.
He attended her funeral.
He once told me he regarded me as a daughter.
“What did Charles want?”
“Control.”
“He already had a board position.”
“He wanted the research properties.”
“What research?”
Helen’s fear became visible.
“The foundation clinics collected genetic samples from thousands of low-income patients. Keene used them to build a private database.”
My skin went cold.
“For what purpose?”
“Embryo selection. Disease prediction. Intelligence markers. Physical traits.”
“They were designing children?”
“Selecting them.”
“And my children?”
“Proof that the process worked.”
I looked toward Rosie’s room across the hall.
“What was special about my embryos?”
“Your family has an unusual genetic resistance to a hereditary heart condition.”
My mother had died from a heart condition.
I had created the foundation because of it.
“Resistance?”
“Your mother carried the disease marker but remained healthy for decades. You do not carry the active mutation. Keene believed your eggs could help isolate protective genes.”
“So they used my children as experiments.”
Helen began crying.
“I tried to protect Rosie.”
“You kept her imprisoned.”
“I raised her.”
“You taught her to fear me.”
“Julian insisted.”
“And the second child?”
Her breathing changed.
“What second child?”
“Julian said another child was born in Europe.”
Helen looked away.
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do.”
“Clara—”
“Where is my child?”
She pulled off the oxygen tube and spoke quickly.
“Geneva. Saint Aurelia Children’s Residence.”
Agent Bell, standing near the door, wrote down the name.
“Boy or girl?” I asked.
“A boy.”
“How old?”
“Five.”
Five years old.
Older than Rosie.
That meant the first transfer had taken place during the early months of my treatment.
While Julian and I were supposedly trying to create our own family, someone had already used my embryo to create a child for another purpose.
“What is his name?”
“Samuel.”
The name was another wound.
Samuel had been my father’s name.
Julian knew that too.
“Who is raising him?”
Helen’s eyes moved toward Agent Bell.
“A family paid by the program.”
“Does he know anything about me?”
“No.”
“Is he safe?”
“I don’t know.”
Bell immediately left the room to contact authorities in Switzerland.
I remained beside Helen.
“What does Charles Whitmore gain from children carrying my genetics?”
“Control of the foundation.”
“How?”
“The succession clause.”
I shook my head.
“The clause gives authority to my biological descendants.”
“Yes.”
“Then children connected to me would strengthen my control, not his.”
“Not if you were declared mentally incompetent.”
My blood turned cold.
Helen continued.
“If you were permanently discredited, the guardian appointed for your descendants would exercise their voting authority.”
“Julian.”
“Initially.”
“Initially?”
“Julian was never meant to keep the foundation.”
The truth settled slowly.
Julian had believed he was stealing my organization.
But Charles Whitmore had been using him too.
“Who was supposed to become guardian?”
Helen looked directly into my eyes.
“Charles.”
A knock sounded at the door.
A hospital administrator stepped inside.
“Ms. Hale, there is an urgent call for you from St. Jude’s.”
I answered the phone.
Dr. Vance’s voice came through.
“Clara, the court approved temporary protective arrangements for Oliver.”
“Where is he?”
There was a pause.
“That’s why I’m calling.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“What happened?”
“Sienna disappeared during transport.”
My heart stopped.
“She took Oliver?”
“No.”
“Then where is he?”
Dr. Vance lowered his voice.
“Someone posing as a child-welfare officer removed him from the hospital.”
I looked toward Helen.
She had heard every word.
Her expression filled with terror.
“Charles,” she whispered.
Then every monitor beside her bed began screaming.
Helen’s body convulsed.
A nurse rushed into the room.
As doctors surrounded her, she grabbed my wrist with surprising strength.
“Don’t trust the foundation board,” she gasped.
May you like
Her eyes rolled toward the doorway.
“And don’t trust Audrey Vance.”
