Chapter 8 - The Brother Who Left a Warning
Clara stared at the message.
Do not trust Samuel.
Her father stood behind her, breathing heavily.
“Daniel wrote that?” he asked.
The blood was fresh.
Clara turned.
“Why would he warn me about you?”
“I don’t know.”
“You brought us through the only entrance without cameras.”
“Because I knew the building.”
“You disappeared when the shooting started.”
“To cut the power.”
“And now Daniel is gone.”
Samuel stepped closer to the glass.
“Adrian may have forced him to write it.”
“Or Daniel discovered something.”
“We don’t have time for suspicion.”
“That is exactly what everyone says when they need me to stop asking questions.”
An explosion shook the eastern corridor.
Flames rose near the control room.
Adrian was destroying the facility.
Samuel grabbed Clara’s arm.
“We need to leave.”
She pulled free.
“I’m searching the room.”
“Clara.”
“My brother bled here.”
She found a thin piece of metal hidden beneath the chair.
A surgical staple.
Daniel had scratched tiny numbers into the floor.
417.
Samuel saw them.
“What does it mean?”
Clara photographed the marks.
“We’ll find out.”
They escaped through a drainage tunnel seconds before the west wing collapsed.
Outside, Chloe had already been transported to Marcus’s private clinic.
Julian remained with her.
Marcus reported that the contractions had slowed, but doctors were concerned about the drugs administered during the kidnapping.
Clara and Samuel drove separately to the clinic.
On the way, Clara searched corporate records for 0417.
It matched a storage designation beneath Whitmore Tower.
Sublevel 4, Unit 17.
The tower’s official plans showed only three basement levels.
Clara called the building’s head of security.
He denied knowing about a fourth.
She ordered the tower sealed.
At the clinic, Chloe slept under heavy monitoring.
Julian sat beside the bed.
His shirt was covered in blood that was not his.
When Clara entered, he stood.
“The baby’s heartbeat is stable.”
“Did she say anything?”
“She keeps asking for Daniel.”
“She saw him alive.”
“I know.”
Clara studied Julian’s face.
“You thought he was dead when you began sleeping with her.”
“Yes.”
“Did Chloe think he was dead?”
Julian’s answer took too long.
“I believed she did.”
Clara looked through the glass at Chloe.
“Ask the question correctly.”
Julian lowered his voice.
“I don’t know what Chloe believed.”
Samuel waited in the corridor.
The sight of him made Julian tense.
Clara showed Marcus the numbers from Daniel’s cell.
“Sublevel 4, Unit 17,” Marcus said.
“We go before Adrian does.”
Samuel shook his head.
“It could be another trap.”
Clara looked at him.
“Then you can stay here.”
“No.”
“You don’t trust me?”
“I don’t trust what Daniel may have discovered.”
They entered Whitmore Tower before dawn.
The elevators stopped at Basement 3.
Behind a maintenance panel, Marcus’s team found a biometric scanner.
Samuel placed his palm against it.
Access denied.
Clara tried.
Access granted.
A hidden elevator descended.
The display showed no floor numbers.
Only the silver symbol.
Sublevel 4 was colder than the levels above.
Rows of servers filled the first chamber.
The second contained locked cabinets labeled with names of politicians, business leaders, judges and military officers.
The third was Unit 17.
Clara used the brass key from Daniel’s envelope.
Inside, she found a small apartment.
Someone had lived there.
A bed.
A desk.
Medical equipment.
Photographs of Clara covered the wall, but these were different from the surveillance images in Chloe’s basement.
They showed her childhood.
Clara at six holding a red bicycle.
Clara at twelve beside her mother.
Clara at nineteen sleeping beside Samuel’s hospital bed.
On the desk rested a video recorder.
Clara pressed play.
Her mother appeared on the screen.
Laura Monroe had died when Clara was fourteen, officially from complications following pneumonia.
In the video, she looked thin and frightened.
“Samuel,” she said, staring into the camera. “If you are watching this, Evelyn knows about Daniel. Richard knows about the trust. They are using Clara’s medical records to prepare a continuity claim.”
The image flickered.
“I found evidence that Adrian is not protecting the program from Richard. He is protecting Richard from you.”
Samuel sat heavily on the bed.
Clara kept watching.
Her mother leaned closer to the camera.
“There is something you never told Clara. You must tell her before they use it.”
The recording cut to static.
Then another file began.
A much younger Samuel appeared.
He was arguing with Adrian.
Adrian’s voice came from off camera.
“The girl is not biologically yours.”
Clara stopped the video.
Nobody spoke.
She looked at Samuel.
His face had collapsed beneath the weight of the secret.
“Tell me,” she said.
Samuel’s eyes filled with tears.
“You are my daughter.”
“That isn’t what he said.”
“You are my daughter in every way that matters.”
Clara stepped backward.
“Who was my biological father?”
A soft clap sounded from the doorway.
May you like
Adrian stood there holding the black metal case.
“Now,” he said, “we finally reach the truth that built the empire.”
