Chapter 5 - the embryo that did not belong to julian
The second protocol began with a missing medical record.
Elias took Vivian to a private clinic outside the city, where a physician unaffiliated with the Vale family performed an ultrasound. The baby appeared healthy. Vivian’s blood pressure was elevated from stress but remained manageable.
While she rested, Elias contacted the Vale Reproductive Institute and requested her complete laboratory file.
The clinic refused.
They claimed Vivian had signed a privacy restriction preventing disclosure to outside physicians.
“I never signed that,” Vivian said.
“They have a document with your signature.”
“I want to see it.”
The clinic sent a scanned copy.
Vivian recognized the final page from a packet Julian had brought home months earlier. He had told her it authorized insurance billing.
The first nine pages were different.
Her signature had been attached to a broader agreement granting Julian authority over the embryos and all associated genetic records.
“They changed the document after I signed it.”
Ruth examined the scan.
“Or they replaced the pages.”
Elias requested the embryology chain-of-custody report.
The clinic responded that a server failure had corrupted the data.
Vivian almost laughed.
“A private clinic serving billionaires lost the most important file in the building?”
“Not lost,” Elias said. “Removed.”
Ruth inserted Helena’s first cassette into an old recorder.
Static filled the apartment.
Then Helena’s voice emerged.
“If Vivian hears this, Conrad is either dead or no longer in control. That does not mean the danger has passed. Julian learned patience from his father and cruelty from his mother.”
Vivian closed her eyes.
Her mother’s voice sounded exactly as she remembered it.
Warm.
Firm.
Alive.
“Adrian’s biological samples were stored at St. Catherine’s after the crash. Conrad ordered them transferred to the family institute. I replaced the official container with an empty one, but Adrian insisted that one sample remain accessible.”
Elias looked sharply at Ruth.
“You never told me that.”
Ruth raised a hand for silence.
The recording continued.
“Adrian believed his genetic material might one day prove he survived the crash. He placed the sample in a cryogenic archive under a coded identity. Only three people knew the number. Adrian, me, and the physician who helped us.”
Elias stared at the cassette player.
“I was the physician.”
Vivian looked at him.
“You said you didn’t know where the sample was.”
“I didn’t.”
Helena’s voice continued.
“Elias did not know I changed the final digits.”
Ruth removed the laboratory number from the envelope.
AV-28-0417.
“The crash occurred on April 17,” Elias said. “That is the obvious code.”
Ruth turned the card over.
Faint writing appeared on the back.
AV-28-0712.
Vivian recognized the second date.
“July 12 was my mother’s birthday.”
Ruth nodded.
“The original sample was stored under that number.”
Vivian looked at the first number.
“Then what was AV-28-0417?”
“A decoy.”
“If Julian used the decoy, the embryo could not be Adrian’s.”
“Unless Julian found the real number,” Elias said.
The apartment intercom buzzed.
Everyone became silent.
Ruth checked the security camera. A delivery driver stood outside the building entrance holding flowers.
“No one knows we’re here,” she said.
Elias enlarged the image.
The driver kept his face lowered.
Vivian’s emergency phone vibrated.
A message from Julian appeared.
COME HOME. WE CAN FIX THIS.
She did not respond.
Another message followed.
THE PEOPLE WITH YOU ARE USING YOUR FEAR.
Then another.
ASK ELIAS WHY HE KEPT ADRIAN’S RING.
Vivian looked at Elias.
“Did Adrian have a ring?”
Elias said nothing.
Ruth turned away from the intercom.
“Elias?”
He reached beneath his shirt and pulled out a chain.
A dark metal ring hung from it.
Vivian stood.
“You have had that the entire time?”
“Adrian gave it to me before Helena moved him.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because it opens something Conrad spent twenty-eight years searching for.”
Ruth looked furious.
“You told me the ring was lost.”
“I told everyone it was lost.”
Vivian moved away from him.
“Julian knew you had it.”
“I don’t know how.”
“He knows because someone here told him.”
The intercom buzzed again.
The delivery driver looked up at the camera.
It was Julian’s security director.
Ruth switched off the screen.
“We need to leave.”
Elias placed the ring back beneath his shirt.
“There’s a secondary exit through the basement.”
Vivian did not move.
“Not until you tell me what the ring opens.”
“A deposit vault Adrian created beneath St. Catherine’s old trauma wing.”
“What is inside?”
“I never opened it.”
“You expect me to believe that you kept the key for twenty-eight years and never used it?”
“Adrian told me the vault could be opened only in the presence of his direct descendant.”
Vivian placed both hands over her stomach.
“And now you think my baby is that descendant.”
“I think Julian believes he is.”
The building alarm sounded.
Ruth looked through the peephole.
Two men had entered the stairwell.
Elias gathered the tapes.
Vivian picked up Helena’s letter.
They escaped through the basement as the men reached the apartment.
In the alley behind the building, Ruth’s car waited.
They drove toward St. Catherine’s through heavy rain.
Halfway there, Vivian received a call from the reproductive institute.
A woman spoke rapidly.
“Mrs. Vale, my name is Lauren Pike. I was an embryologist assigned to your case.”
Vivian put the call on speaker.
“Why are you calling?”
“Because I saw your records were requested.”
“Was Julian’s sample used?”
The woman began to cry.
“I thought the container belonged to him. The authorization carried his signature and the director’s seal.”
“What was the identification number?”
“AV-28-0712.”
Ruth gripped the dashboard.
Vivian’s voice shook.
“Did you create my child using Adrian Vale’s sample?”
“I don’t know who Adrian Vale is.”
“Where are you now?”
“At the north train station. I’m leaving the city.”
“Wait for us.”
“I can’t.”
A sound came through the phone.
A station announcement.
Then a man’s voice in the background.
Lauren gasped.
The call ended.
Vivian tried to call back.
The number had been disconnected.
A final message arrived from Lauren’s phone.
May you like
YOUR HUSBAND DID NOT CREATE ONE EMBRYO.
HE CREATED FOUR.
