Chapter 6 - The Explosion Beneath the Chapel
Ethan moved before Calvin’s thumb reached the detonator.
He struck Calvin’s wrist against the cot frame. The device fell, bounced once, and slid beneath the console. Celia lunged for it.
Calvin wrapped both hands around Ethan’s throat.
The wounded guard should not have possessed that strength. His pupils were enormous, his skin gray with shock, yet he fought without hesitation or pain.
Mara seized one of the syringes from the black case.
“Hold him.”
She drove the needle into Calvin’s thigh.
He released Ethan, staggered backward, and collapsed.
Celia retrieved the detonator.
A red number blinked on its screen.
00:23.
“It’s already active,” she said.
The crypt trembled.
Ethan looked at the wall map.
“The river tunnel.”
Mara pointed to a blue passage running beneath the eastern gardens.
They lifted Lucy through the steel door and hurried into a low tunnel. Celia supported Calvin while Ethan carried the black case and ledger. Mara followed with the flashlight.
At twelve seconds, the command room vanished behind a steel barrier.
At six, the floor pitched downward.
At zero, the chapel exploded.
The blast chased them through the tunnel like a living thing. Heat struck Ethan’s back. Stone cracked overhead. He threw himself over Lucy as dust and debris filled the passage.
For several seconds, no one moved.
Then Lucy coughed.
Ethan lifted his head.
Mara lay nearby, bleeding from the scalp. Celia had shielded Calvin with her own body.
The passage behind them had collapsed.
Ahead, dim moonlight entered through an iron grate.
They emerged near the river beyond the estate wall. Rain had softened to a cold mist. Vale House stood above the trees, one wing burning where the chapel had been.
Sirens wailed in the distance.
Ethan’s phone regained signal and immediately filled with missed calls. His assistant, police, board members, reporters.
A news alert appeared.
MARGARET VALE ABDUCTED FROM SAINT MERCY MEMORIAL.
Another followed seconds later.
VALE HOUSE EXPLOSION: HEIR ETHAN VALE REPORTED MISSING.
Someone had prepared the story before the blast.
Celia read over his shoulder.
“They want the world looking for you.”
“Or believing I’m dead.”
Lucy tugged his sleeve.
“The other woman has my mother’s face.”
Celia looked away.
Ethan knelt beside the child.
“Have you seen her before?”
Lucy nodded.
“She visited the apartment when Mom was gone. She said she was my aunt.”
“What name did she use?”
“Evelyn.”
Celia turned sharply.
“That was my mother’s name.”
Lucy started crying.
Celia crouched and held her.
“She looked like me?”
“Exactly. But older in her eyes.”
Ethan remembered Margaret’s words: That is the daughter we buried.
Not the woman.
The daughter.
“What if Celia had a twin?” he asked.
Mara shook her head.
“The ledger recorded one female child.”
“The ledger was altered.”
Calvin groaned.
He was conscious again, but weaker now.
“Not twins,” he whispered. “Copies.”
Ethan stared at him.
“What does that mean?”
Calvin’s gaze drifted toward Celia.
“Saint Mercy selected children with similar features. Same blood type when possible. Same age. Daniel called them mirrors.”
Celia went rigid.
“Children were made to impersonate one another?”
“For legal transfers. Custody substitutions. Inheritance. Witness replacement.”
Mara crossed herself.
Calvin continued.
“The girl in the hospital is not your twin. She is Subject Seven.”
Lucy whispered, “Aunt Evelyn.”
Calvin nodded.
“She was trained to answer to Evelyn, then Celia, then whatever name the program required.”
Ethan thought of the tapes in the command room.
“Heir conditioning.”
“Your father built the program. Hale managed it. Margaret shut it down after Daniel died.”
“Why would Subject Seven help Margaret now?”
“She isn’t helping Margaret.”
Calvin looked toward Vale House.
“She is following the last order Daniel gave her.”
Ethan felt a pressure in his chest.
“My father has been dead twelve years.”
Calvin’s expression held something close to pity.
“Daniel recorded orders for every possible outcome. Some were scheduled by date. Some were triggered by names, locations, or deaths.”
“What order was triggered?”
Calvin looked at Lucy.
“The return of Evelyn Ward’s bloodline.”
A vehicle moved along the river road.
Headlights swept through the trees.
Celia raised her gun.
A black ambulance stopped near the gate. Two men in medical uniforms stepped out.
Ethan recognized neither.
Then Simon Hale emerged from the passenger side, his shoulder bandaged.
He held Margaret by the arm.
She wore a hospital gown beneath a coat. Her face was pale but alert.
Hale pressed a pistol to her ribs.
“Bring me the ledger,” he called. “Or your mother goes into the river.”
Ethan stepped from the trees.
Margaret saw him.
Her expression was not relief.
It was fury.
“Don’t give it to him,” she said.
Hale pushed the gun harder against her.
Margaret looked at Lucy.
May you like
Then she shouted the most terrifying command Ethan had heard all night.
“Celia, kill your daughter.”
