Chapter 7 - The Twenty-Four Children
The flash drive contained twenty-four folders.
H-01 through H-24.
Most were marked DECEASED.
Some within days of birth.
Others during childhood.
Austin sat in the penthouse office with Irene, Quinn, Grant, and Carla.
No one spoke for several minutes.
H-17 was Irene.
STATUS: TRANSFERRED.
PROTECTIVE IDENTITY: MERCER.
H-24 had no name.
STATUS: UNRESOLVED.
Irene stared at the screen.
“What does unresolved mean?”
Quinn opened the file.
Almost empty.
A date of birth.
Seven months after Irene.
Sex: male.
Blood markers partially listed.
Custodial note:
Removed before disposition.
Carla looked sick.
“What was this place?”
Austin clicked through the other records.
Medical trials.
Genetic assessments.
Psychological projections.
Family lineage evaluations.
The Harrow family had not simply hidden heirs.
They had studied them.
Irene pushed back from the table.
“I need air.”
Austin followed her to the terrace.
She gripped the railing.
“I was a project.”
“You were a baby.”
“They numbered me.”
“They failed to define you.”
“That’s easy for you to say.”
“No, it isn’t.”
She looked at him.
“My father was part of this system.”
“Your father helped my parents hide me.”
“And before that?”
Austin did not know.
The ledger showed Charles cooperating with Thomas Mercer.
But it did not explain his earlier role.
Irene looked toward the city.
“What if your father didn’t save me?”
“What if he moved me because he wanted me later?”
Austin had already considered that.
“I don’t know.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“You do.”
“I know it’s possible.”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For not lying to make me feel better.”
They returned inside.
Quinn had found another document.
“Listen to this. H-24 was moved by a physician.”
“Name?” Austin asked.
“Leonard Vale.”
The Vermont doctor.
Irene immediately said, “We go.”
This time Austin did not argue.
Dr. Leonard Vale lived in a retirement community near Burlington.
They reached him that afternoon.
He was thin, white-haired, and walked with oxygen tubing beneath his nose.
When Irene introduced herself, the old man dropped his coffee cup.
“You’re alive.”
Irene stared.
“You knew me?”
“I delivered you.”
Austin closed the apartment door.
“Then start talking.”
Vale sat slowly.
“I was a young physician with debts.”
“What kind of debts?” Quinn asked.
“Gambling.”
“And the Harrows paid them?”
“Charles did.”
Austin’s head lifted.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
Vale closed his eyes.
“Your father recruited me.”
Irene stiffened.
Austin had expected it.
Hearing it still hurt.
“For what?”
Vale looked toward Irene.
“To evaluate the infants.”
“What did that mean?”
“Genetic disease risk. Cognitive projections. hereditary markers. The Harrow family believed control of the trust should pass only through certain bloodlines.”
“That sounds like eugenics,” Quinn said.
Vale gave a weak nod.
“It became worse.”
“How?”
“The trustees began deciding which children would be acknowledged.”
“And the others?”
Vale’s silence answered.
Irene stood.
“You killed babies?”
“No!”
He coughed violently.
“I never killed anyone.”
“But you helped.”
“Yes.”
Tears filled his eyes.
“I told myself I was only testing.”
Austin asked, “What changed?”
“Evelyn.”
Irene froze.
“Your mother discovered what the trustees had done to previous descendants. When she became pregnant, she pretended to cooperate.”
“With me.”
“Yes.”
“She gave birth at Harrow House.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
“Charles was supposed to approve your disposition.”
Austin went rigid.
Vale looked at him.
“Your father was already trying to dismantle the system from inside.”
“Was he?”
“I believed so.”
“What happened that night?”
“Evelyn begged him to save Irene. Charles contacted Thomas Mercer, who had worked security systems for one of the Harrow companies. Thomas agreed to take the baby.”
Irene whispered, “My dad.”
“Yes.”
“Claire?”
“She knew everything.”
Tears slipped down Irene’s cheeks.
“They chose me.”
“They risked their lives for you.”
“And sixteen years later they died.”
Vale looked away.
“Because someone found them.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“You must know something.”
Vale’s breathing became rough.
“A week before the fire, Thomas called me.”
Irene’s hands shook.
“What did he say?”
“He said Margaret had found a school photograph of Irene.”
Austin’s blood chilled.
“Margaret knew before I met Irene.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t she act then?”
Vale stared at Austin.
“Because Charles stopped her.”
“My father was supposedly dead years later.”
“No. The fire happened before his disappearance.”
Austin calculated.
Irene’s parents died fifteen years ago.
Charles vanished nine years ago.
For six years after the fire, Charles remained publicly alive.
“What did he do?”
“He threatened to expose Margaret.”
“Expose what?”
Vale looked at Irene.
“The payment.”
“What payment?”
“The one Margaret made three days before the Mercer fire.”
Irene’s face collapsed.
Austin stepped forward.
“To whom?”
Vale began to answer.
A red dot appeared on his chest.
Austin saw it.
“DOWN!”
The window shattered.
Vale jerked backward.
Irene screamed.
Grant fired through the broken glass toward a distant rooftop.
Quinn dropped beside the doctor.
Blood spread across Vale’s shirt.
His lips moved.
Irene leaned closer.
“What?”
Vale whispered one word.
May you like
“Crowe.”
Then his eyes closed.
