Chapter 3 - Twenty-Four Hours
Robert was waiting in the kitchen when Emily and Maya returned home.
He hadn't turned on the lights.
He sat at the table with both hands around a glass of water.
Emily stopped in the doorway.
Maya remained behind her.
Robert looked older than he had that morning.
"Sit down."
Emily dropped her keys onto the counter.
"No."
"Emily."
"Tell me what happened to Maya when she was a baby."
Maya stiffened.
Robert looked at her.
"You told her?"
Maya's voice shook.
"I asked."
Robert rubbed his face.
Emily stepped closer.
"Why does she have a scar?"
"She had a procedure."
"What procedure?"
Robert didn't answer.
Emily's anger rose.
"You told me they took blood."
"They did."
"From where? Her abdomen?"
"It wasn't that simple."
"Then make it simple."
Robert stood.
"She was sick."
"With what?"
"They thought something was wrong with her liver."
Emily stared.
"You never told me that."
"You had pneumonia. You were barely conscious."
"I was her mother."
"I was trying to protect you."
Emily laughed once.
"That's what you're going with?"
Maya whispered, "What did they do?"
Robert looked at her.
For the first time, his defensive posture cracked.
"They ran tests."
"What tests?"
"A biopsy."
Emily's stomach dropped.
"A biopsy?"
"It was negative."
"Where?"
"A private clinic."
"Which one?"
Robert hesitated.
Emily saw it.
"You don't remember?"
"It closed."
"Name."
"St. Gabriel Pediatric Institute."
Emily pulled out her phone.
Robert lunged.
"Don't."
She stepped back.
"What are you doing?"
"That clinic doesn't exist anymore."
"So?"
"So you won't find anything."
Emily searched anyway.
No hospital.
No institute.
No archived webpage.
Nothing.
She looked up.
"Where was it?"
"Outside Briar Glen."
"We lived two hundred miles from Briar Glen."
"It was a specialist."
Maya's face had turned ghostly.
"Who called you last night?"
Robert froze.
Emily looked between them.
"What call?"
Maya swallowed.
"I heard Dad."
Robert's eyes narrowed.
"You were listening?"
"I was going to the bathroom."
"What did he say?" Emily asked.
Maya looked at him.
"He said I didn't remember anything."
Robert's face drained.
"And he said fifteen years was the agreement."
Emily slowly lowered her phone.
Robert sat down again.
No denial came.
That frightened Emily more than any confession might have.
She whispered, "What agreement?"
Robert stared at the floor.
"Some mistakes don't disappear because you regret them."
Emily felt cold.
"What did you do?"
Robert looked toward Maya.
"I was twenty-seven. Your mother and I were broke. My business had failed. We had medical debt."
Emily shook her head.
"We weren't that broke."
"You didn't know everything."
"Apparently I didn't know anything."
Robert rubbed his palms together.
"A man approached me."
"What man?"
"Dr. Adrian Vale."
Maya frowned.
"Doctor?"
"He ran research programs."
Emily's voice became quiet.
"What kind of research?"
Robert shook his head.
"I didn't know everything."
"Stop saying that."
"He told me Maya had a rare genetic marker."
Maya stared at him.
"What marker?"
"I don't know."
Emily slammed her hand onto the table.
"Don't lie to us again."
Robert flinched.
"I swear. I didn't understand it. They said the marker made certain tissue studies valuable."
The kitchen became silent.
Maya looked at her mother.
Emily couldn't speak.
Robert hurried on.
"They weren't supposed to hurt her."
Emily's face changed.
"What did you let them do?"
"It was a biopsy."
"You sold access to our baby?"
"No."
"You accepted money?"
Robert didn't answer.
Emily stepped toward him.
"Did you accept money?"
"Yes."
Maya began crying silently.
Robert looked at her.
"Maya, listen to me."
"Don't."
"I never thought they would keep monitoring you."
Maya wiped her cheek.
"What?"
Emily's head snapped toward him.
"Monitoring?"
Robert's phone buzzed on the table.
All three looked at it.
A message appeared.
STOP THE IMAGING.
Emily read it.
Robert grabbed the phone.
Too late.
"Who sent that?"
"No one."
"Who?"
Robert's voice broke.
"I don't know."
Emily moved closer.
"You've been talking to them for fifteen years."
"I haven't."
"Then who called last night?"
Robert looked trapped.
"The calls started again three months ago."
Maya's eyes widened.
"When my pain started."
Robert nodded once.
Emily felt sick.
"What did they say?"
"That if Maya developed certain symptoms, I should contact them."
"And you did?"
"I panicked."
"You called the people who experimented on our daughter instead of taking her to a doctor?"
"They told me not to let anyone scan her."
Emily stared at him.
"Why?"
Robert looked toward the window.
"Because they said if a hospital found what was inside her, everything would come apart."
Maya's breath caught.
"What's inside me?"
Robert closed his eyes.
"I don't know."
Emily grabbed her purse.
"Maya. We're leaving."
Robert stood.
"Emily."
"Move."
"You can't take her to that appointment."
Emily faced him.
"Try to stop me."
"They're dangerous."
"So are you."
Robert looked wounded.
That almost made Emily laugh.
"You don't understand," he said. "These people have spent fifteen years protecting whatever they did."
"Then tomorrow they'll learn they chose the wrong mother."
Emily took Maya upstairs.
They packed clothes into two bags.
When they returned twenty minutes later, Robert was gone.
On the kitchen table sat his phone.
Beside it was a note.
Emily,
If I don't come back, take Maya to the scan.
Do not trust anyone who says they are from St. Gabriel.
And whatever the doctors find, do not let them remove it until federal authorities are present.
Emily read the note twice.
Then Maya pointed toward the driveway.
"Dad's car is still here."
Emily looked outside.
It was.
Robert Thorne had left his own house without his phone, wallet, coat, or car.
And he had left behind one final warning.
May you like
At the bottom of the note, written so faintly Emily almost missed it, were five words.
They already know where we live.
