Chapter 9 - Anna Vale
The stairwell seemed to narrow around Emily.
“My mother’s name was Laura Reed.”
Richard’s voice came through the speaker.
“That was the name she used after she escaped.”
Ashley stared at Emily.
“Our mother?”
“She died when we were children,” Emily said.
Ashley’s face had gone pale.
Richard continued.
“Anna Vale was a research assistant at Carter Medical Center. Brilliant. Ambitious. Unfortunately unstable.”
Ruth shouted toward the speaker.
“She was not unstable.”
“Ruth always admired her.”
Emily looked at Ruth.
“You knew my mother?”
Ruth said nothing.
Richard spoke again.
“Anna volunteered for an experimental fertility program. She became pregnant using one of my embryos.”
Ashley’s hand tightened into a fist.
“You’re saying you were our father?”
“No.”
Richard’s answer came quickly.
“Anna ended the pregnancy before disappearing.”
Ruth shook her head.
“He’s lying.”
“Then tell them the truth,” Richard replied.
Ruth stopped on the landing.
For twenty-nine years, she had carried a secret that fear had kept buried.
Now every face turned toward her.
“Anna didn’t end the pregnancy,” Ruth said. “She gave birth to twins.”
Emily looked at Ashley.
He looked back at her.
Richard’s voice became colder.
“Continue.”
Ruth swallowed.
“The program was illegal. Richard’s team created embryos using genetic material from employees, donors and patients without proper consent.”
“That’s absurd,” Richard said.
“They were trying to preserve family bloodlines. Wealthy clients paid to create heirs with selected traits.”
Sarah leaned against the railing.
“Our hospital did that?”
Ruth nodded.
“Anna discovered the program was using her eggs without permission. She planned to expose it.”
Emily struggled to process the words.
“Were Ashley and I created there?”
“No,” Ruth said. “You were conceived naturally.”
“Then who was our father?”
Ruth’s eyes filled with regret.
“I don’t know.”
Richard interrupted.
“Ruth is manipulating you.”
But Ruth continued.
“Anna had been involved with someone at the hospital. She never told me who. When she became pregnant, Richard assumed the children were his because she had been part of his research.”
Ashley laughed without humor.
“So he tried to take us.”
“He tried to prove ownership.”
Emily felt sick.
“Ownership?”
“He believed your mother carried an embryo from his program. She fled before the birth. Daniel helped her change her identity.”
“Dr. Monroe?”
“He was a young resident then.”
Emily remembered the envelope.
Your child was selected.
“Why did he contact me now?”
“Because Richard found you.”
The speaker went silent.
Ruth looked upward, as though she could see through the walls.
“Michael didn’t meet you by accident. Richard had been searching for Anna’s children for years.”
Emily touched her stomach.
“He chose me because of my DNA.”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
Ruth’s answer was interrupted by footsteps below.
Several people were climbing the stairs.
Ashley looked over the railing.
“Three men.”
Ruth pointed toward the fifth-floor door.
“Through there.”
They entered a service corridor lined with pipes and locked maintenance rooms.
Ashley barricaded the stairwell door with a metal cart.
“Where’s the exit?”
“End of the hall,” Ruth said.
Emily walked as quickly as she could.
Sarah remained close behind.
“You knew about this,” Emily said to her.
“I knew Father had research projects. I didn’t know what they were.”
“You called me a carrier.”
“I thought the embryo came from a donor.”
“Which donor?”
Sarah shook her head.
“I was never told.”
Emily reached the exit door.
It required a keycard.
Ruth searched her pockets.
“My card is gone.”
The stairwell door shook behind them.
Ashley examined the electronic lock.
“I can break it.”
“With what?”
He looked at the exposed pipes.
“Give me a minute.”
“We don’t have one,” Sarah said.
The men struck the stairwell door again.
Metal groaned.
Emily pressed both hands to her stomach as another painful tightening moved through her abdomen.
Ruth saw her expression.
“How far apart?”
“What?”
“The contractions.”
“They’re not contractions.”
“Emily.”
“They can’t be.”
Ruth placed a hand on her belly.
The muscles tightened beneath her palm.
“You’re in labor.”
“I’m only thirty-two weeks.”
The stairwell door bent inward.
Sarah looked at the white powder still covering her suit from the fire extinguisher.
Then she reached into her handbag.
She removed a black keycard.
Ruth stared at it.
“You said your card was gone.”
“It is.”
Sarah held up the card.
“This belongs to Father.”
She swiped it across the lock.
A green light appeared.
The door opened.
On the other side stood Michael.
Blood covered the collar of his white shirt.
May you like
In one hand, he held the yellow blanket.
In the other, he held a gun.
