# CHAPTER 15 ## THE OTHER DAUGHTER
The little girl did not seem frightened.
That was the first thing I noticed.
Armed adults surrounded her.
The underground house had sealed itself.
Federal agents and Meridian operatives were somewhere beyond the estate.
August Vale watched her from his wheelchair with an expression that could almost have been affection.
Yet Rose stood beside Naomi as calmly as though she had entered a classroom.
She wore a dark green dress beneath an oversized coat.
Her black hair had been cut unevenly near her shoulders.
A thin medical bracelet circled her wrist.
Printed across it were the characters:
R-12
I crouched so my eyes were level with hers.
“Who told you that you were made to replace me?”
Rose pointed at August again.
“He did.”
My grandfather’s mouth curved.
“Children simplify complex ideas.”
I stood.
“She’s a child, not an idea.”
“That distinction has caused considerable inefficiency.”
My mother raised her gun toward him.
“Say one more thing like that.”
August turned his wheelchair slightly.
“You had no objection when Claire’s development saved your life.”
Helena’s face changed.
“What does he mean?” I asked.
She did not answer.
Naomi moved farther into the room.
Blood covered the side of her shirt.
Jonah rushed toward her.
“Are you hit?”
“Not mine.”
“Whose?”
“The man who brought us through the service tunnel.”
She handed Jonah the gun.
Grant stared at Rose.
“Where did you find her?”
“In a medical facility beneath the west side of the estate.”
Adrian looked toward the sealed wall.
“There is no west-side facility.”
Naomi laughed bitterly.
“There is beneath the property records you don’t own.”
Adrian’s gaze shifted to August.
“You built another level.”
August closed his eyes.
“A prudent custodian maintains redundancy.”
Rose walked toward me.
Everyone watched her.
She reached up and touched the pendant at my throat.
“You opened yours.”
“You have one too?”
She pulled a small chain from beneath her dress.
A glass teardrop hung from it.
Identical to mine.
My mother made a sound behind me.
“No.”
Rose opened her pendant.
Inside was an empty compartment.
“They took my key yesterday.”
“Who?”
“The man with the silver ring.”
Conrad wore a silver family ring.
Grant recognized the description too.
“My father.”
Rose nodded.
“He said I would help him fix a mistake.”
I looked toward August.
“What is R-12?”
“A research designation.”
“There were eleven before her?”
“Eleven attempts.”
My stomach turned.
“What happened to them?”
“Most failed before birth.”
“Most?”
He remained silent.
My mother crossed the room and struck him across the face.
His medical chair beeped, but the flood system was no longer connected.
August slowly turned back toward her.
“You always allowed emotion to interrupt discovery.”
“You created children to use as locks.”
“I created continuity.”
Rose watched them without expression.
I knelt in front of her again.
“Do you know your parents?”
She considered the question.
“Dr. Maren said I didn’t need parents because I had a purpose.”
Naomi looked away.
Grant cursed quietly.
I held Rose’s hands.
They were cold.
“You deserve more than a purpose.”
She studied my face.
“Are you my sister?”
“I don’t know.”
“August said your blood is inside me.”
Every person in the room went still.
I looked at my grandfather.
“What did you use?”
“Genetic samples collected from Claire during childhood medical procedures.”
Victor moved toward him.
“You used her blood?”
“Not blood alone.”
My father seized the arms of the wheelchair.
“I will kill you.”
August showed no fear.
“You brought her to Hawthorne Medical every six months. You signed the authorization forms.”
“For routine examinations.”
“Your failure to read the complete language is not my deception.”
Victor raised his fist.
I caught his arm.
“Don’t.”
“He used you.”
“And hitting a dying man will not undo it.”
Victor released the chair.
Rose looked at me.
“Am I a copy?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you’re asking the question.”
She seemed to think about that.
The emergency alarm continued pulsing.
Adrian examined the security map.
“Two teams approaching from the north. One from the east.”
“Federal agents?” Jonah asked.
“Federal vehicles. Not necessarily federal loyalties.”
Naomi pressed a hand against her side.
“Conrad has a warrant authorizing lethal force if anyone resists.”
“Of course he does,” my mother said.
I looked at Naomi.
“You disappeared before the gala.”
“I was taken.”
“By whom?”
She nodded toward Evelyn.
Grant’s mother stiffened.
Grant looked between them.
“Mom?”
Evelyn stepped backward.
“I was trying to protect the investigation.”
Naomi laughed.
“You drugged me in a parking garage.”
“I moved you before Conrad’s men arrived.”
“You kept me tied to a bed for two days.”
“Because you refused to stop transmitting your location.”
Grant looked exhausted.
“Is there anyone in this room who protects people without kidnapping them?”
No one answered.
Naomi walked toward me.
“Before they took me, I found evidence that Conrad planned the assault.”
“Why didn’t you warn me?”
“I tried. Your communications were monitored by Jonah.”
I looked toward the security chief.
He did not deny it.
“My father ordered it?”
“Yes,” Jonah said.
Victor shook his head.
“I ordered threat screening, not message suppression.”
“Your office filtered all unverified warnings.”
“Someone inside my office,” Victor said.
Jonah nodded.
“Conrad’s people.”
I felt trapped all over again.
Not by steel barriers.
By decisions made around me.
For me.
Without me.
Naomi removed a small memory card from her sleeve.
“This contains the original gala plan. Guest placements, security overrides, emergency response scripts.”
I took it.
“Who created it?”
“The document is signed by someone using the initials C.H.”
“Claire Hawthorne?”
“That is what Conrad wants investigators to believe.”
Grant looked at me.
“He framed you before the gala began.”
Naomi nodded.
“The assault triggered a lockdown associated with Claire’s voice authorization. Once the files were discovered, everything would appear to be a Hawthorne extortion operation.”
I thought of my command.
Dad.
Seal the exits.
My voice had activated the final piece of Conrad’s plan.
“He expected Victor to protect me.”
“Yes.”
“And Grant was supposed to take the blame if anything failed.”
Grant stared at the floor.
Naomi continued.
“But Conrad did not know Helena had transferred the verification chip into Claire’s necklace. He expected the archive to remain inaccessible.”
August laughed softly.
“Conrad always underestimates women.”
My mother pointed her gun at him again.
“You do not get credit for that observation.”
Rose touched my hand.
The simple gesture cut through the arguments.
“Are the men outside coming for me?”
I looked at Adrian.
“Yes,” he said.
I glared at him.
Rose did not react.
“Why?”
“Because you may be capable of archive access.”
She nodded calmly.
“Dr. Maren said people would come if I became useful.”
I knelt again.
“Listen to me. You are not useful.”
Her brow furrowed.
“That sounds bad.”
“You are important. That is different.”
“How?”
“Useful is about what someone can take from you. Important is about who you are.”
Rose looked at our joined hands.
“No one said that before.”
The security alarm changed.
A countdown appeared on the wall.
EXTERNAL BREACH IN FOUR MINUTES.
Adrian opened a cabinet and distributed weapons.
My mother took one.
Victor took another.
Grant checked the rifle.
Jonah unfolded a property diagram.
“There’s an emergency tunnel beneath the library.”
August spoke.
“Conrad knows about it.”
Adrian looked at him.
“Then another route.”
“There is none.”
Rose pointed toward the fireplace.
“There is.”
We all looked at her.
“Dr. Maren brought me through the room behind the fire.”
Adrian touched a control panel near the mantel.
Nothing happened.
Rose approached.
She placed her palm against a black stone.
A scanner activated.
R-12 ACCESS CONFIRMED.
The fireplace moved aside.
A white corridor appeared.
August stared at Rose with open fascination.
“You retained unscheduled access memory.”
Rose looked at him.
“I remember everything.”
My mother and Adrian exchanged a look.
The trait August had described.
Exceptional memory integration.
Rose possessed it too.
We entered the hidden corridor.
Naomi and Jonah went first.
Rose held my hand.
Grant stayed behind us.
Victor pushed August’s wheelchair.
Adrian and Helena covered the rear.
The fireplace closed.
The corridor was clean and modern, unlike the old tunnels beneath the museum.
Glass doors revealed laboratories.
Empty beds.
Medical equipment.
Rows of frozen storage units.
Rose pointed toward one room.
“That’s where I slept.”
There was no bed.
Only a reclining examination chair with restraints.
I squeezed her hand.
She looked up.
“Why are you angry?”
“Because they hurt you.”
“They said pain was information.”
“They lied.”
“Why?”
“Because lies made it easier for them.”
We reached a central laboratory.
A large screen displayed genetic family trees.
Vale.
Hawthorne.
Holloway.
Dozens of names connected by lines.
Some marked deceased.
Some marked active.
Some identified only by numbers.
Grant stared at the display.
“There are more children.”
Naomi moved to the console.
“Twelve active subjects.”
Rose corrected her.
“Eleven.”
Naomi looked at her.
“One died last week.”
The room fell silent.
August spoke without emotion.
“R-9 suffered neurological rejection.”
Rose looked toward him.
“His name was Samuel.”
August ignored her.
She released my hand.
She walked to his wheelchair.
For the first time, emotion appeared on her face.
Not fear.
Anger.
“You said he was sleeping.”
“He is no longer in pain.”
“You lied.”
“He would not have understood death.”
“I understood.”
August studied her.
Rose slapped him.
The sound was small.
The meaning was not.
My grandfather smiled.
“Excellent.”
Rose backed away.
“Why are you smiling?”
“Because anger indicates independent identity formation.”
She looked at me.
“I don’t like him.”
“That makes two of us.”
Naomi searched the system.
“There are transfer orders for the remaining subjects.”
“Where?” I asked.
“Three locations. One in Switzerland. One in Singapore. One marked Saint Orison.”
Adrian’s face changed.
“Saint Orison does not exist.”
My mother looked at him.
“Yes, it does.”
“Where?”
“An island Conrad purchased through a religious foundation.”
Grant moved toward the screen.
“My father owns an island?”
“He owns the government that controls it,” Naomi said.
A file opened.
SUCCESSION ASSEMBLY—PHASE TWO
Scheduled for forty-eight hours from now.
All active genetic subjects were to be transported to Saint Orison.
The purpose was listed as:
CUSTODIAN SELECTION AND NONVIABLE ASSET TERMINATION.
Rose read the words.
“What is termination?”
No one answered.
She looked at me.
“Claire?”
I closed the file.
“It means we’re going to stop them.”
An explosion shook the corridor.
The external team had entered the house.
Jonah checked the map.
“They’ll find the lab in less than two minutes.”
Naomi downloaded the transfer data.
Victor looked at Adrian.
“How do we reach the island?”
“We don’t. It has military-level air defenses and no registered coordinates.”
Helena opened another file.
“The coordinates are encrypted into Rose’s medical bracelet.”
Rose touched her wrist.
“Dr. Maren said never remove it.”
My mother examined the bracelet.
“If we break the seal, it transmits her location.”
Grant raised his weapon.
“Then we use it as bait.”
I looked at him.
“She is eight years old.”
“I mean the signal, not the child.”
August laughed.
“Conrad will not send coordinates to retrieve her. He will send an aircraft.”
Naomi understood first.
“We let them take us.”
Victor shook his head.
“No.”
I looked at the transfer orders.
Eleven children.
Forty-eight hours.
A hidden island.
An organization preparing to murder anyone it considered unsuitable.
“They already think they’ve won,” I said.
My father recognized the tone in my voice.
“Claire.”
“At the gala, they believed the steel doors trapped them.”
“What are you proposing?”
I looked at Rose.
Then at Grant.
Then at the witness drive.
“We make Conrad believe he is bringing the new custodians to Saint Orison.”
Adrian smiled slightly.
“And once we are inside?”
I thought of the ballroom.
Every exit sealed.
Every powerful person suddenly forced to face the consequences waiting inside with them.
“We lock the island.”
Rose looked up at me.
“From the inside?”
“Yes.”
The building speakers came alive.
Conrad’s voice echoed through the laboratory.
“Claire, federal agents have surrounded the property. Send Rose into the corridor alone, and I will guarantee everyone else a fair hearing.”
Grant aimed his rifle at the speaker.
His father continued.
“To my son, your mother has already accepted immunity. You can still do the same.”
Grant looked toward Evelyn.
Her face went pale.
“I didn’t.”
Conrad laughed through the speakers.
“She always was a poor liar.”
Evelyn backed away from us.
Grant’s expression changed.
“Mom.”
“I contacted him before Naomi arrived.”
“Why?”
“I thought I could negotiate your safety.”
“You gave him our location.”
“I did it for you.”
Grant closed his eyes.
The same excuse again.
The same poison dressed as love.
A door at the far end of the laboratory unlocked.
Evelyn ran.
Grant shouted after her.
She disappeared into the corridor just as armed agents entered from the opposite side.
They did not arrest her.
They moved aside and let her pass.
Then they raised their weapons toward us.
Conrad’s voice delivered one final instruction.
May you like
“Kill everyone except Claire and Rose.”
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