CHAPTER 10: BLOOD DOES NOT LIE
Everyone stared at Grant.
The stretcher’s monitor continued beeping beside him.
Grant looked down at his own hands.
“That’s impossible.”
Mercer took the drive from me and moved it closer to Grant.
The green light intensified.
HAWTHORNE SIGNATURE DETECTED.
HOLLOWAY SIGNATURE INCOMPLETE.
Grant’s face emptied.
Mercer stepped backward.
“You are not Gideon’s biological son.”
Grant looked toward my mother.
“Tell me he’s wrong.”
Helena did not answer quickly enough.
“Tell me!”
“Evelyn believed Gideon was your father,” she said carefully.
“Believed?”
“Samuel and Evelyn had a relationship before she married Gideon.”
Grant turned toward the screen.
Samuel’s confidence disappeared.
“You knew,” Grant said.
Samuel tightened his grip on Rebecca.
“I suspected.”
“All those visits to my house.”
“I was watching over you.”
“You watched Gideon turn me into a weapon.”
“I could not challenge him without exposing the network.”
Grant laughed once.
The sound was broken.
“So you protected your museum instead.”
Samuel looked away.
The biometric system had revealed the truth Grant’s family had buried for more than thirty years.
Daniel Mercer was Gideon Holloway’s biological heir.
Grant was Samuel Hawthorne’s heir.
I remained the Vale heir.
The three signatures needed to open the ledger were already inside the main gallery.
My father had not assembled Grant and me by accident.
The museum acquisition.
The auction.
The transfer documents.
Every move had been designed to place three heirs near the drive.
Arthur had been trying to unlock Meridian.
The only question was why.
I held the drive between us.
“We can open it here.”
Mercer shook his head.
“The data may be encrypted through a physical archive server.”
“Where?”
Samuel answered through the screen.
“Inside the original vault.”
Rebecca glanced toward the damaged wall beside her.
“The drive will authenticate anywhere, but the full database can only be extracted through the museum server.”
Samuel looked surprised.
She had kept that detail from him.
Mercer turned to me.
“We need to reach the restoration level.”
Grant forced himself to stand.
The paramedic tried to stop him.
He pushed the man’s hand away.
“If I’m the Hawthorne key, I’m going.”
“You are also under investigation for assault,” Mercer said.
Grant looked at me.
“I’m aware.”
I did not forgive him.
But forgiveness was not required to recognize necessity.
“Restrain one wrist,” I told Elias.
Grant offered his arm without argument.
The damaged service staircase groaned beneath us as we descended.
Elias remained above to manage the evacuation. Mercer led with his weapon drawn. Grant followed beside me, one wrist secured to a metal line running along the wall.
Dust drifted from the ceiling.
“You remembered me under the piano,” Grant said quietly.
“I remembered Gray.”
“I used to think that was a dream.”
“So did I.”
“Did I hurt you back then?”
“No.”
His expression tightened.
“I became him.”
“Gideon?”
“Yes.”
“You chose to become him.”
Grant accepted the words.
“I know.”
We reached the restoration level.
Samuel stood behind Rebecca near the vault.
His gun shifted toward us.
Mercer raised his own weapon.
“Let her go.”
“No one lowers anything until the drive is opened,” Samuel said.
The damaged ceiling cracked above him.
Rebecca remained calm.
“Mara, the server is inside the vault. Place the drive into the center console.”
“Then what?”
“Each heir touches one scanner.”
Grant stared at Samuel.
“You could have told me the truth.”
“You were safer as Gideon’s son.”
“Was I?”
Samuel had no answer.
I approached the vault.
Three glass panels surrounded the central console.
VALE.
HOLLOWAY.
HAWTHORNE.
Mercer placed his hand against the Holloway panel.
Grant touched Hawthorne.
I pressed my palm to Vale.
The drive slid into the console.
The laboratory lights dimmed.
Biometric lines scanned our hands.
SIGNATURES CONFIRMED.
MERIDIAN ARCHIVE UNLOCKED.
The vault doors opened.
Inside was no collection of jewels or stolen paintings.
There were thousands of paper files.
Photographs.
Medical records.
Birth certificates.
Adoption documents.
Rebecca’s face changed.
“This isn’t the transaction archive.”
Samuel looked genuinely confused.
“What did Arthur store here?”
A monitor activated.
PROJECT ORPHAN.
Grant removed his hand from the scanner.
“What is that?”
The first file opened automatically.
It showed a hospital nursery photographed thirty-four years earlier.
Newborn children lay behind glass.
Each crib carried a number instead of a name.
The next page contained a list of families.
Judges.
Governors.
Bankers.
Foreign officials.
Beside each name was the word LEVERAGE.
My mother’s recorded voice played from a hidden speaker.
“Meridian did not only trade objects.”
“They traded children.”
Grant stared at the screen.
Mercer’s face became pale.
A new photograph appeared.
Evelyn Holloway stood inside the nursery holding two babies.
One was Daniel.
The other was Grant.
The final line beneath the image read:
SUBJECT G-2 TRANSFERRED TO HOLLOWAY HOUSEHOLD.
BIOLOGICAL MOTHER: HELENA VALE.
Grant turned toward me.
Then toward my mother’s live image upstairs.
My body went cold.
Grant was not merely connected to my family.
May you like
According to the ledger, he was my mother’s son.
My brother.
