Chapter 5 - Genevieve Had Hidden One Last Message
The clue led us to an abandoned church in downtown Chicago.
Genevieve had once visited it regularly.
I hadn't known.
We found a wooden box hidden beneath the third pew.
Inside was a key.
And a letter addressed to me.
Lawson,
If you are reading this, then Elena found you.
Please listen to her.
She knows what I couldn't prove.
The truth about Victor is bigger than Mercer Biogen.
It reaches into our family.
Your father knew.
My hands began shaking.
I read the next line.
He didn't create the program alone.
The person who financed it was someone we trusted.
I looked at Elena.
“Who?”
She shook her head.
“The letter doesn't say.”
Then a sound came from the church balcony.
Prescott drew his weapon.
We waited.
Nothing.
He searched the balcony.
Empty.
But someone had left a second envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
My father.
Victor.
And a third man.
I recognized him.
Dr. Franklin Yates.
I stared at the photo.
“No.”
Elena stepped back.
“That can't be.”
Dr. Yates had been treating my children.
He had told me about the ten days.
He had discovered the compound.
He had helped us.
Or so I believed.
Prescott's phone rang.
It was Dr. Yates.
“Lawson,” he said urgently. “Don't trust the people around you.”
My blood froze.
“Why?”
“Because the first diagnosis was never real.”
“What?”
He was crying.
“The leukemia diagnosis was manipulated.”
I turned to Elena.
She looked stunned.
“Who manipulated it?”
“I did.”
Silence.
“What?”
“I was forced.”
“By Victor?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
A pause.
“My own brother.”
I felt a chill.
“Who is your brother?”
He whispered:
“Richard Mercer.”
Everything snapped into place.
Dr. Yates wasn't part of Victor's operation by choice.
He had been blackmailed.
His brother had threatened his family.
The original leukemia diagnosis had been exaggerated.
The true condition was still dangerous, but the ten-day prediction had been designed to terrify me.
To make me desperate.
To drive me into Victor's control.
“You mean my children never had ten days?”
“No.”
I closed my eyes.
“Then why did you say they did?”
“Because Victor wanted you broken.”
I nearly collapsed.
Elena grabbed my arm.
“Where is Victor?”
“I don't know.”
Dr. Yates continued.
“There is another patient file.”
“Whose?”
“Genevieve's.”
My heart stopped.
“What about her?”
“Her blood was tested after the crash.”
“Why?”
“Because she wasn't dead when she arrived.”
I couldn't breathe.
“What?”
“She survived the initial collision.”
Elena covered her mouth.
Dr. Yates whispered:
“Someone disconnected her ventilator before she could tell the police anything.”
The call ended.
I stared at the phone.
Genevieve had been alive.
Someone had killed her at the hospital.
And someone had covered it up.
We found the old hospital records.
There was a missing page.
Then a staff schedule.
One nurse had disappeared afterward.
Her name was Martha Bell.
Prescott tracked her to Wisconsin.
We drove there.
Martha was elderly and terrified.
When she saw me, she cried.
“Your wife begged me.”
“Begged you for what?”
“To find you.”
“What did she say?”
Martha handed me a cassette tape.
“I was afraid to keep it.”
We played it that night.
Genevieve's voice filled the motel room.
Lawson, if you hear this, I need you to forgive me.
I should have told you everything.
Victor wasn't the only person involved.
Your mother knew.
I stopped the tape.
“My mother?”
Elena's eyes widened.
My mother had died when I was nineteen.
She had always told me my father's death was a tragic accident.
But suddenly, every memory felt suspicious.
We drove to the family cemetery.
My mother's grave was beside my father's.
Behind the headstone was a hollow compartment.
Inside was another journal.
I read the first page.
I was afraid of my husband.
The second page:
I was afraid of Victor.
The third:
And now I am afraid of my son.
I stopped reading.
“What did I do?”
Elena gently took the journal.
“You were a child.”
But the next entries explained it.
My father had trained me from childhood to become ruthless.
He wanted me to inherit Mercer Holdings.
He intended to use me as the public face of the biological program.
My mother had spent years trying to protect me.
When I married Genevieve, my father became convinced I was becoming independent.
That was why Genevieve had been targeted.
Not simply because she knew too much.
Because she was changing me.
I looked at Elena.
“Why did she choose you?”
Elena smiled sadly.
“Because she knew I would remind you who you were before your family taught you to be someone else.”
I felt tears burn my eyes.
That night, we returned to the estate.
The children were sleeping.
Elena stood beside me in the hallway.
“I never meant to become part of your life.”
“I know.”
“I'm not trying to replace Genevieve.”
“You couldn't.”
“I know.”
She looked at me.
“I don't want to.”
I nodded.
Then Jonah appeared at the top of the stairs.
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“Is Elena staying?”
I smiled.
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“Good.”
May you like
Then he looked at me.
“Because Mommy said she would.”
