Chapter 6 - The Woman Who Couldn't Remember Her Own PastThe room went silent.
Victor's voice came through every speaker.
“Claire, you were always very good with your hands.”
I stared at the ceiling.
“You know who I am.”
“I know more than that.”
Sebastian reached for me.
“Don't answer him.”
Victor laughed.
“You think she's your weakness.”
Silence.
“She isn't.”
“She is the key.”
The transmission ended.
Gabriel immediately began searching the security network.
I stood frozen.
Memories surfaced.
A hospital corridor.
A man with gray eyes.
A white coat.
A clipboard.
A locked door.
A crying child.
Then nothing.
My head began to hurt.
I grabbed the table.
Sebastian caught me.
“Claire.”
“I remember.”
“What?”
“A basement.”
Gabriel looked at us.
“Where?”
“Mercy Saint.”
“That hospital?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“I don't know.”
Sebastian pulled me into the chair.
“Think carefully.”
I closed my eyes.
“I was there during my internship.”
“Why?”
“Victor asked me to help with rehabilitation.”
“What patients?”
“Children.”
My stomach twisted.
“Oliver was one of them.”
Sebastian's face changed.
“No.”
I shook my head.
“Not Oliver.”
“Then who?”
“I don't know.”
Gabriel searched the archives.
Then his computer beeped.
He stared at the screen.
“Subject fourteen.”
I looked.
The photograph was a baby.
Not Oliver.
Another child.
A little girl.
Then I recognized her.
“She was my patient.”
“What happened?”
“She died.”
Gabriel looked at the records.
“No.”
He turned the screen.
“She's alive.”
The child's name was Emma Vale.
Marcus Vale's daughter.
The same Marcus who had supposedly died in the bombing.
Everything connected.
Victor had not been conducting research on random children.
He had been tracking families connected to the Lombardi organization.
Children of enemies.
Children of allies.
Children of witnesses.
Emma had survived.
She was now twenty-three.
And she was working as a neurologist in Chicago.
We found her that night.
She refused to speak.
Until she saw Sebastian.
Then she cried.
“My father told me you'd come.”
Sebastian stared.
“Your father is dead.”
Emma shook her head.
“No.”
She handed him a photograph.
Marcus Vale was standing beside a younger Victor Lombardi.
The photo had been taken one week before the bombing.
Sebastian's face turned white.
Marcus had not been killed.
He had betrayed the family.
Then Emma said:
“Your paralysis wasn't caused by the bomb.”
Sebastian stared.
“Then what caused it?”
“The drug.”
“What drug?”
“The one they tested on you.”
Silence.
“Why?”
“To see whether adult nerve tissue could regenerate.”
Sebastian looked at me.
“Your hands triggered it.”
Emma nodded.
“Claire's neurological technique activates dormant pathways.”
I shook my head.
“That's impossible.”
“No.”
Emma looked at me.
“Your hands don't heal people.”
My stomach sank.
“You recognize damaged pathways.”
“Through training.”
“No.”
Emma leaned closer.
“You were part of the research before you remembered.”
I stared.
“Someone erased my involvement.”
“Why?”
“To protect you.”
“From Victor?”
Emma shook her head.
“From Sebastian's father.”
I couldn't breathe.
Sebastian looked at her.
“What did my father do?”
“He ordered Claire's memory suppression.”
“Why?”
“Because she discovered the treatment was killing children.”
I looked at Sebastian.
“I exposed your family.”
“Yes.”
“Then why am I alive?”
Emma looked toward the window.
“Because someone inside the Lombardi family loved your mother.”
The room fell silent.
“My mother?”
Emma nodded.
“Your mother and Sebastian's father knew each other.”
Sebastian's expression changed.
“Impossible.”
“No.”
Emma stood.
“Your families were connected long before any of you knew.”
Then the door opened.
Gabriel entered.
“Victor has made a move.”
“What?”
“He kidnapped someone.”
“Who?”
Gabriel looked at Sebastian.
“Your mother.”
Sebastian stopped breathing.
May you like
His mother had been dead for seventeen years.
Or so he thought.
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