Chapter 8 - Rebecca Refuses to Break
The first hour was unbearable.
Police filled the house.
Street cameras were pulled.
Transit systems alerted.
Rebecca sat on the nursery floor holding Ava’s blanket.
Mark knelt beside her.
“I’m sorry.”
She looked at him.
“For what?”
“Everything.”
Rebecca’s face hardened.
“Do not make this about guilt.”
He stopped.
“Our daughter needs us useful.”
The sentence changed him.
He nodded.
Michael stood near the window.
“I know how Patricia thinks.”
Rebecca looked up.
“You were raised by people connected to her.”
“Yes.”
“Then think.”
Michael closed his eyes.
Thomas’s network had used safe houses near hospitals, courthouses, and private labs.
Not luxury locations.
Functional places.
Patricia would need medical equipment if she planned to verify Ava’s genetics formally.
Naomi asked, “Why verify? They already have hospital records.”
Michael shook his head.
“Because hospital data can be challenged. For trust activation, they need chain-of-custody testing.”
Mark’s face changed.
“So she needs an accredited lab.”
Claire pulled up Meridian locations.
Six in the region.
Police moved on all of them.
Nothing.
Rebecca stared at the list.
Then noticed one.
A mobile neonatal unit.
Currently assigned to a private fertility clinic in New Jersey.
Patricia had consulted there.
They drove with police escort.
The unit was gone.
Security footage showed a woman matching Patricia driving it away.
With an infant carrier in the back.
Rebecca made a sound Mark would never forget.
But she did not collapse.
“Where would she go?”
Michael stared at the map.
Thomas had owned land near the Delaware Water Gap.
An old research property.
Patricia had used it years ago.
Police moved.
The drive took ninety minutes.
Rebecca counted every one.
They found the mobile unit outside an abandoned medical building.
Lights on.
Mark wanted to rush in.
Rebecca grabbed his arm.
“No.”
He looked at her.
“Our daughter is inside.”
“And charging through the door is how people get her hurt.”
Mark stopped.
Again Rebecca saw it.
He was learning.
Police entered first.
No gunfire.
No shouting.
Then an officer appeared.
“We found the baby.”
Rebecca ran.
Ava lay in a portable bassinet.
Alive.
Crying.
Rebecca lifted her.
The sound that came out of her was half sob, half prayer.
Mark wrapped both arms around them.
Michael stood back.
Claire cried openly.
Patricia was gone.
But she had left blood samples.
Documents.
And one video recording.
On screen, Patricia sat calmly.
“Eleanor will tell you Thomas stole Michael.”
Eleanor stared.
Patricia continued.
“That isn’t the whole truth.”
Michael’s face tightened.
“Of course.”
May you like
Patricia smiled.
“Eleanor chose which baby to keep.”
