Doctors gave my six-year-old twins ten days to live, and for the first time, every dollar, weapon, and ounce of power attached to my name meant absolutely nothing. Then a penniless woman appeared outside my Chicago estate and refused to leave, and when she told my security chief she knew my children were dying, I discovered she was carrying something that had belonged to my dead wife.

Lawson stared at the report until the letters seemed to move.

Jonah Mercer.

Blythe Mercer.

The names were correct.

The date was impossible.

Seven years earlier.

One full year before Genevieve became pregnant.

Lawson slowly raised his eyes.

“Explain.”

Elena glanced at Prescott Hale and the two armed guards.

“Not here.”

“You walked into my house carrying my dead wife’s necklace and a medical file with my unborn children’s names on it. You will explain wherever I tell you to.”

Her fear disappeared.

“Then your children may die while you’re proving you’re powerful.”

Prescott inhaled sharply.

Nobody spoke to Lawson Mercer that way.

Nobody except Genevieve.

That similarity disturbed him.

Lawson dismissed the guards but kept Prescott.

Elena opened the report.

“This came from a research program at St. Vincent Biomedical Center. Genevieve volunteered for genetic screening before trying to conceive.”

Lawson frowned.

“She never told me.”

“She was looking for a specific mutation.”

“Why?”

“Because her older sister died from leukemia at nine.”

Lawson froze.

Genevieve had told him she was an only child.

Elena continued.

“The researchers found a rare inherited bone-marrow disorder. It can remain hidden for years. In children, it can look like aggressive leukemia.”

Lawson looked toward the hallway leading to the medical wing.

“So the doctors diagnosed them incorrectly?”

“Not exactly. They have leukemia. But the mutation changes how their marrow responds to standard treatment.”

“Why wouldn’t their physicians know that?”

“Because this report was removed from Genevieve’s hospital record before the twins were born.”

Lawson’s voice dropped.

“Removed by whom?”

Elena shook her head.

“I don’t know.”

“You expect me to believe Genevieve discovered this seven years ago, hid it from me, gave you her necklace, and somehow predicted our children would get sick?”

“She didn’t predict it.”

Elena reached into her coat.

Prescott’s hand moved toward his weapon.

Lawson raised one finger.

Elena produced an old photograph.

Genevieve stood outside St. Vincent beside another woman.

Elena.

Both were younger.

Between them stood Dr. Franklin Yates.

The same physician who had just told Lawson his children had ten days left.

Lawson’s blood went cold.

On the back, Genevieve had written: