Chapter 4 - THE FATHER IN THE SHADOWS
My father’s name was Thomas Ellison.
When I was seventeen, my mother told Julian and me that he had died in a boating accident off the coast of Maine.
No body was recovered.
There was a memorial.
A closed casket.
My mother wore black for a year.
I spent nine years believing the sea had swallowed him.
Vanessa’s flash drive contained a video recorded inside Adrian’s private office three months earlier.
Adrian sat behind his desk.
Across from him was an older man with silver hair and a scar near his chin.
Time had changed his face.
Not enough.
I recognized the way he pressed his thumb against his wedding ring.
My father always did that when he lied.
Thomas was alive.
“You promised Mara would never discover the trust was built from my patents,” Adrian said in the recording.
Thomas leaned back.
“She believes her mother created Northstar.”
“She did create it.”
“With assets she stole from me.”
“You abandoned your family.”
“I disappeared because Evelyn threatened to expose the trials.”
My mother’s name was Evelyn.
Adrian lowered his voice.
“What trials?”
Thomas smiled.
“The ones your children are continuing.”
The recording ended.
I watched it three times.
Each viewing created more questions.
My mother had founded a medical-research company before Northstar.
She rarely discussed it.
After my father’s supposed death, she sold the company and moved its profits into investments.
Those investments became the trust now controlling Adrian’s empire.
Julian arrived after midnight.
When I showed him the video, he gripped the back of a chair.
“He’s alive.”
“You knew nothing?”
“Nothing.”
I believed him.
Julian had spent years trying to find our father’s remains.
He paid private investigators.
He traveled to Maine twice.
Our mother had lied to both of us.
Celeste searched historical corporate files.
Thomas Ellison had developed early gene-screening software through a company called Helix Meridian.
The software analyzed embryos for inherited disease.
At least, that was its stated purpose.
Internal documents suggested Helix Meridian also ranked embryos according to predicted intelligence, appearance, sex, and physical traits.
The program was illegal, medically unreliable, and ethically monstrous.
My mother discovered Thomas had tested the software on patients without informed consent.
Several children were born with severe complications.
One infant died.
Evelyn copied the evidence.
She forced Thomas to surrender his shares and disappear in exchange for not exposing the full scandal.
She did not report him.
Instead, she protected the company.
The truth shattered my idealized memory of her.
She saved Julian and me from our father.
But she also allowed victims to remain hidden.
“Why would she do that?” I asked.
Celeste looked down.
“Northstar’s original capital came from selling Helix Meridian technology.”
My inheritance had been built partly from suffering.
Adrian knew.
Thomas knew.
Conrad Pierce knew.
They believed the twins could become the first successful demonstration of an updated Helix program.
I was not simply a target because of my money.
My pregnancy was an experiment.
The genetic test results arrived the following morning.
Dr. Morgan entered with an envelope.
“The twins are biologically yours,” she said.
Relief struck first.
Then fear.
“And Adrian’s?”
She hesitated.
“No.”
I stared at her.
“Who is the father?”
“The sample does not match Adrian.”
“Does it match anyone in the database?”
“The clinic voluntarily compared it with samples connected to its investigation.”
Her face tightened.
“It matches Thomas Ellison.”
For several seconds, nobody moved.
Then Julian slammed both hands against the wall.
My twins had been created using my eggs and my father’s genetic material.
The horror of it made my body reject language.
“No,” I whispered.
Dr. Morgan quickly clarified.
“The embryos do not show a conventional parent-child genetic relationship. The sample appears to have been altered. Portions of Thomas’s genetic material were used to modify Adrian’s contribution.”
It was still a violation.
My father’s DNA had been inserted into my children without my knowledge.
Not to create incestuous embryos, but to reproduce genetic markers associated with his research.
The twins were living evidence.
Evidence Thomas and Adrian intended to control.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
My father’s voice spoke for the first time in sixteen years.
“Mara,” he said. “You need to leave the hospital.”
“Why?”
“Because Adrian is not the person planning to kill you.”
May you like
A fire alarm erupted in the corridor.
Then the hospital lights went out.
