Chapter 3 - THE FATHER I HAD NEVER TOUCHED
For almost a minute, neither Emily nor Adrian spoke.
Then Emily laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because biology had apparently become insane overnight.
“That laboratory is wrong.”
Adrian’s face was rigid.
“They repeated it.”
“You knew?”
“Ten minutes before you.”
“You submitted your DNA without telling me.”
“I’ve been Evan’s father for seven years. I needed to know.”
Emily wanted to be angry.
She was.
But the larger impossibility consumed it.
“We had never met.”
“No.”
“I would remember.”
“So would I.”
Martin entered after Adrian called him.
When he heard the result, the color drained from his face.
Emily noticed.
“You know something.”
“No.”
“You’re terrible at lying when you’re frightened.”
Adrian stepped toward him.
“Martin.”
The security chief looked between them.
“I know one possibility.”
Emily’s stomach tightened.
“What?”
“Cross mentioned assisted reproduction once.”
She froze.
Seven years earlier, before pregnancy, Emily had participated in a fertility preservation study.
Not because she was infertile.
Because Meridian’s earliest medical robotics work partnered with a California reproductive clinic, and employees were offered discounted egg freezing.
Emily had undergone one retrieval.
Twelve eggs.
She later received a letter saying the storage facility experienced a refrigeration failure.
All material had supposedly been destroyed.
She had cried for an afternoon, then moved on.
Three months later, she met Julian.
Six months after that, she became pregnant.
Her doctor told her conception had occurred naturally.
Or so she believed.
Emily looked at Adrian.
“Have you ever stored genetic material?”
His face changed.
“My sister.”
“What about her?”
“She had a hereditary cardiac condition. Before trying to conceive, our family underwent genetic screening.”
“That doesn’t explain your sperm.”
“No.”
Adrian looked toward Martin.
Martin lowered his eyes.
Adrian went cold.
“What did my father do?”
Emily felt the question before she understood it.
Martin rubbed one hand over his face.
“Your father was obsessed with preserving the Kane line.”
Adrian’s expression became disgusted.
“Continue.”
“When your sister became ill, he pressured you to bank reproductive material.”
Adrian stared.
“I did.”
Emily looked at him.
“When?”
“Nine years ago.”
Two years before Evan was born.
“Where?”
Adrian named a Los Angeles clinic.
Emily’s heart stopped.
Same medical network.
Different branch.
She called her attorney immediately.
Then Meridian’s chief legal officer.
By eight that morning, they had confirmed the fertility center Emily used and Adrian’s clinic had been owned by the same parent company.
A company called Helix Reproductive Partners.
It had closed after multiple malpractice claims.
Emily sat in Adrian’s library while documents populated her tablet.
One name appeared repeatedly.
Medical director:
DR. SIMON CROSS.
Julian Cross’s older brother.
Emily’s blood went cold.
“Julian’s brother ran the clinic.”
Adrian read over her shoulder.
“And my father invested in it.”
Silence.
Emily looked at him.
Adrian’s father, Dominic Kane, had invested eight million dollars in Helix.
Three years before Evan’s birth.
“What the hell were they doing?”
A former clinic employee answered part of that question later that afternoon.
Her name was Dr. Natalie Reese.
She agreed to speak only after Emily’s attorney promised formal whistleblower protection.
Natalie was seventy now.
Retired.
Terrified.
“The clinic ran an unauthorized embryo-selection program,” she said.
Emily felt cold.
“Explain.”
“High-net-worth clients paid for expanded genetic screening. Some wanted disease avoidance. Others wanted… more.”
“More what?”
“Specific traits. Intellectual markers. Physical projections.”
Adrian’s jaw hardened.
“Eugenics.”
Natalie looked ashamed.
“Yes.”
Emily wanted to be sick.
“What does that have to do with me?”
Natalie studied her.
“You were not supposed to be a client.”
“What was I?”
“A donor profile.”
Emily stopped breathing.
Her eggs had not been destroyed.
Someone had retained them.
And Adrian’s stored sample had been accessed.
“Who authorized fertilization?”
Natalie shook her head.
“I never saw the order.”
“Who would?”
“The medical director.”
“Simon Cross.”
“Yes.”
Emily’s thoughts raced.
Then Julian entered her life months later.
Had that been coincidence?
No.
Nothing felt accidental anymore.
“How did I become pregnant?”
Natalie’s face changed.
“That’s the part I never understood.”
“What?”
“The embryo created from your egg and Mr. Kane’s sample was logged as transferred to a gestational carrier.”
Emily stared.
“I carried Evan.”
“Yes.”
“I gave birth to him.”
“Yes.”
“Then who was the carrier?”
Natalie swallowed.
“The original transfer failed.”
Emily’s skin prickled.
“So how did the embryo end up in me?”
Natalie looked toward the attorneys.
“I think Julian Cross arranged it.”
“How?”
“You were treated for severe endometriosis symptoms at the clinic shortly before you began dating him.”
Emily remembered.
A minor hysteroscopic procedure.
Sedation.
A day she barely remembered.
Her hands began shaking.
“No.”
Natalie continued carefully.
“There were allegations years later that some patients underwent embryo transfer without full informed consent.”
Emily stood so quickly the chair fell.
Adrian caught the back of it.
Not her.
He did not touch her.
Good.
Emily could barely breathe.
Someone may have put an embryo inside her body without telling her.
Then sent Julian into her life to control what happened next.
She looked at Natalie.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Natalie’s eyes filled.
“But Simon kept private files.”
“Where?”
“When Helix closed, he removed them.”
“And Simon?”
“He disappeared.”
Emily laughed bitterly.
The Cross brothers had a talent for vanishing.
Then Natalie said:
“There is one person who may know.”
“Who?”
“Dominic Kane’s private physician.”
Adrian’s face hardened.
“My father’s doctor died five years ago.”
Natalie shook her head.
“Not Dr. Landry.”
She whispered another name.
“Dr. Miriam Vale.”
Emily felt the room change.
Adrian looked stunned.
Emily asked:
“Who is Miriam Vale?”
Adrian answered slowly.
May you like
“The woman who raised me after my mother died.”
And according to Natalie, Miriam had signed the authorization that created Evan.
