Chapter 12 - I don't remember running.One second I was standing beside the police chief.
The next I was sprinting through the ballroom.
“Sabrina!”
No answer.
Doors slammed.
Security shouted into radios.
The police searched every hallway.
Nothing.
Then one guard found a broken bracelet near the service entrance.
Sabrina's bracelet.
The same one she had been wearing earlier.
I picked it up.
There was blood on it.
My heart stopped.
But something felt wrong.
Too obvious.
Too clean.
I looked at the blood.
It was bright red.
Fresh.
Then I smelled it.
Paint.
Not blood.
“She's alive.”
The police chief looked at me.
“What?”
“This is theater.”
“Why?”
“Because they want us to panic.”
I looked toward the service cameras.
“All cameras on.”
Marcus had compromised them.
But there was another system.
An old analog security system my father had installed.
Almost no one knew about it.
I accessed the backup feed.
One camera was still operating.
It showed the loading dock.
Three men.
A black van.
Sabrina.
She was walking.
Not being dragged.
She was conscious.
She was getting into the van voluntarily.
I paused the footage.
She looked back at the camera.
Her mouth moved.
I zoomed in.
Three words.
Trust no one.
Then she disappeared into the van.
I turned to the police chief.
“She wasn't kidnapped.”
“What?”
“She went with them.”
“Why?”
“To save someone.”
I watched the footage again.
Sabrina's eyes moved toward the driver's seat.
Someone was inside.
I enlarged the image.
My stomach tightened.
The driver was Raymond.
But Raymond was supposed to be in custody.
The police chief checked his radio.
“Someone moved him.”
“What?”
“An officer just transferred Raymond to another facility.”
“When?”
“Twenty minutes ago.”
“Who authorized it?”
The chief checked the record.
His face went pale.
“Marcus.”
I closed my eyes.
Everything connected.
Marcus had infiltrated the police system.
He had moved Raymond.
He had taken Sabrina.
He had stolen money.
And now he was heading somewhere.
I knew where.
The old warehouse on Pier 19.
The place my father had once used for shipping records.
We drove there.
The warehouse doors were locked.
Inside, we found dozens of paper files.
Bank statements.
Property deeds.
Passport copies.
Photographs.
And hundreds of pages relating to my family.
One file stood out.
SABRINA MERCER.
I opened it.
The first page contained her birth record.
The second contained medical records.
The third contained a DNA report.
I stopped.
The DNA test did not list Raymond.
It listed me.
Biological father: Daniel Mercer.
I stared.
“What?”
The police chief looked over my shoulder.
“That contradicts everything we've heard.”
I read the report again.
Then I saw the date.
The test had been performed twenty-three years ago.
Before I ever married Victoria.
Before Sabrina's first birthday.
Before Raymond returned.
How?
I kept reading.
There was another report.
A paternity test between Raymond and Sabrina.
Probability: 0.00%.
Raymond had never been her father.
I was.
My father's letter had been true.
I was Sabrina's biological father.
Not through an affair.
Through something else.
I remembered the years before I married Victoria.
The fertility clinic.
The anonymous donor program.
I had donated genetic material after being told it would remain anonymous.
But someone had apparently matched it.
Victoria had known.
She had known all along.
Sabrina was my biological daughter.
My daughter.
Not because I raised her.
Not because I loved her.
Because she was literally mine.
I sat down.
The police chief whispered:
“Mr. Mercer?”
I could barely speak.
Then another file fell open.
Inside was a contract.
Embryo Transfer Agreement.
The names were visible.
Victoria.
Daniel Mercer.
And a fertility clinic.
The date was one month before Sabrina's birth.
I read the final line.
Recipient identity: Victoria Hale.
Hale.
Raymond's family name.
But Victoria had not been Victoria Mercer yet.
She had been Victoria Hale.
Sabrina had been born through an embryo created from my genetic material.
Which meant Raymond had never been the father.
Victoria had lied about everything.
But why?
The police chief opened another file.
“Look.”
A bank transfer.
$8 million.
From my father's trust.
To Victoria.
Twenty-three years ago.
The reason was listed.
Custodial inheritance arrangement.
I stared.
My father had paid Victoria.
Not to steal Sabrina.
To protect her.
Then who was trying to destroy us now?
A sound came from the warehouse.
Metal scraping.
We turned.
A door at the end of the building opened.
Marcus stepped inside.
He held Sabrina beside him.
But he was not pointing a gun at her.
He was pointing it at himself.
And behind him stood Raymond.
May you like
Alive.
Smiling.
