Chapter 15 - THE LAST SECRETFor several seconds, nobody moved.
Poppy stared at the boy beside her.
Jonah stared back.
Then Poppy whispered,
“Are you my brother?”
Jonah's lips trembled.
“Yes.”
Marlo stepped forward.
“Poppy, come here.”
Victor raised the syringe.
“Not yet.”
Elias aimed his weapon.
“Put it down.”
Victor laughed.
“You think you can shoot me?”
“Yes.”
“You won't.”
“Try me.”
Samuel slowly pushed himself upright.
His face was covered in blood.
“Elias.”
Elias glanced at him.
“Don't listen to Victor.”
Victor turned.
“You don't get to speak.”
Samuel smiled.
“You never understood what she did.”
Victor frowned.
“What?”
Samuel looked at Poppy.
Then Jonah.
Then Marlo.
“The children were never the experiment.”
Victor froze.
“The parents were.”
Silence.
Marlo stared.
“What?”
Samuel continued.
“The program wasn't designed to create healing children.”
“It was designed to alter parents.”
Marlo's eyes widened.
“They wanted to know whether genetic damage could be reversed before birth.”
Victor's face darkened.
“And you ruined it.”
“No.”
Samuel shook his head.
“I completed it.”
The room went silent.
Victor took one step backward.
“You didn't.”
“I did.”
Samuel looked at Marlo.
“Your mother and I finished the procedure eleven years ago.”
Marlo whispered,
“What procedure?”
“The one that created Poppy.”
Victor's grip tightened around the syringe.
“You were supposed to destroy the data.”
“I destroyed the data.”
He smiled.
“But I kept the children.”
Victor suddenly understood.
“The files.”
Samuel nodded.
“The blue envelope was never the complete file.”
Marlo looked at him.
“What was missing?”
Samuel answered,
“The final page.”
He pulled a folded sheet from his coat.
He handed it to Marlo.
She opened it.
There were two names.
POPPY HART.
JONAH HART.
Underneath:
STATUS: SUCCESSFUL.
But there was another line.
A line Marlo had never seen.
GENETIC TRANSFERRED TRAIT: ACTIVATED AT AGE 18.
Marlo looked at Jonah.
“He hasn't activated yet.”
Samuel shook his head.
“No.”
“Then why does Victor want him?”
“Because he believes Jonah can trigger Poppy's cells.”
Marlo looked horrified.
“And Poppy?”
Samuel closed his eyes.
“Poppy's cells can stabilize Jonah.”
Victor smiled.
“Now you understand.”
He raised the syringe.
“If one survives, the other does.”
“And if neither?”
“Then the program ends.”
Elias stepped forward.
“You're not touching them.”
Victor pressed the syringe against Jonah's neck.
Elias fired.
The shot struck Victor's shoulder.
He stumbled.
The syringe fell.
Jonah ran.
Poppy grabbed Marlo.
Victor crawled toward the weapon.
Elias kicked it away.
Sirens sounded in the distance.
Marlo looked at Samuel.
“You called the police?”
Samuel shook his head.
“No.”
“Then who?”
A voice came from the doorway.
“Me.”
Elena stood there.
Alive.
Bloodied.
Holding a phone.
“I sent everything to the FBI.”
Victor stared at her.
“You stupid girl.”
Elena smiled.
“You taught me how to survive.”
Police stormed the laboratory.
Victor was arrested.
Samuel surrendered.
Margaret was taken to the hospital.
Preston was dead.
The Children's Renewal Program was exposed.
Six hundred and fourteen names were released.
Hospitals were investigated.
Doctors disappeared.
Executives fled.
But the worst secret remained.
Poppy.
And Jonah.
Months later, Marlo reopened Heart and Crumb Bakery.
Elias came every morning.
One apricot tart.
Cash.
Same table.
Poppy sat beside him doing homework.
Jonah sometimes joined them.
For the first time, Marlo watched her daughter laugh without fear.
One morning, Elias placed an envelope on the counter.
Marlo frowned.
“What is that?”
“Something I found.”
She opened it.
Inside was a photograph.
A hospital room.
A newborn Poppy.
A newborn Jonah.
And standing beside them was Margaret.
But there was someone else in the photograph.
A woman Marlo had never seen.
Young.
Smiling.
Holding a clipboard.
On the back was a date.
Two days before Poppy was born.
And one sentence.
Marlo read it twice.
Then looked at Elias.
“What?”
He could tell from her face that something was wrong.
She turned the photograph around.
“Who is she?”
Elias stared.
His expression changed.
“I don't know.”
Marlo's phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
Nobody spoke.
Then a woman's voice whispered,
“You found the photograph.”
Marlo froze.
“Who are you?”
The woman laughed softly.
“The woman who was in the room when your children were made.”
Marlo's blood turned cold.
“Where are you?”
The woman answered,
“Closer than you think.”
The line went dead.
Elias stood.
“Marlo?”
She looked across the bakery.
At the windows.
At the street.
At the customers.
Then she saw her.
An older woman sitting alone at a corner table.
Reading a newspaper.
Marlo had never seen her before.
The woman lowered the newspaper.
Their eyes met.
Then the woman smiled.
And placed a blue envelope on the table.
Marlo slowly stood.
Elias reached for his weapon.
The woman opened the envelope.
Inside was one final photograph.
This one showed six newborn babies.
Not two.
Six.
And beneath them was a handwritten number.
Marlo's hands began to shake.
Elias whispered,
“That's impossible.”
The woman smiled.
“No.”
She looked directly at Marlo.
“What's impossible is that you ever believed there were only six hundred and fourteen.”
The bakery door opened.
A cold wind swept inside.
The woman stood.
And before anyone could stop her, she walked through the crowd and disappeared.
Marlo looked down at the photograph.
Six babies.
Six names.
Poppy Hart.
Jonah Hart.
And four others.
She felt Elias move beside her.
“Marlo.”
She didn't answer.
Because at the bottom of the photograph, beneath the names, there was one final sentence.
THE OTHER FOUR ARE STILL ALIVE.
And for the first time since she had grabbed a stranger’s hand and whispered, “Just play along,” Marlo understood the truth.
She had never been escaping the story.
May you like
She had been walking directly into it.
And somewhere in the city, four people were waiting for her to find them.
