Chapter 6 - The First Wife in the Security Room
Rebecca appeared on the medical-room monitor.
She sat inside the mansion’s security office wearing a white coat over a black dress.
She looked older than the photographs Daniel kept hidden in an attic box.
But unmistakably alive.
Behind her, screens showed every hallway in the house.
The fake police officers moved from room to room, locking the remaining relatives inside the dining room.
“Rebecca,” Daniel whispered.
She smiled.
“You look disappointed.”
“I watched them lower your coffin.”
“It was empty.”
“Why?”
“Your father needed me inside Winter Glass.”
Daniel turned toward Richard.
“You used my wife as a test subject?”
Richard answered.
“She was not a subject.”
Rebecca leaned closer to the camera.
“I was his partner.”
She had helped design the adult phase of the program.
Memory suppression allowed the company to silence witnesses without killing them.
People could be made to forget meetings, assaults, signatures, entire relationships.
Rebecca discovered Richard planned to replace her after the program’s success.
So she disappeared first.
She spent twelve years gathering evidence.
“Then why poison Claire?” Daniel asked.
Rebecca’s eyes moved toward me.
“Because she remembers where the master archive is hidden.”
“I don’t.”
“Not consciously.”
The cream contained a trigger compound.
It was designed to cause a neurological reaction and force suppressed memories to surface before destroying key neural pathways.
Richard wanted the archive location.
Rebecca wanted it too.
Emma had opened the wrong present and absorbed only a small amount through her skin.
The full dose might have killed me.
Cole leaned against the wall.
“If you want the archive, why attack the police?”
Rebecca shrugged.
“Because Richard arranged for Daniel to be arrested. I arranged for the arresting team to disappear.”
Richard looked at the monitor.
“You have become reckless.”
“You taught me.”
Daniel stepped toward the camera.
“Let the family leave.”
“Bring Emma to the security office.”
“No.”
“She was exposed to the trigger. Her blood may now carry the activation sequence.”
I held Emma tighter.
“She is a child.”
“So were you,” Rebecca said. “That never stopped Richard.”
The screen went black.
A countdown appeared.
TEN MINUTES UNTIL FIRE SUPPRESSION FAILURE.
Richard looked at the ceiling.
“She has sealed the gas system.”
Cole struggled to stand.
“If she releases fire suppressant into the lower tunnels, it can suffocate us.”
Daniel opened the medical-room vent panel.
“There is another route to the security office.”
Richard shook his head.
“She expects that.”
“Then what do you suggest?”
“Give her what she wants.”
“The ledger?”
“Emma.”
Daniel hit him.
Richard fell against the cabinet.
Emma gasped.
Daniel stood over his father.
“You will never use my daughter again.”
Richard wiped blood from his lip.
Then he laughed.
“You still think she is your daughter.”
The room went silent.
I looked at him.
“What does that mean?”
May you like
Richard glanced toward Emma.
“The fertility clinic that created her was owned by Winter Glass.”
