Chapter 8 - THE FIRST CHILD
Audrey reopened the oldest clinic archive.
Five years before Lily, another embryo from Clara’s genetic material had been transferred.
The child was a girl.
Name: Emma Shaw.
Age seven.
The transfer occurred before Clara married Julian.
Her eggs had been collected during an ovarian procedure when she was twenty-six.
The paternal sample belonged to Julian’s father, Charles Bennett.
The family had selected Clara as a reproductive match before she ever met Julian.
Emma had been raised by Margaret.
The entire marriage had been arranged around a genetic plan.
Julian’s cruelty came partly from learning his father had used Clara first.
He turned humiliation into revenge against a woman who had never known.
Charles Bennett had died three years earlier.
Or so the family believed.
A current bank transaction showed him paying the Maine estate’s property tax.
Then Emma appeared on a school security camera in Boston.
Beside her stood Charles.
May you like
Alive.
Read Chapter 9 to discover why Julian’s father had created the first child.
