Chapter 13 - THE FALSE RESCUE
My contractions intensified while Naomi tried to locate Anna’s baby.
The hospital became a fortress.
No staff member entered without two forms of identification.
Every medication was tested.
Every camera feed was monitored.
Yet someone inside continued sending Jonathan information.
He knew when labor started.
He knew Lily was beside me.
He knew the vault had opened.
A video arrived on Naomi’s encrypted phone.
Jonathan sat in a chapel holding Anna’s newborn.
The baby was alive.
Behind him stood Dr. Cole.
Cole claimed he had been forced to cooperate.
Jonathan offered an exchange.
My unborn child for Anna’s baby and the remaining abducted children.
Naomi refused to negotiate through me.
I demanded to hear him.
“You want the DNA evidence destroyed,” I said during the call.
“I want a mistake corrected.”
“She is a person.”
“She is a laboratory accident.”
Lily stepped into view.
“And what am I?”
Jonathan’s expression softened.
“You were supposed to be the proof our system worked.”
“I’m proof you failed.”
He ended the call.
Ortiz traced the chapel to an old Providence orphanage outside the city.
Federal agents prepared a raid.
At the same moment, my baby’s heartbeat dropped.
Dr. Hale ordered an emergency cesarean.
They moved me to surgery while agents approached the orphanage.
Sarah appeared on a secured video from jail and requested to speak with Lily.
Lily refused.
Then Sarah said she knew where Jonathan would move the children if the raid failed.
In exchange, she wanted protection from Diane.
Naomi agreed to hear her.
Sarah revealed an underground tunnel beneath the orphanage leading to an abandoned rail platform.
Agents split their teams.
The information was accurate.
They intercepted Dr. Cole carrying Anna’s baby toward the tunnel.
Jonathan escaped deeper underground with three other children.
Cole surrendered and revealed a remote explosive had been placed beneath the chapel.
Agents evacuated.
Seconds later, the building collapsed.
Jonathan was presumed buried.
No body was found.
In the operating room, Dr. Hale lifted my daughter into the light.
For one terrible second, she made no sound.
Then she cried.
I cried with her.
Lily stood behind the glass, both hands pressed against it.
My daughters saw each other for the first time.
Rebecca entered afterward with tears in her eyes.
“You’re both safe.”
But Detective Ortiz followed her.
Her expression told me the word safe was temporary.
The DNA results from my baby had returned.
Richard was not the father.
Jonathan had altered the profile.
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The true donor was alive.
And he was inside the hospital.
