Chapter 6 - THE DOCTOR WHO REMEMBERED EVERYTHING
Dr. Adrian Cole vanished before federal agents reached his clinic.
His office had been stripped, but technicians recovered a damaged hard drive from the furnace room.
It contained fertility records spanning fourteen years.
My name appeared twice.
At seventeen, I was listed as Patient E-17.
The father field was encrypted.
For my current pregnancy, I was listed as Patient E-30.
The embryo-transfer notes showed that Michael’s genetic sample had never been used.
Dr. Cole had implanted an embryo created years earlier and kept frozen under Judge Hale’s authorization.
The embryo was genetically linked to Lily.
My unborn child was not merely Lily’s sibling.
The files suggested they might have the same father.
Rebecca ordered immediate DNA comparisons.
While we waited, Michael requested a private meeting.
Naomi refused at first, but he offered the location of Dr. Cole.
I agreed to listen through a secure glass partition.
Michael entered wearing county jail clothing. Without his suit and controlled voice, he looked smaller.
“Sarah planned the transplant,” he said. “Not me.”
“You chained me.”
“You were going to run.”
“You forged my signature.”
“Diane forged it.”
“You threatened my baby.”
His face tightened.
“I was trying to scare you.”
I leaned toward the glass.
“You let them steal Lily.”
“I didn’t know about her until after we married.”
That surprised me.
Michael admitted Diane selected him as my husband because his family had financial ties to Sarah. He married me to access my inheritance and manage my pregnancies.
But he claimed Dr. Cole controlled the embryos.
“Who is the father?”
Michael looked toward the observation camera.
Then he whispered, “Rebecca’s father.”
My stomach turned.
Judge Hale had been in his fifties when I was seventeen.
“No.”
“I found the original file. Your mother destroyed it.”
“Why would she protect him?”
“Because he paid her.”
Michael offered the location of the encrypted backup in exchange for protection.
Naomi asked where.
“Saint Agnes chapel. Beneath the baptismal font.”
Federal agents searched the chapel.
They found a sealed drive containing birth records, DNA profiles, videos, and payment logs.
The first decrypted file disproved Michael’s claim.
Judge Hale was not Lily’s father.
The DNA profile matched another man.
My father.
Not the man who raised me.
The biological father listed in my birth records.
My mother’s brother, Richard.
I read the report twice, refusing to understand it.
Rebecca took the document from me.
“This could be falsified.”
Before she finished, the hospital door opened.
A tall gray-haired man stood there with federal agents behind him.
Richard Carter.
My uncle.
He had been missing for thirteen years.
He looked at Lily, then at me.
“I came to tell the truth,” he said.
But Lily recoiled before he took another step.
“I know him.”
May you like
She pointed with a trembling hand.
“He’s the man Sarah took me to every summer.”
