Chapter 6 - THE PRICE OF BLOOD
The call lasted twenty-three seconds.
Celeste did not say where she was. She did not explain how she had survived the apparent attack in Maine. She only told Dominic not to search for her, warned him that Voss had someone inside the federal investigation, and said Noah was in immediate danger. Then the line went dead.
The FBI traced the call to a prepaid phone near Baltimore, but the device had already been discarded. Dominic wanted to move the girls to a second property. Hannah argued that repeatedly moving children from one fortress to another would only deepen their fear. Elena agreed. Marcus recommended a compromise: reduce staff, relocate only essential personnel, and place independent federal agents outside the estate while his team controlled the interior. For the first time in years, Dominic accepted security he did not command.
The next morning, Adrian Vale arrived from London.
He came alone.
Hannah expected a version of Dominic with different features, but the brothers were opposites in presentation. Adrian wore a camel coat, no tie, and the faint expression of a man who had spent his life learning to smile before anyone could decide whether he was a threat. He was older by four years and resembled their father in the family portraits. When Dominic told him that Noah might be biologically Dominic’s son, Adrian’s smile vanished.
“That’s not possible,” he said.
Vivian had died from cancer three years earlier. Adrian explained that they had used Saint Arden after multiple failed fertility treatments. Voss personally handled the process. Adrian had been told the embryo came from anonymous donors because neither he nor Vivian had viable genetic material. He had never questioned it. Noah was his son in every way that mattered.
Dominic did not challenge that. Hannah noticed the restraint.
“Where is he now?” Marcus asked.
Adrian looked toward the windows. “Boarding school in Connecticut.”
Every person in the room moved at once.
The school confirmed Noah had left campus thirty minutes earlier. A man carrying valid authorization papers had signed him out, claiming a family emergency. The documents carried Adrian’s digital signature.
Adrian had not signed them.
Marcus dispatched teams. State police issued an alert. Dominic stood in the operations room with both hands flat on the table, staring at road maps and traffic feeds. Hannah watched fury battle helplessness inside him. He had built a life around the belief that enough money, enough guards, enough fear could prevent loss. Now an eleven-year-old boy had disappeared using forged paperwork.
Sophie wandered in unnoticed and heard Noah’s name. “Is he our brother?” she asked.
Silence filled the room.
Dominic crouched to her height. “Maybe biologically.” Sophie frowned. “What does that mean?” Hannah knelt beside them. “It means bodies can connect people in one way. Families can connect people in other ways too.” Sophie thought about that seriously. “So if he’s scared, we still help him.” Dominic closed his eyes for a moment. “Yes.”
A traffic camera finally found the vehicle that had taken Noah. It was heading south toward an abandoned Saint Arden storage facility outside Newark, New Jersey. Federal agents coordinated the response, but Dominic insisted on going. Adrian insisted too. Hannah surprised herself by joining them. Elena called the decision reckless. Hannah agreed. “But Noah may have been told something about me. If he’s being used because of my donor file, I want him to see a face that isn’t lying to him.”
The storage facility stood inside an industrial district beneath a web of highway ramps. It looked abandoned, but thermal imaging detected several people inside. Agents surrounded the building. Then a message arrived on Dominic’s phone from an unknown number.
BRING HANNAH REED TO DOOR THREE. ALONE. OR THE BOY LEAVES IN PIECES.
Dominic immediately said no.
Hannah stared at the message. “They want me alive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“If they wanted me dead, they had a rifle in Vermont.”
Dominic grabbed her arm, then released it instantly as if remembering the rule she had set. “I will not trade you.”
“You don’t get to decide whether I take the risk.”
Their eyes locked.
For a moment the old Dominic—the man who had forced her into an SUV—returned to his face. Then he stepped back. “What do you need?”
It was the most important question he had asked her.
The plan was built around deception. Hannah would approach Door Three wearing a concealed transmitter while tactical agents entered from the rear. Dominic and Adrian would remain in the command vehicle, though both hated it. Hannah walked across wet pavement alone, every step echoing between empty warehouses. She thought about her mother, who had survived the surgery Hannah once paid for with the fertility clinic money. She thought about three little girls waiting at the estate. She thought about an eleven-year-old boy who had no idea why powerful adults had turned his existence into a weapon.
Door Three opened.
Dr. Voss stood inside.
Behind him, Noah sat tied to a chair. He had Dominic’s eyes.
Voss smiled. “There you are.”
Hannah stepped inside.
Voss held a pistol loosely at his side. He told her the government would misunderstand everything. The clinic had helped create families, he said. Wealthy clients had paid for certainty, and donors like Hannah had been compensated. “Everyone benefited.”
“I didn’t consent.”
“You needed money.”
“That isn’t consent.”
His expression hardened. “History will not care about paperwork.”
Hannah looked past him at Noah. The boy was terrified but alert. She saw him watching her hands. Slowly, she raised one finger—the signal Marcus had taught her to indicate the suspect was armed.
Voss moved closer. “You could make this disappear. Sign a corrected authorization. Confirm the extended consent. I will release the boy and ensure your future is financially secure.”
Hannah laughed softly.
Seventeen years earlier, Saint Arden had counted on her poverty.
Now Voss was making the same mistake.
“You still think the price is the point,” she said.
The rear wall exploded inward.
Agents flooded the building.
Voss spun, firing once. Hannah dropped to the floor. Noah kicked the chair sideways. A bullet struck a steel beam. Two agents tackled Voss before he could fire again.
Within seconds it was over.
Adrian reached Noah first. He cut the ropes with shaking hands and pulled the boy against his chest. Noah clung to him, sobbing, “Dad.”
Dominic stopped several feet away.
Hannah watched him make a choice that no test, contract, or blood result could make for him.
He did not claim the boy.
He simply said, “You’re safe.”
Later, as Voss was led past in handcuffs, he turned toward Hannah.
“You think this ends with me?” he said.
May you like
She met his eyes.
“No,” she replied. “I think it starts with you.”
