Chapter 6 - Boone's Last Lie
Boone returned before dawn.
He found Vivian waiting in the hospital chapel.
“You shouldn't have come back,” she said.
“I came for my family.”
Vivian laughed.
“You still think this is about family.”
“What do you want?”
“The same thing I wanted eleven years ago.”
“Emma?”
“No.”
Vivian's eyes hardened.
“The evidence.”
Boone went still.
“What evidence?”
“The evidence your sister stole.”
“She didn't steal anything.”
“She copied it.”
Vivian leaned closer.
“And she hid it inside her daughter.”
Boone's face changed.
“What did she do?”
“She implanted the access key into something no one would suspect.”
“Where?”
Vivian smiled.
“Ask Claire.”
Meanwhile, I was examining Emma's records.
Something was wrong.
Her DNA test had never been completed.
I ordered one.
The result arrived three hours later.
I opened it.
Mother: Rachel Mercer.
Probability: 99.99%.
Father:
Boone Mercer.
I stared at the screen.
Then I noticed a second result.
A mitochondrial anomaly.
Emma wasn't simply Rachel's daughter.
She carried a genetic marker belonging to someone else.
Someone in the hospital.
Someone alive.
Someone who had never been listed as family.
I searched the database.
The match appeared.
My hands began shaking.
The genetic marker belonged to—
Melissa Grant.
I ran to her office.
“Melissa.”
She looked up.
“What happened?”
I closed the door.
“I need to ask you something.”
Her face changed when she saw the DNA report.
“Where did you get that?”
“Emma's test.”
“You tested her?”
“Yes.”
Melissa stood.
“You weren't authorized.”
“Why are you afraid?”
She didn't answer.
“Your DNA matches hers.”
Silence.
May you like
Then Melissa whispered,
“Because Rachel wasn't the only woman who gave birth that night.”
