Chapter 12 - MRS. KANE
Everett did not react for several seconds.
His mother, Eleanor Kane, had supposedly died sixteen years earlier.
Cancer.
A private funeral.
Closed casket.
Everett had been twenty-two.
Mara had been nineteen.
“Impossible,” Mara said when they told her.
Everett remained silent.
Willa watched him.
“What exactly did Allison say?” she asked Shaw.
“He said Eleanor built the medical network with Whitfield.”
“Why?”
“Money initially.”
“Then?”
“Influence. Blackmail. Access to powerful families needing secret medical procedures.”
Everett shook his head.
“My mother hated hospitals.”
Shaw looked at him sadly.
“Perhaps because she knew what happened inside them.”
Mara stood.
“We watched her die.”
“Did you?”
The question came from Naomi.
Mara stared.
Naomi continued.
“You saw her sick?”
“Yes.”
“You saw her body?”
Silence.
“No.”
Everett’s expression changed.
Closed casket.
Private funeral.
Whitfield had been the family doctor then too.
Willa felt the pattern forming.
A physician who could control death certificates.
Sedation.
Medical records.
Identities.
“Where is Whitfield now?” Everett asked.
Shaw shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
The flash drive contained patient files going back twenty-four years.
Many names were coded.
Some were children.
Some politicians.
Some corporate executives.
One folder was labeled EK-01.
Everett.
The first entry was dated when he was sixteen.
He stared at it.
Willa opened the file.
Behavioral assessment.
Blood panels.
Drug-response studies.
Mara whispered, “They experimented on you as a teenager.”
Everett read silently.
Then another folder appeared.
MK-02.
Mara Kane.
Her face went white.
“No.”
Willa opened it.
Less extensive.
Still horrifying.
Sedatives.
Memory assessment.
Psychological conditioning.
Mara backed away from the computer.
“I don’t remember any of this.”
Naomi looked at her.
“That may have been the point.”
A third folder.
RK-H.
Ruth Kane?
No.
Ruth Hayes.
Willa opened it.
Her mother’s medical records.
Experimental compounds administered over seven years.
Cognitive decline documented as “acceptable collateral progression.”
Willa stood so fast the chair fell.
“Acceptable?”
Everett caught her arm.
She pulled away.
“I’m going to kill him.”
This time Everett was the one saying, “No.”
Willa stared at him.
He almost smiled grimly.
“Annoying when reversed?”
She hated him for being right.
The final file on the drive contained coordinates.
A property in Wisconsin near Lake Geneva.
Registered to a shell company.
Everett recognized the company.
“My mother’s foundation.”
Federal teams prepared a raid.
Everett insisted on going.
Voss refused.
Everett threatened to go anyway.
Voss eventually compromised by allowing him to remain behind the tactical perimeter.
Willa came too.
The property looked like an ordinary private rehabilitation center hidden among trees.
Beautiful.
Quiet.
Terrifying.
Agents entered at 5:40 a.m.
No gunfire.
No guards.
Only six elderly patients and three medical staff who claimed they were recently hired.
Whitfield was gone.
Then an agent called from the basement.
They had found a hidden surgical suite.
And a bedroom.
Inside the bedroom were photographs of Everett and Mara from childhood.
Birthday parties.
School events.
Graduations.
Recent surveillance photos too.
Including Everett’s wedding.
Willa found one image taken through the chapel window.
Someone had watched.
A woman.
Reflected faintly in the glass.
Older.
Silver-haired.
Everett saw her.
His face changed.
“Mother.”
Mara began crying.
Not loudly.
Almost angrily.
Everett stood motionless.
Then a speaker in the ceiling clicked.
A woman’s voice filled the room.
“Everett.”
He went pale.
Willa looked toward the hidden camera.
The voice continued.
“I wondered how long it would take you.”
Everett stepped forward.
“Where are you?”
A soft laugh.
“You sound like your father.”
“What did you do to him?”
“James was sentimental.”
“You killed him.”
“He forced a decision.”
Mara screamed toward the camera.
“You let us believe you were dead!”
Eleanor’s voice softened.
“My darling girl.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“You survived.”
Mara stared.
“What does that mean?”
“You both did.”
Everett looked at Willa.
Then toward the camera.
“Whitfield.”
“He has become difficult.”
“Did you order what happened to me?”
Silence.
Then Eleanor replied.
“No.”
Everett frowned.
“Sterling?”
“No.”
“Whitfield?”
“Yes.”
Something shifted.
Whitfield had exceeded orders.
Eleanor continued.
“I wanted you removed from the company temporarily. Alan decided eight months was useful.”
“You experimented on me when I was sixteen.”
“You were sick.”
“I was healthy.”
“You were reckless.”
Mara whispered, “You drugged us.”
“I protected you.”
Willa stepped toward the camera.
“Like you protected my mother?”
Silence.
“Willa Hayes.”
“You know me.”
“I know everything about you.”
“Then you know I’m going to expose you.”
Eleanor laughed gently.
“My dear, you’re still thinking this is about exposure.”
“What is it about?”
“Survival.”
The basement lights turned red.
Naomi looked at the control panel.
“Gas.”
Everett grabbed Willa.
Ventilation ducts opened.
Agents shouted.
A sweet chemical smell entered the room.
“Move!”
They ran toward the stairwell.
Behind them Eleanor’s voice continued calmly.
“If Everett wants answers, he knows where our family began.”
The doors began locking.
Everett fired into one electronic lock.
Agents broke another.
They reached open air seconds before the basement filled with sedative gas.
Outside, Everett collapsed to his knees coughing.
Willa knelt beside him.
“What did she mean?”
He looked toward the building.
“Where family began.”
Mara understood first.
“The Kane farm.”
Everett nodded.
Their grandfather’s original property.
Northern Illinois.
Abandoned for decades.
Willa stood.
Voss told them no one was going anywhere until a tactical team cleared it.
Then Everett’s phone rang.
Unknown caller.
He answered.
Whitfield.
His voice trembled.
“Everett, listen carefully.”
Everett put the call on speaker.
Whitfield continued.
“Your mother is going to kill everyone who can connect her to the network.”
“Where are you?”
“I can give you everything.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s hunting me too.”
Willa stepped closer.
“What do you want?”
Whitfield heard her.
“Protection.”
Willa laughed once.
“You kept Everett trapped for eight months.”
“I can explain.”
“You murdered Harold Fisk.”
“Allison ordered it.”
“You poisoned my mother.”
Silence.
Then Whitfield whispered, “No.”
Willa stopped.
“What?”
“I treated Ruth.”
“You destroyed her memory.”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
Whitfield’s breathing became ragged.
“Eleanor.”
A gunshot sounded through the phone.
Whitfield screamed.
The connection remained open.
Footsteps approached him.
Then an unfamiliar male voice said:
“Dr. Whitfield?”
A second gunshot.
Silence.
The line disconnected.
May you like
Everett looked at Willa.
Someone else had entered the game.
