Chapter 9 - CHOOSE A SON
Grant stared at the photograph until the words blurred.
YOU FOUND YOUR REAL SON.
NOW CHOOSE WHICH BOY YOU WANT TO KEEP.
Elena reached for his phone.
“Zoom in.”
“What?”
“The blanket.”
Grant handed it to her.
Noah was asleep on his side beneath the pale yellow hospital blanket. A plastic oxygen monitor glowed around one foot. The photograph had been taken from above and slightly behind the crib.
Inside the secure pediatric room.
Or so it seemed.
Elena enlarged the corner.
“There.”
A tiny reflection appeared on the metal rail.
Not a person.
A black circle.
“A camera,” Mateo said.
Grant was already calling the hospital.
No answer from the private security line.
He called again.
Nothing.
Detective Sloan contacted Boston-area federal partners while Grant called the pediatric floor directly.
A nurse answered on the fourth ring.
“St. Gabriel pediatric observation.”
“This is Grant Mercer. Put me through to Room Twelve.”
A pause.
“Mr. Mercer, your son was transferred.”
The room went silent.
Grant’s voice became almost frighteningly calm.
“Transferred where?”
“I’m sorry, I thought your team arranged it.”
“When?”
“Twenty minutes ago.”
“By who?”
“Two federal agents.”
Sloan swore.
“We didn’t authorize a transfer.”
Grant closed his eyes once.
Then opened them.
“Vehicle?”
The nurse checked.
“White medical transport van.”
Lily pulled Ethan closer.
Elena looked at Mateo.
“Can Harbor spoof hospital authorization?”
“They can spoof anything built from records.”
Grant ended the call.
“Find him.”
Sloan was already moving.
State police issued a silent alert for the van. Toll cameras were checked. Traffic feeds searched. Every official channel began looking.
Mateo did something else.
“Grant, did Noah still have the rabbit?”
Grant turned.
“The stuffed rabbit?”
“Yes.”
“I think so.”
Elena understood.
“The key was inside it.”
“And Audrey hid more than one thing.”
Mateo opened a laptop.
“Mercer toys sold through your smart-nursery division use low-energy tags for the Find My Toy feature, right?”
Grant stared at him.
“That rabbit is a prototype.”
“Exactly.”
“It hasn’t been registered in years.”
“But the tag still exists.”
Grant logged into a legacy device server.
The rabbit appeared.
Last signal: six minutes ago.
Interstate 95 southbound.
Sloan called state police.
The van was found nine minutes later at a rest area.
Empty.
The rabbit lay on the driver’s seat.
Grant gripped the edge of the table.
“They knew.”
Mateo nodded.
“They knew we would track it.”
Elena stared at the map.
A decoy route.
“Then why take the rabbit?”
“To make us look south.”
Grant looked north.
Boston.
Audrey.
The message was not really about choosing between Noah and Ethan.
It was about splitting them.
Grant’s phone rang.
Celeste.
From police custody.
He almost refused the call.
Elena said, “Answer.”
He did.
Celeste was crying.
“They took Noah, didn’t they?”
Grant’s expression hardened.
“How do you know?”
“Because that was always the second step.”
“What second step?”
“If Ethan was found, Noah would be moved.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Grant’s patience snapped.
“You have exactly one useful sentence left before I hang up.”
“Mercer headquarters.”
He stopped.
Celeste spoke quickly.
“Raymond showed me a room there. Below the original research floor. He called it the vault.”
Mateo looked up.
Grant said, “There is no basement below research.”
“There is.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I saw Audrey there.”
Silence.
“When?” Grant whispered.
“Six months ago.”
Elena felt the pieces move.
Audrey had supposedly been shot six months ago and taken to a private recovery center.
What if that center was another story?
Celeste continued.
“She was injured. Raymond had people treating her. He wanted her memory back.”
“Why?”
“She knew where the original Harbor ledger was.”
Mateo looked down at the DNA samples.
“The ledger.”
Celeste said, “Raymond thinks she hid a paper original somewhere inside Mercer headquarters.”
Grant stared at the table.
Audrey had built emergency protocols into his house.
She had hidden records in Noah’s toy.
She had used his own company against the people infiltrating it.
Of course she would hide evidence inside the building Harbor needed most.
“Why take Noah there?” Elena asked.
Celeste heard her through speakerphone.
“Because Grant’s board is meeting today.”
Grant looked at the time.
Emergency meeting.
The scandal had forced it.
Celeste continued.
“Raymond wants Grant removed as CEO. Then the trustees use Ethan’s holding interest to control the company.”
“And Noah?”
“Audrey will cooperate if they threaten him.”
Grant’s face changed.
“They’re using the wrong child to control the right mother.”
“Yes.”
Elena looked at Ethan asleep against Lily.
Harbor still believed Grant would see Noah as less valuable after learning the DNA truth.
That was their mistake.
Grant picked up his jacket.
“We’re going to headquarters.”
Sloan blocked the door.
“You’re not storming your own building.”
“I have access.”
“So does the criminal network that infiltrated it.”
“Then bring people.”
“I am bringing people.”
Mateo stood.
“I know the old server tunnels.”
Elena looked at him.
“No.”
He blinked.
“You don’t get to say no after what you’ve done today.”
“I am your older sister.”
“By eleven minutes.”
“It counts.”
“You jumped into a pool after a baby.”
“Exactly. This family has reached its rescue quota.”
Grant interrupted.
“Elena stays with Ethan.”
She stared at him.
“No.”
“Wonderful. Nobody listens.”
Lily said quietly, “I’ll stay with Ethan.”
Elena shook her head.
“You’re the only person he knows.”
“Which is why I’ll stay.”
Grant looked at Elena.
“You’re coming because?”
“Because Noah reaches for me when he’s scared.”
That ended the argument.
Before they left, Grant went to Ethan’s crib. He stood there awkwardly until Lily stepped aside.
“Can I?” he asked.
She nodded.
Grant touched two fingers to Ethan’s small hand. The boy stirred but did not wake.
“I’m coming back,” Grant whispered.
Elena heard the promise and understood it was meant for both boys.
Grant straightened. Whatever fear remained in his face had changed shape.
“Let’s get Noah.”
Thirty-eight minutes later, Grant entered Mercer Home Systems through a loading dock beneath police tactical cover.
The headquarters building was forty-two stories of glass and steel, filled with more than two thousand employees on a normal weekday.
Today most had been evacuated because of the scandal and an alleged security threat.
Raymond had emptied the building for them.
Mateo led Grant, Elena, and Sloan through an obsolete cable corridor behind the original server room.
“You’ve been here before,” Grant said.
Mateo nodded.
“With Sofia.”
“Did Audrey know?”
“Yes.”
“Of course she did.”
They reached a concrete wall.
Mateo pressed a hidden switch beneath an electrical panel.
The wall opened.
An elevator waited behind it.
Grant stared.
“My company has a secret elevator.”
Elena looked at him.
“Your house had a secret archive. At this point, I’d be disappointed if the office didn’t.”
The elevator descended below the marked basement levels.
Doors opened.
A white corridor stretched ahead.
Medical equipment.
Security doors.
An old research facility hidden beneath one of the most famous smart-home companies in America.
They heard a child crying.
Noah.
Elena ran before anyone could stop her.
She found him in a glass-walled room strapped into a car seat on a table.
A man stood beside him.
Gray hair.
Thin face.
Grant’s father’s eyes.
Raymond Allen Mercer.
He held no weapon.
He did not need one.
Audrey sat in a wheelchair behind him.
Alive.
Pale.
A bandage covered part of her temple.
Grant stopped.
Everything in him seemed to break at once.
“Audrey.”
She looked toward him.
Confusion crossed her face.
Then recognition.
“Grant?”
His eyes filled with tears.
Raymond smiled.
“Family reunion.”
Elena moved toward Noah.
A red light blinked above the glass door.
Locked.
Raymond held up a tablet.
“Don’t.”
Grant looked at him.
“What do you want?”
“Your resignation.”
“Take it.”
Raymond’s smile faded slightly.
That answer had come too quickly.
Grant continued.
“You want the company? Take it. You want the house? Take it. You want every dollar attached to my name? Fine.”
Raymond stared.
“Open that door and give me Noah.”
“You know he isn’t yours.”
Grant’s voice became steady.
“Yes, he is.”
Raymond frowned.
“The DNA—”
“I don’t care.”
Elena felt tears rise.
Grant stepped closer to the glass.
“He woke me at two in the morning for eleven months. He threw oatmeal on my board presentation. He said something that might have been ‘Dada’ and then refused to say it again for three weeks.”
Noah saw him through the glass.
The baby reached both hands out.
Grant’s voice broke.
“He is my son.”
Raymond’s plan depended on biology being stronger than love.
It wasn’t.
Raymond looked toward Audrey.
“Then perhaps she can choose.”
Audrey stared at Noah.
Her face twisted with fear.
Raymond leaned toward her.
“Tell me where you hid the ledger.”
Audrey shook her head.
“I don’t remember.”
“Yes, you do.”
“No.”
He placed one hand on Noah’s car seat.
Audrey screamed.
“Don’t touch him!”
Grant moved toward the door.
Raymond smiled again.
“There she is.”
Elena looked at Audrey.
The woman’s memory was not gone.
May you like
It was buried beneath terror.
And Raymond knew exactly how to dig for it.
