Chapter 7 - THE ESCAPE
Michael contacted me at 2:16 a.m.
One message.
COME ALONE.
Attached was a photograph of my mother.
Alive.
Tied to a chair.
I showed Detective Brooks.
She immediately shook her head.
"No."
"I have to go."
"Absolutely not."
"My mother is there."
"That's exactly what he wants."
I knew she was right.
But then another message appeared.
COME WITH THE ORIGINAL FILE.
I understood.
Michael wanted the medical report.
The one naming C-17.
I looked at Detective Brooks.
"We can track him."
"Yes."
"Then let me go."
She stared at me.
"Sarah, this isn't a movie."
"I know."
"I'm not sending you into a trap."
"Then don't send me."
She paused.
"Don't."
I looked at her.
"Let me walk."
We created a plan.
A tracker was hidden in my coat.
A police team followed from a distance.
I carried a fake file.
The real documents stayed with Detective Brooks.
Michael's location led us to an abandoned medical facility.
Carter Medical.
The building had been closed for years.
I entered alone.
The hallway smelled like dust.
A light flickered above me.
Then Michael appeared.
He looked different.
His face was bruised.
His shirt was soaked from the rain.
But he was smiling.
"You came."
"Where's my mother?"
"Safe."
"Let me see her."
He stepped aside.
My mother was sitting in a chair.
Alive.
Her wrists were tied.
"Mom."
She looked at me.
"Don't give him anything."
Michael laughed.
"Still trying to protect her."
He walked toward me.
"Do you know why I married you?"
I said nothing.
"At first, because my father told me to."
My stomach tightened.
"He said you were the missing subject."
"You knew?"
"Not everything."
He rubbed his face.
"Then I fell in love with you."
I stared at him.
"You don't love someone you tattoo."
His expression broke.
"I know."
For a second, I almost saw regret.
Then he continued.
"But by the time I understood what my father had done, I was already trapped."
"By who?"
He looked toward the ceiling.
"They're still watching."
A loud metallic sound echoed through the building.
Michael turned.
His face changed.
"They found us."
Detective Brooks's voice came through the hallway.
"Police! Drop your weapon!"
Michael looked at me.
"I didn't bring you here to hurt you."
"Then why?"
He whispered:
"Because the person who ordered all of this isn't my father."
A door slammed somewhere upstairs.
Michael grabbed my arm.
"Someone else is here."
Gunshots echoed through the building.
My mother screamed.
Michael shoved me behind a concrete pillar.
Detective Brooks shouted.
Then the lights went out.
In the darkness, I heard someone whisper directly behind me.
"Sarah."
I turned.
It wasn't Michael.
It was a woman.
The woman from the old photograph.
The woman from my birth records.
She looked at me and said:
May you like
"I'm your biological mother."
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