Chapter 14 - WHAT CHARLES DID TO HIS OWN WIFE
Victor found Evelyn sitting beside Lily.
“What happened to my mother?”
Evelyn’s face emptied.
Lily looked between them.
“What?”
Victor held up the phone.
“Malcolm told me to ask you.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
Victor felt rage rise again.
“You knew my mother?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“She helped me search for Lauren.”
Victor stared.
His mother, Margaret Blackwood, had died when he was nine.
A stroke.
That was what he had always been told.
“She knew what Charles was doing?”
“Some of it.”
Victor’s voice dropped.
“Did my father kill her?”
Evelyn didn’t answer.
That was enough.
Victor turned away.
He gripped the window frame.
For forty years, his life had been built from edited facts.
His mother died of a stroke.
Lauren died at birth.
Claire died in a crash.
Rebecca quit.
Lily came from an agency.
Serena loved him.
Every truth had another truth beneath it.
Lily asked quietly, “What actually happened?”
Evelyn answered.
“Margaret discovered children were being kept at a behavioral center funded by Charles.”
Victor closed his eyes.
“She confronted him?”
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
“He had her declared unstable.”
Victor turned.
“No.”
“He paid a doctor to diagnose her.”
“No.”
“He isolated her.”
Victor remembered his mother’s final year.
Locked bedroom doors.
Whispered conversations.
His father saying she was sick.
Victor being told not to upset her.
“She wasn’t sick?”
Evelyn shook her head.
Victor’s eyes filled.
“I stopped visiting her room.”
“You were a child.”
“He told me she was dangerous.”
“You were nine.”
“I believed him.”
Evelyn stood.
“He wanted you to.”
Victor wiped his face angrily.
“How did she die?”
“A medication overdose.”
“Accidental?”
Evelyn looked at him.
“No.”
The word cut through him.
“Charles?”
“I can’t prove he ordered it.”
“But Malcolm?”
Evelyn’s silence said enough.
Victor’s expression hardened.
“So Malcolm killed my mother. Helped take Lauren. Helped imprison Claire. Kept Mirror running.”
“Yes.”
“And he’s watching the hospital.”
Daniel entered.
“We found him.”
Victor spun.
“Where?”
“He isn’t at the hospital.”
“Then where?”
Daniel placed a tablet on the table.
“His laptop was routing feeds from multiple cameras. We traced the control node.”
Victor looked at the map.
His own company headquarters.
Blackwood Tower.
“He’s in my building?”
Daniel nodded.
“Top floor.”
Victor almost laughed.
“Of course he is.”
The forty-eighth floor contained Charles Blackwood’s old private office.
Victor had sealed it after taking over.
He had never used the room.
Malcolm had.
For years.
Police surrounded the tower.
Victor came too.
This time, nobody stopped him.
He walked into the lobby beside Ruiz.
“I’m going up.”
Ruiz sighed.
“I knew you were going to say that.”
“Then save your energy.”
They took the service elevator.
Floor forty-eight.
The doors opened.
Charles’s old office was lit.
Malcolm stood beside the windows.
Seventy-one years old.
Silver hair.
Expensive suit.
A glass of whiskey in one hand.
No weapon visible.
Victor stepped out.
“Malcolm.”
The older man smiled.
“You look like him when you’re angry.”
“I’m getting very tired of hearing that.”
Malcolm took a sip.
“You should be grateful.”
“For what?”
“Your father built everything you have.”
“He destroyed everything I had.”
Malcolm shrugged.
“Sentiment.”
Victor stared.
“My mother.”
“Weak.”
“Claire.”
“Curious.”
“Lauren.”
“Exceptional.”
“Ethan.”
Malcolm smiled.
“Promising.”
Victor lunged.
Ruiz caught him.
“No.”
Malcolm chuckled.
“There. That’s what we were measuring.”
Victor fought to control his breathing.
“You broke my family to study me?”
“Your father’s work deserved completion.”
“He was a criminal.”
“He was a realist.”
“You trafficked children.”
“We shaped assets.”
Lily had come up behind the police despite being told to remain downstairs.
When Malcolm saw her, his smile deepened.
“Number Seven’s sister.”
Lily’s face hardened.
“You don’t get to call her that.”
Malcolm raised an eyebrow.
“Interesting.”
“You tortured her.”
“No.”
“You made her afraid.”
“We made her effective.”
“You took her name.”
“Names are tools.”
Lily stepped forward.
Ruiz extended an arm to stop her.
She looked directly at Malcolm.
“What was her favorite food?”
Malcolm frowned.
“What?”
“Lauren. What was her favorite food?”
He said nothing.
“What music did she like?”
Silence.
“What made her laugh?”
Malcolm rolled his eyes.
Victor understood what Lily was doing.
“You said you shaped her,” Lily continued. “But you never knew her.”
Malcolm’s smile disappeared.
“You’re sentimental like Victor.”
“No. I’m proving you failed.”
“Failed?”
“You spent decades making a human weapon.”
Lily’s voice sharpened.
“And tonight, when she thought her mother had looked for her, she cried.”
Malcolm’s face tightened.
“She hesitated because someone loved her.”
“Enough.”
“She didn’t become what you wanted.”
“Enough.”
“She stayed human.”
Malcolm slammed his glass down.
“You know nothing about her!”
Lily smiled sadly.
“There you are.”
Malcolm stared.
“You care.”
Victor watched the old man’s mask crack.
Only slightly.
But enough.
Malcolm’s hand moved inside his jacket.
Ruiz drew.
“Hands!”
Malcolm pulled a small remote.
Victor froze.
Not again.
Malcolm smiled.
“Charles always believed in contingency plans.”
Daniel’s voice exploded through Ruiz’s earpiece.
“Evacuate the building!”
Victor looked around.
“What did you do?”
Malcolm lifted the remote.
“Blackwood Tower has a structural maintenance system.”
Daniel shouted through the radio.
“He rigged charges in the mechanical floors!”
Ruiz aimed at Malcolm.
“Drop it.”
Malcolm smiled at Victor.
“Your father built a company that would outlive him.”
Victor looked at the detonator.
Malcolm continued.
“Let’s see if his son deserves to.”
His thumb moved.
Victor did not lunge.
He did not scream.
He simply said one word.
“Claire.”
Malcolm paused.
Victor saw it.
“You never understood my father’s greatest weakness.”
Malcolm frowned.
Victor continued.
“He thought people were predictable.”
“So?”
“You do too.”
Malcolm’s eyes narrowed.
Victor glanced toward the ceiling camera.
“And while you were busy watching my family…”
Daniel’s voice came through the building speakers.
“…we were watching you.”
The detonator in Malcolm’s hand went dead.
Its signal had been blocked.
Again.
Malcolm pressed it.
Nothing.
Victor almost smiled.
“You really need a new trick.”
Malcolm’s face went white.
Police moved in.
He reached for a gun.
Ruiz fired once.
The bullet struck Malcolm’s shoulder.
He dropped.
Officers pinned him to the floor.
As they cuffed him, Malcolm looked up at Victor.
“You think this ends because you arrested one old man?”
Victor crouched beside him.
“No.”
Malcolm smiled.
“Good.”
Victor’s eyes hardened.
“It ends because tomorrow morning I open every Blackwood archive to federal investigators.”
Malcolm stopped smiling.
“Every account.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Every clinic.”
“Victor.”
“Every name.”
“You’ll destroy the company.”
Victor leaned closer.
“Then the company deserves to die.”
For the first time, Malcolm Reeves looked truly terrified.
But as police dragged him away, Daniel approached Victor.
“There’s one final file.”
Victor rubbed his face.
“What now?”
Daniel handed him a tablet.
Project Mirror personnel records.
Seven children listed.
Six had been identified.
One had not.
Victor looked at the final entry.
ASSET 01.
Status: ACTIVE.
Current occupation: BLACKWOOD HOLDINGS EXECUTIVE LEADERSHIP.
Victor stared.
Someone inside his own executive team had been part of Project Mirror since childhood.
And unlike Lauren…
May you like
this person had never been caught.
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