Chapter 25 - The Bargain of Blood
"Family?" I spat, clutching the brass key in my closed fist. "You hunted my sister like an animal! You used Julian Vance to frame me and tear my unborn child from my womb!"
Vivienne let out a soft, pitying sigh, stepping gracefully into the library while her men kept their rifles trained on Marcus’s chest. "Julian Vance was a crude, impatient tool. He rushed the timetable because he wanted to commercialize the patent before the fiscal quarter closed. He failed to comprehend the delicate nature of what your father created."
"Our father was a physician, not a corporate lab butcher!" I countered.
"Your father was a genius who cured congenital heart failure using your maternal lineage's rare cellular markers," Vivienne said coldly. "He funded his research with fifty million francs from my family vault. The deal was simple: the intellectual property belonged to the Dubois foundation. But when your mother died giving birth to you and Lauren, your father fled into hiding, splitting the genetic blueprint between your two medical profiles."
She stepped closer, the gold rings on her fingers catching the pale moonlight streaming through the shattered skylight. "Vance thought he could simply steal one of your babies to replicate the cell line. He didn't realize the sequence requires *both* maternal lineages to be synthesized together. One child alone produces nothing but useless tissue. I need both children, Clara."
"You will die before you touch my baby," I said through gritted teeth.
"A mother's defiance is touching, but mathematically irrelevant," Vivienne said, checking a thin platinum wristwatch. "While you were driving up this desolate mountain, my extraction team located Lauren's safehouse on the coast of Maine. She is currently surrounded. Give me the Hofmann key, Clara. Hand over the protocol. Do it, and I will allow your child to live in comfort under our patronage. Refuse, and your sister’s cabin will be reduced to a smoking crater in three minutes."
To prove her point, she turned a high-definition tablet toward me.
May you like
On the screen was a live satellite thermal feed: a remote cabin surrounded by a dozen red heat-signatures closing in through the trees.
***