Chapter 6 - The Brother in the White Coat

“My uncle.”

Anna nodded.

“Your uncle.”

Evan laughed once.

“Of course.”

I looked at my mother.

“So the man hunting my daughters is family.”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t Dad kill him?”

“Because Adrian disappeared before he could.”

“Comforting.”

Margaret sat against a hay bale, her shoulder bandaged.

“He resurfaced after your father died.”

I paced.

“Why take Caroline and Emma?”

Anna said, “Pressure.”

“And Lily? Sophie?”

“No proof they have them.”

I looked at the photo again.

Caroline and Emma.

No children.

I called Lily’s tablet.

No answer.

Again.

Nothing.

Evan said, “We need to assume they’re taken.”

“No.”

“Ryan.”

“No. We verify.”

Margaret said, “The lab has internal cameras.”

Evan pulled out his laptop.

Ten minutes later, we watched footage.

Two masked men entered through the rear.

Caroline pushed Lily and Sophie into a storage room.

Emma blocked the hallway.

A struggle.

Caroline and Emma were taken.

But the girls never left the storage room.

I almost collapsed.

“Where are they now?”

Evan switched cameras.

A closet door opened.

Lily emerged holding Sophie’s hand.

Then both disappeared off camera.

My phone rang.

Lily.

I answered instantly.

“Bug?”

“Daddy?”

I closed my eyes.

“Where are you?”

“In the room with the cold boxes.”

“Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“Sophie?”

“She’s here.”

Sophie’s voice came faintly.

“Daddy?”

The word hit differently now.

Not a mystery.

A claim.

“I’m here.”

Lily whispered, “Mommy said hide until you call.”

“Good. Stay hidden.”

“There’s a lady here.”

I froze.

“What lady?”

“She says she knows Grandma.”

Anna stood.

“What does she look like?”

Lily whispered, “Black hair. Green coat.”

Anna’s face changed.

“Ava.”

I stared.

“What?”

She grabbed the phone.

“Lily, is the woman’s name Ava?”

A voice came through the speaker.

“Yes.”

Adult.

Calm.

“Hello, Anna.”

My mother stopped breathing.

“Ava?”

“Been a long time.”

I took the phone.

“Who are you?”

“Your sister.”

“You’re with my daughters?”

“They’re safe.”

“Prove it.”

Lily came back.

“Daddy, she gave me crackers.”

I closed my eyes.

“Okay.”

Ava said, “You need to listen.”

“Where are Caroline and Emma?”

“Voss has them.”

“Where?”

“Your house.”

“Why?”

“Because he wants the drives.”

“Then why are you at the lab?”

“Because I came for the girls before he did.”

“Why should I trust you?”

“You shouldn’t.”

At least someone was honest.

Ava continued.

“But I’m the reason Sophie escaped the facility.”

Emma had said she escaped six months ago.

I remembered.

“You helped her?”

“I gave her access codes.”

“Why?”

“Because Voss was preparing to move Sophie overseas.”

“Where?”

“Singapore.”

“Why?”

“Buyer.”

My stomach turned.

“She’s a child.”

“To him, she’s intellectual property.”

I gripped the phone.

“Stay with them.”

“I plan to.”

“We’re coming.”

“No.”

“What?”

“Voss expects you to go to the house.”

“He has Emma and Caroline.”

“I know.”

“So I’m going.”

“He has Vale too.”

That stopped me.

“Vale sent the first messages.”

“Yes.”

“And now?”

“Voss took him off the board.”

“Meaning?”

“He’s dead.”

Silence.

Ava continued.

“Voss is cleaning up.”

Anna said, “Ava, can you unlock the archive?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Need all three markers.”

“You have Lily and Sophie.”

“And mine.”

I stared.

“That’s all three.”

“Yes.”

“Then unlock it.”

“Not without the drives.”

I touched my jacket.

“Fine.”

“Bring them to the lab.”

“No.”

“Ryan.”

I looked at Anna.

“We go to the house first.”

Ava’s voice hardened.

“If Voss gets those drives, he can destroy the only evidence.”

“If I don’t go, he kills my wife and Emma.”

A pause.

Then Ava said, “There may be another way.”

“What?”

“Your father duplicated the authentication terminal.”

“Where?”

“Mercer House.”

I laughed.

“Of course.”

“In the greenhouse room?”

“No.”

“Where?”

“Behind the wall.”

I stopped.

“What wall?”

“The one Sophie was hiding in.”

I thought back.

The second concealed door.

The hidden room.

The passage.

“What am I looking for?”

“A panel with three circular slots.”

“What goes in them?”

“Blood samples.”

Evan said, “We have samples at the lab.”

Ava said, “Exactly.”

Anna whispered, “Then if Ava brings the children’s samples to the house—”

“We can unlock the archive there.”

I said, “And broadcast it.”

Ava was silent.

I understood.

“You can broadcast it, can’t you?”

“Yes.”

“To who?”

“Federal prosecutors, international journalists, watchdog groups.”

Evan smiled grimly.

“Dad built a dead-man switch.”

Ava corrected him.

“No. He built a family switch.”

I hated how much that sounded like him.

We made the plan.

Ava would bring Lily and Sophie to a safe position near the property with the samples.

Evan would access the house network remotely.

Anna and I would enter through the storm tunnel.

Margaret would stay behind because of her wound.

She protested.

I said, “For once, someone in this family is going to stay where they’re told.”

She almost smiled.

At dusk, we returned.

The house looked normal from the road.

That was the worst part.

Warm lights.

Curtains.

My porch.

Inside, monsters.

Anna and I entered through the greenhouse tunnel.

Evan spoke through my earpiece.

“Two men in kitchen. One upstairs.”

“Voss?”

“Living room.”

“Caroline and Emma?”

“Living room too.”

I crawled through the passage.

At Lily’s vent, I stopped.

Voices.

Voss said, “Ryan will come.”

Caroline answered, “You don’t know him.”

“I know his bloodline.”

Emma said, “That’s the problem with you. You think blood explains people.”

Voss laughed.

“And yet here you are, defending the man who abandoned you.”

“He didn’t know.”

“Everyone says that.”

I almost laughed.

Even Voss had noticed the family motto.

Anna whispered, “Go to the panel.”

We crawled farther.

Behind the concealed room, Ava’s instructions led us to a metal plate hidden under insulation.

Three circular ports.

Evan said, “I’m in the network.”

Ava’s voice came through the earpiece.

“Samples ready.”

“How close?”

“Greenhouse.”

I looked at Anna.

“Bring them.”

“No children inside,” she said.

“Just the samples.”

Five minutes later, a small case came through the tunnel.

Three tubes.

Lily.

Sophie.

Ava.

I inserted them.

The panel lit.

A screen appeared.

MERCER ARCHIVE.

AUTHORIZATION INCOMPLETE.

Evan said, “What?”

A second line appeared.

REQUIRES PRIMARY SUCCESSOR LIVE CONFIRMATION.

I closed my eyes.

“Ava has to come in.”

Anna whispered, “No.”

Voss’s voice suddenly came through the wall.

“Actually, yes.”

The concealed door opened.

He stood there.

Tall.

Silver-haired.

White shirt.

Gun in hand.

Behind him, Caroline and Emma were bound to chairs.

Three armed men surrounded them.

Voss smiled.

“Bring my daughter inside.”

I stared.

“Your daughter?”

Anna gasped.

Voss looked at her.

“You never told him?”

Ava’s voice came through my earpiece.

“What did he say?”

Voss smiled wider.

“A-09.”

He looked directly at the tunnel entrance.

“Come meet your father.”

Before we left the barn, Anna stopped me beside the truck.

“There’s something else about Adrian.”

I looked at her.

“There’s always something else.”

“He doesn’t improvise. If he took Caroline and Emma to the house, he wants more than the drives.”

“What?”

“He wants you to choose.”

“Choose what?”

“Evidence or family.”

I stared at her.

“That’s not a choice.”

“To him, it is. He built his whole philosophy around proving that people become predictable under pressure.”

“So I’m another experiment.”

“Yes.”

I laughed bitterly.

“Then he’s going to be disappointed.”

Anna touched my arm.

“Ryan, that certainty is exactly what your father had.”

I pulled away.

“Don’t compare me to him.”

“I’m not. I’m warning you.”

Evan closed the laptop.

“She’s right.”

I looked at him.

“You too?”

“Dad always believed he could control the board if he understood every piece. That’s what got him killed.”

“And your solution?”

“Stop playing Voss’s game.”

I looked down at the picture of Caroline and Emma tied to chairs.

“He has already put pieces on the board.”

Evan nodded.

“Then move a piece he doesn’t know exists.”

Ava.

That was when I understood why she mattered beyond the archive.

Voss believed blood created ownership.

Ava was living proof that it did not.

I called her again.

She answered immediately.

“What?”

“I need to know something.”

“Ask.”

“Are you afraid of him?”

Silence.

“Yes.”

“Good.”

She sounded offended.

“Good?”

“Fear means you know what he is. Just don’t confuse fear with obedience.”

Ava was quiet for a long time.

Then she said, “You really are Anna’s son.”

“I’m not sure that’s a compliment.”

“It wasn’t.”

Despite everything, I smiled.

“What aren’t you telling us?”

She exhaled.

“Voss has a secondary server in the house.”

“Where?”

“Unknown. But if he gets the drives near it, he can overwrite part of the archive.”

“So he needs the physical drives because—”

“They contain the only clean version of the index.”

Evan leaned closer.

“Can he erase the evidence already mirrored elsewhere?”

“No. But without the index, connecting aliases to real names becomes much harder.”

“How much harder?”

“Years.”

I looked at the drives in my hand.

“So they’re not just evidence. They’re the map.”

“Yes.”

“And he expects me to walk them straight into the house.”

“Yes.”

I put them back into my jacket.

“Then we make him believe I did.”

Evan looked at me.

“What are you thinking?”

“Decoys.”

He smiled.

“Now you’re learning.”

We copied the drive casings, weighted them, and put the originals into a sealed pouch that Anna strapped beneath her jacket.

For the first time all night, we had one advantage Voss did not know about.

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