Chapter 6 - THE MAN IN THE DARK HALLWAYMarcus pulled Maya behind the concrete wall.
Agent Ortiz fired toward the end of the corridor.
The shooter disappeared into the smoke.
Emergency lights flickered on.
Red light washed across the hallway.
The fire alarm continued screaming.
“Are you hit?” Marcus asked.
Maya touched the side of her face.
A fragment of glass had cut her cheek.
“I’m fine.”
Ortiz ordered two agents to pursue the shooter.
Another team rushed toward the records room with extinguishers.
Maya looked down the stairwell.
The shadow of a man moved across the landing.
She remembered the voice.
She had heard it before.
At Sterling family dinners.
At charity events.
At her own wedding.
“Gerald,” she whispered.
Marcus looked at her.
“Who?”
“Gerald Price.”
“Victoria’s security director.”
Gerald had worked for the Sterling family for more than thirty years.
He had carried Ethan on his shoulders as a child.
He had escorted Maya down the aisle after Victoria refused to acknowledge her foster father.
He had smiled while pretending to welcome her into the family.
Now he had tried to kill her.
Ortiz radioed the identification to the agents outside.
A crash came from the records room.
The fire had reached the cabinets.
Marcus dragged a metal cart toward the flames while agents used extinguishers.
Maya noticed a stack of folders near the doorway.
She pulled them away before the fire consumed them.
One folder bore her mother’s false name.
LAURA GRAY.
Inside were twenty-four years of medical reports.
The earliest report described a female patient with head trauma and multiple fractures.
She had repeatedly asked for her husband and daughter.
A handwritten instruction appeared on the first page.
NO OUTSIDE CONTACT.
AUTHORIZED BY V.S.
The medication list grew longer each year.
Sedatives.
Antipsychotics.
Memory suppressants.
Drugs powerful enough to keep a healthy person confused.
“They did not treat her,” Maya said.
“They imprisoned her.”
Marcus turned another page.
A photograph showed Leah Vaughn sitting beside a window.
She was thin.
Her dark hair hung around her shoulders.
Her eyes looked empty.
But around her neck was a chain.
A tiny wooden apple hung from it.
Maya suddenly remembered a woman carving that apple at a kitchen table.
Her mother.
The memory was no longer a shadow.
It was real.
Ortiz returned.
“Gerald escaped through the eastern service entrance.”
“What about the transport van?” Marcus asked.
“State police are attempting to intercept it.”
A message arrived seconds later.
The van had been found abandoned beside the highway.
There was blood on the passenger seat.
No patient.
No doctor.
Maya’s fear hardened into determination.
“They are taking her somewhere Victoria controls.”
Marcus examined the rescued documents.
One recurring note mentioned a visitor identified as E.S.
The visits had begun six years earlier.
The initials appeared thirty-seven times.
Maya felt cold.
Ethan Sterling.
Her husband had visited North Valley thirty-seven times.
He had stood inside the same building where her mother was imprisoned.
He had returned home afterward.
He had kissed Maya.
He had watched her search adoption databases.
And he had said nothing.
Maya called Agent Ortiz at the Sterling estate.
“Put Ethan on the phone.”
A moment later, his voice came through.
“Maya?”
She stared at the scratched name on the wall.
“You visited my mother.”
Silence.
“Thirty-seven times.”
“Maya, I can explain.”
“You have one chance.”
Ethan’s breathing became uneven.
“I did not know who she was at first.”
“When did you learn?”
“Two years ago.”
Maya closed her eyes.
Their son was eight months old.
Ethan had known before Noah was born.
He had watched Maya decorate the nursery with apple trees because she did not understand why apples made her feel safe.
“Where would Victoria take her?” Maya asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Then think.”
Ethan remained silent.
Marcus took the phone.
“If Leah dies, every lie you have protected becomes part of her murder.”
Ethan finally spoke.
“There is an old Vaughn research property near Lake Mercer.”
“My mother bought it through a shell company after the accident.”
“Gerald takes her there when she wants no records.”
Marcus knew the property.
Gabriel Vaughn had designed experimental aircraft there.
Ortiz ordered every available unit toward Lake Mercer.
As Maya left Room 317, she saw something written beneath the windowsill.
May you like
The letters were smaller than the others.
GABRIEL LIVES BELOW THE WATER.
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