Chapter 3 - The Spark in the Dark
The Guest Wing of the Cross Estate was larger than the entire apartment building Emma and Lily had lived in for the last five years.
The bedroom was a vast expanse of cream-colored silk, polished mahogany, and floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the dark Pacific. A silver tray filled with fresh fruit, roasted chicken, and small pastries sat on the table near the fireplace.
Lily lay in the center of the massive king-sized bed, her small body swallowed by the down comforter. She had refused to take off her Padres jersey, but her dirty feet had been washed, and her hair was brushed out, smelling of the expensive lavender soap from the guest bath.
Emma sat in the armchair beside the bed, her eyes wide, staring at the fire crackling in the hearth.
"Mom?" Lily’s voice was small, muffled by the pillow.
"Yeah, baby?"
"Is the man in the chair a bad man?"
Emma looked at her daughter, her heart breaking at the innocence in those gold-flecked eyes. "He's... he's a very powerful man, Lily. Sometimes, when people have too much power, they forget how to be kind."
"He didn't look mean," Lily said, turning onto her side. "He looked like the old dog we saw at the shelter. The one that sat in the back of the cage and wouldn't bark because he thought no one was coming for him."
Emma closed her eyes, the tears finally flowing freely now that the door was locked and the guards were outside. "Go to sleep, Lily. We'll figure it out tomorrow."
"I like the bed," Lily whispered, her eyes closing. "It feels like a cloud."
Downstairs, in the medical wing of the mansion, Dr. Arthur Vance—Caroline’s cousin and the estate’s personal physician—was staring at a small vial of blood on his desk.
"You're out of your mind, Adrian," Arthur said, his hand shaking as he adjusted his glasses. He was fifty-two, a distinguished man who had spent his career in the elite research clinics of San Francisco before Adrian bought his loyalty. "The DNA test will take twelve hours. But even if the girl is Caroline's... how is it possible? The baby was pronounced dead at the scene of the crash."
"My father-in-law was the one who signed the release forms, Arthur," Adrian said, his wheelchair parked near the clinical table. "He was a United States Senator. He had the state police, the hospital board, and the medical examiners in his pocket. If he wanted to hide his daughter’s child from a son-in-law he considered a criminal thug... he had the means to do it."
"But why Emma?" Arthur asked. "She was a maid. A nobody."
"Because she was a nobody," Adrian said, his voice dark. "If Senator Vance had given the baby to a wealthy family, I would have found them. But a poor woman living in a trailer park near Bakersfield? A woman who had been paid fifty thousand dollars from Caroline's private account just weeks before the crash? It was the perfect hiding place."
He reached down, his fingers touching the fabric of his trousers over his right knee.
"And there's something else, Arthur."
"What?"
"I felt it," Adrian said. "When she danced. I felt my leg."
Arthur’s face turned serious. He walked over to Adrian, kneeling on the floor. He pulled a small rubber reflex hammer from his pocket and tapped the tendon below Adrian’s right kneecap.
Nothing happened.
He tapped it again, harder.
Still, the leg remained perfectly still.
"There’s no reflex, Adrian," Arthur said gently. "The nerve damage from the L4-L5 compression is complete. The signals aren't getting through."
"I'm telling you I felt it!" Adrian roared, his hand slamming onto the armrest of his chair. "It wasn't a spasm, Arthur! It was a current. It was warm. It happened when she turned the speaker on. When she started to spin."
Arthur looked at his patient, his eyes filled with a professional pity that Adrian hated more than anything else. "The mind is a powerful thing, Adrian. You see a girl who looks like Caroline, you see those eyes... the emotional shock can trigger phantom sensations. It’s a well-documented neurological phenomenon."
"Get out," Adrian said.
"Adrian—"
"I said get out," Adrian growled, his slate-gray eyes turning to ice. "Bring me the results of the test by nine tomorrow morning. If you lie to me... if you let Senator Vance’s people know what we’re doing here... I’ll make sure you never practice medicine on this continent again."
Arthur sighed, picking up his leather case. "I'll run the analysis myself, Adrian. I won't use the state database. Nobody will know."
He walked out, leaving Adrian alone in the sterile white room.
Adrian looked down at his legs. He reached down, unlacing his left shoe, then his right. He pulled off his socks, exposing his pale, thin feet to the cool air of the room.
He closed his eyes.
He remembered Caroline. Her laugh. The way she would spin around their Chicago apartment when she was happy, her green-gold eyes flashing with a light that made him believe he was more than just a street thug who had built a shipping empire.
“You have to put music in it, Adrian,” her voice echoed in his mind, merging with the tinny, scratchy soul record from Lily's speaker.
Adrian’s big toe twitched.
May you like
It was small. A mere millimeter. But in the silence of the medical wing, Adrian saw it.
He began to tremble.
