“That does not mean you had to follow him.”
“I couldn’t leave him.”
Samuel held the boy more tightly.
Gideon stepped forward.
“You knew this could happen?”
Samuel looked at him for the first time.
Recognition appeared immediately.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
“You,” Samuel said.
Gideon’s chest tightened.
“Have we met?”
“Not properly.”
Samuel’s eyes moved toward Evelyn.
His grip on his cane hardened.
“But I met people who worked for your family.”
Evelyn’s face became rigid.
“Samuel.”
Gideon looked from one to the other.
“You know him.”
Evelyn said nothing.
Samuel moved in front of Owen.
“You have no right to speak his name.”
“I haven’t seen you in years,” Evelyn replied.
“Not because you stopped looking.”
Owen stared at his grandfather.
“What does she mean?”
Samuel ignored the question.
“We’re leaving.”
Dr. Cole blocked the doorway.
“The boy needs medical attention.”
“No blood tests.”
“We can examine him without—”
“No machines. No samples. No scans.”
“Mr. Parker, he nearly collapsed.”
Samuel looked at the doctors surrounding Miles.
“You saw what he did. That means someone else saw it too.”
Gideon glanced toward a camera mounted in the corner of the suite.
Evelyn followed his gaze.
The camera’s small green light had turned red.
She crossed the room and pressed the communication panel.
“Security control, disable every recording from this room.”
No response came.
She pressed it again.
“Security?”
The doors closed.
A magnetic lock clicked.
The lights dimmed.
Miles’s monitor continued beeping, but every other screen in the suite went black.
A calm male voice emerged from the ceiling speaker.
“Evelyn, you always underestimate the speed of a good surveillance system.”
Gideon went completely still.
The voice was older than he remembered.
Thinner.
Yet impossible to mistake.
“Father?”
Samuel’s face drained of color.
Owen looked between them.
Evelyn backed away from the speaker.
Gideon stared upward.
“My father is dead.”
The voice chuckled.
“Your father held a public funeral.”
Gideon’s hands curled into fists.
“I saw the coffin.”
“You saw what you were expected to see.”
Miles began crying more loudly.
Dr. Cole lifted him carefully and checked the monitor.
Gideon did not move.
“Where are you?”
“Close enough to hear my grandson return from death.”
“What have you done?”
“I built the place in which he was saved.”
“Owen saved him.”
“Yes,” the voice replied. “And that is why the boy must remain.”
Samuel drew Owen behind him.
“No.”
The old man in the speaker seemed amused.
“You kept Clara’s son hidden longer than I expected.”
Owen looked up at Samuel.
“Hidden from whom?”
Samuel’s shoulders sagged.
“From Victor Hart.”
The founder of Hart Biomedical.
Gideon’s father.
The man whose portrait occupied the hospital’s entrance hall.
The man newspapers said had died eighteen months earlier.
The man who now controlled the locked room.
Gideon looked at his wife.
“You knew he was alive.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
The answer struck harder than a denial.
“You let me bury him.”
“The board believed his death would protect the company.”
“From what?”
Samuel answered.
“From the truth.”
The ceiling speaker crackled.
“Be careful, Samuel.”
“No,” Samuel said. “I spent twelve years being careful.”
He pointed toward the floor.
“Tell your son what is under this hospital.”
Victor’s voice lost its humor.
Gideon looked at Evelyn.
“What is he talking about?”
She seemed unable to speak.
Samuel placed a hand on Owen’s shoulder.
“Your family built a hidden research unit called the Orpheus Wing.”
Dr. Cole turned sharply.
“There is no Orpheus Wing.”
“Not on your maps.”
“What did they research?” Gideon asked.
Samuel looked at the brass music box.
“Children who could hear life disappearing.”
Owen stared at him.
“Children like Mom?”
Samuel’s eyes filled with grief.
“Yes.”
“And like me?”
“Yes.”
The boy stepped away from him.
“You told me the song was only something she taught you.”
“I was trying to give you a childhood.”
“You lied.”
“I was trying to keep you alive.”
The speaker activated again.
“Clara possessed extraordinary sensitivity to biological electrical patterns. She could recognize when a damaged nervous system was still capable of returning.”
Gideon felt sick.
“You experimented on her.”
“We studied her.”
“She was seventeen,” Samuel said.
“She volunteered.”
“She was hungry. Her mother was sick. You promised to pay for treatment.”
Victor remained silent for a moment.
“History is always simplified by angry survivors.”
Samuel raised his cane toward the ceiling.
“You locked her underground.”
Owen’s lower lip trembled.
“What happened to my mother?”