The cruelty of it struck Melanie harder than a blow.
All her life, she had believed she was the chosen daughter.
Now she understood she had only been a tool.
A door slammed behind us.
My father appeared from a service tunnel, blood on his shirt and rage in his eyes.
He had somehow escaped police custody.
Mother turned in surprise.
“Arthur?”
He raised a second gun.
But he did not aim at me.
He aimed at her.
“You were going to leave without me.”
Mother’s face hardened.
“You were arrested.”
“You had passports for yourself and Melanie.”
“Melanie was necessary.”
“And me?”
“You were always replaceable.”
Father fired.
The bullet struck the gun from Mother’s hand.
Chaos exploded.
Beckett’s officers rushed forward. Wyatt dragged me down. Melanie threw herself over Walter.
My parents fought like animals—shouting, clawing, accusing each other of theft, murder, betrayal, and hidden bank accounts.
Within seconds, both were pinned to the ground and handcuffed.
Mother turned her face toward me.
“You think this is over?”
I stood above her, shaking.
“It is for you.”
She smiled through blood on her lip.
“No, Sadie. Virex knows you’re alive.”
Then the police dragged her away.
Walter looked at me from the floor.
“She’s right.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the company has been waiting twelve years for the last surviving research subject to reappear.”
My heart hammered.
“Last surviving subject?”
Walter’s gaze moved toward Melanie.
And the room went silent.
Melanie whispered the truth before he could.
“You weren’t the only child Grandpa treated.”
—
PART 5
THE SECOND GIRL IN THE FILE
Walter was transported to the hospital under armed guard.
By sunrise, federal investigators had sealed the underground laboratory.
I sat in a secure hospital room with Wyatt and Melanie while Detective Beckett placed a thin file on the table between us.
Two photographs lay inside.
The first showed me as an infant.
The second showed another baby girl with dark hair and a tiny scar beneath her right ear.
Melanie stared at the photograph.
“That’s me.”
Walter nodded weakly from his bed.
“You were both treated.”
My sister looked at me.
“For the same condition?”
“No,” Walter said. “Sadie had optic nerve degeneration. Melanie had a severe immune disorder.”
I remembered how often Melanie had been sick as a child. Hospital stays. Fever. Months of isolation.
Our parents had always said she had simply grown stronger.
“She would have died before her third birthday,” Walter continued. “Harold used a modified version of the treatment to repair her immune response.”
Melanie’s face crumpled.
“Grandpa saved me.”
“Yes.”
“And I helped them kill him.”
“You were fifteen,” I said.
“I carried the pills.”
“You didn’t know.”
“But I stood on the porch while Dad hit you.”
Her voice broke.
“I knew that was wrong.”
I had imagined this moment countless times—the moment Melanie finally admitted what she had done.
I expected satisfaction.
Instead, I felt grief.
Because beneath the cruelty, jealousy, and competition, I suddenly saw the frightened child our parents had shaped into a weapon.
“You wanted Wyatt,” I said.
She stared at the floor.
“At first, I wanted what you had. Mom kept telling me you had stolen my future. She said Grandpa meant to leave everything to me until you manipulated him.”
“You believed her?”
“I needed to.”
The honesty hurt.
