Chapter 2 - The Blood TestGarrett’s private medical clinic occupied the upper floors of an unmarked building on East Sixty-Third Street.
No sign identified it. No public elevator reached it. The doctors who worked there treated celebrities, diplomats, and people whose injuries could never appear in official records.
Garrett carried Mave through a secured entrance while Posie remained pressed against her mother.
The little girl refused to release her.
“Is Mommy going to wake up?” she asked.
“Yes,” Garrett answered.
He had negotiated billion-dollar mergers without hesitation, yet the frightened question of a three-year-old made his voice unsteady.
A physician named Dr. Nora Chen examined Mave while Garrett waited outside the treatment room with Posie.
Wesley stood near the elevator, speaking quietly into an encrypted phone.
“The cathedral is being evacuated,” he reported. “The Ashfords have recalled their people. Victor Ashford has canceled every meeting scheduled for today.”
“That means he’s planning something.”
“It usually does.”
Garrett looked through the glass wall.
Mave lay beneath a white blanket as medical staff attached monitors and administered fluids. Garrett felt anger rise inside him—not at her, but at the years he had lost.
Posie sat beside him, wearing a sweater a nurse had found in storage. It was too large, and the sleeves covered her hands.
She studied Garrett with complete seriousness.
“Are you a king?”
“No.”
“Mommy said bad kings live in tall houses.”
Garrett glanced at Wesley.
“Did she say I was one of them?”
Posie nodded.
Before Garrett could ask more, Dr. Chen entered the waiting area.
“She is stable,” the doctor said. “Exhaustion, dehydration, and a respiratory infection. She has probably been sick for several weeks.”
Garrett’s jaw tightened.
“Why didn’t she seek treatment?”
“She told me she didn’t have insurance.”
The statement felt absurd.
Mave was still legally connected to one of the wealthiest families in the country. Garrett had never finalized their divorce because no court had been able to locate her.
“What about the child?”
“She appears healthy, but I recommend a complete examination.”
Garrett looked at Posie.
“And a DNA test.”
Dr. Chen paused.
“I can arrange it.”
Mave’s voice came from the doorway.
“No.”
She stood unsteadily, gripping the frame.
Garrett rose immediately.
“You should be in bed.”
“You don’t need a test.”
“I need proof no one can challenge.”
“You already know.”
“So do you.”
Mave’s gaze moved to the security cameras in the corners.
“I know what those eyes mean in your family. That is why I kept her hidden.”
Garrett walked toward her.
“My father told you I wanted you gone?”
“He did more than tell me.”
Mave entered the room slowly, and Dr. Chen guided her into a chair.
Three years earlier, Mave explained, she had discovered she was pregnant only days before Garrett left for Europe to settle a dispute between several Hail-controlled companies. She had planned to surprise him when he returned.
Before she could, Garrett’s father, Augustus Hail, summoned her to the family estate.
“He showed me photographs of you with another woman,” Mave said.
Garrett frowned. “What woman?”
“I didn’t know her.”
“There was no one else.”
“I know that now.”
Augustus had presented financial records suggesting Garrett was preparing to divorce Mave and transfer her name off every shared account. Then he gave her the letter ordering her to disappear.
Mave had refused to believe it.
Until someone entered their apartment that night.
“They knew I was pregnant,” she whispered. “They left a silver rattle on our bed.”
Garrett’s face became still.
“What was engraved on it?”
Mave hesitated.
“A wolf.”
Wesley stopped speaking into his phone.
The Hail family crest was a crowned wolf.
Only senior members of the organization received objects carrying that symbol.
“They told me the next gift would be a coffin,” Mave continued. “I called you twelve times. Your number was disconnected.”
“My father controlled communications during the Europe operation.”
“He told me you had chosen the family over me.”
Garrett looked away, remembering how Augustus had insisted all personal communications be restricted for security reasons.
The pieces were beginning to form.
But one question remained.
“Why return today?”
“I wasn’t returning to you.”
Mave explained that she had spent three years moving through small towns under false names. Two months earlier, her identity had been exposed after she applied for a teaching position. A man began following her. She fled to New York because she believed disappearing inside the city would be easier than surviving alone elsewhere.
That morning, she had been walking to an interview.
She had not known about Garrett’s wedding.
“The rain delayed traffic,” she said. “That’s the only reason we crossed paths.”
Garrett did not believe in coincidence.
Someone had guided her toward Fifth Avenue.
Someone wanted him to see Posie on his wedding day.
A nurse entered with a sealed testing kit.
Mave looked at it.
“What happens after the test confirms she is yours?”
“She comes home.”
“Which home? The fortress where your father threatened us?”
“My father is dead.”
“But the person who helped him may not be.”
Garrett crouched in front of her.
“Then help me find them.”
Mave searched his face.
“You’re marrying an Ashford.”
“I was marrying an Ashford.”
“You humiliated Coraline in front of the entire city. She will never forgive that.”
“I didn’t ask for forgiveness.”
Mave looked toward Posie.
“This cannot become a war over her.”
“It already became a war the moment someone threatened my unborn daughter.”
The test was completed quietly.
Dr. Chen personally transported the samples to a secure laboratory.
The results arrived two hours later.
Probability of paternity: 99.9998 percent.
Garrett read the report twice.
Then he walked into the small recovery room where Posie slept beside Mave.
Mave opened her eyes.
“You have your proof.”
Garrett sat beside the bed.
“No. I have confirmation of what I knew the moment I saw her.”
“What are you going to do?”
“First, I am moving you somewhere safe.”
“There is nowhere safe in your world.”
“Then I will create somewhere.”
His phone vibrated.
An unknown number had sent a photograph.
It showed the entrance to the clinic.
Beneath the image were six words.
The child should have remained hidden.
Garrett showed the message to Wesley.
His security chief’s face changed.
“The photo was taken less than a minute ago.”
Garrett turned toward the window.
Across the street, a man in a dark coat disappeared into the crowd.
Garrett issued one immediate order.
“Lock down the building.”
May you like
But the threat was already inside.
The lights went out.
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