Chapter 14 - What Eleanor Was Trying to Hide
Eleanor requested to tell Claire everything without interruption.
Claire agreed.
Ethan attended.
No children.
No Sarah.
No lawyers except record being taken.
Eleanor began:
“I was hiding the fact that I knew St. Catherine had violated your consent before Ethan came home.”
How long?
Nine days.
She had known for nine days that Sarah’s pregnancy might involve Bennett embryo.
She spent those days confirming.
She contacted Catherine.
Melissa.
Private investigator.
Sarah.
Why not Ethan?
Pride.
Guilt.
Fear.
Eleanor had spent years defending St. Catherine against Catherine’s criticism.
If clinic had committed reproductive fraud using Bennett embryo while Eleanor’s old signature appeared in payments, Eleanor feared Ethan would believe she participated.
Instead of accepting possibility of being suspected and telling truth immediately, she tried solve problem privately.
That secrecy culminated in mansion.
She persuaded Claire meet Sarah.
Claire insisted Sarah and Lucy stay overnight.
Eleanor agreed.
Then Sophie’s fetal rhythm became abnormal.
Claire had already been weak after dehydration and stress.
Doctor ordered medication.
Wrong high-concentration vial arrived because Anna released Martin’s draft.
Eleanor believed it legitimate.
Claire refused because she felt faint and couldn't swallow.
Eleanor panicked.
She forced it.
Anna intervened.
Eleanor shoved Anna.
Wheelchair rolled.
No hidden motive to induce labor.
No attempt to steal fetus.
No poison meant for Baby B.
No scheme to kill Claire.
Just a woman who kept deciding urgency gave her authority over others.
Claire asked:
“Why did you stare at my stomach after fall?”
“I was watching for movement because I thought Sophie had died.”
Claire swallowed.
“Why did you say medicine wasn't for me?”
“Because fetal medication was prescribed to treat Sophie through you.”
“And Baby A?”
“Clinic label.”
“Baby B?”
“Lucy.”
“Why newborn crying?”
“She was in library.”
“Why did you look terrified?”
“Because Ethan was about to discover all of it at once, while you were on floor because of me.”
No supernatural secret remained.
Then Claire asked hardest question:
“If you had known dose was wrong, would you still have given it?”
“No.”
“If Anna hadn't stopped you?”
Eleanor began crying.
“I don't know how much I would have forced down.”
That honesty mattered.
Claire ended meeting.
No hug.
No forgiveness.
Eleanor’s future contact with children would depend on legal conditions, treatment and parents’ decision.
Later Claire visited Sarah.
Lucy slept against Sarah’s chest.
Claire did not reach for her immediately.
“May I?”
Sarah handed baby carefully.
Claire held genetic daughter for first time.
She cried.
“I thought I'd feel like she was Sophie.”
Sarah watched.
“Does she?”
“No.”
Lucy was her own child.
Even if DNA nearly identical.
Even if embryo origin shared.
Even if case labels A/B suggested pair.
That distinction would shape family going forward.
Sarah asked:
“What happens to me?”
Claire answered truthfully:
“I don't know yet.”
The court later structured guardianship transition allowing Sarah continued contact if healthy for child, without pretending she was genetic parent or erasing gestational bond.
No instant perfect arrangement.
But adults attempted one centered on Lucy.
Meanwhile Sophie grew stronger after birth.
Two daughters eventually met.
They looked remarkably alike.
But Claire refused matching outfits for photographs.
“No case labels.”
Ethan understood.
Then St. Catherine final external report arrived.
One sentence:
No evidence exists that any additional Bennett-derived embryo remains in storage or was transferred.
There was no Baby C.
No hidden third child.
Inventory fully reconciled.
Central reproductive mystery had edges now.
Only one step remained.
Public/accountability closure.
Then Ethan found small handwritten note in Martin’s seized file:
4471-B successful.
4471-A transfer scheduled.
If both survive, acquisition threshold secured.
That was motive in plain language.
Not love.
Not family.
Metric.
Claire looked at it.
“He didn't create Lucy.”
“No.”
“He used her existence.”
“Yes.”
That was difference they would preserve when one day telling daughters story.
Lucy was never fraud.
Sophie was never statistic.
May you like
Adults made fraud around them.
Chapter 15 would make that record permanent.
