Chapter 3 - The Fifth Pregnancy
There was nothing unusual about how I became pregnant.
At least that was what I believed.
Julian and I had tried naturally.
After four daughters, we weren’t desperate enough for fertility treatment.
Then month after month passed.
No pregnancy.
Eventually Julian convinced me to visit Dr. Leonard Vale, an old family specialist.
“He helped Mom years ago,” Julian said.
I remembered Evelyn looking uncomfortable during our first appointment.
I assumed she was embarrassed discussing fertility.
Now I knew better.
Dr. Vale ran blood tests.
Hormone panels.
Genetic screening.
Then he gave me medication to “stabilize implantation.”
Two months later, I was pregnant.
I considered it luck.
Then at nineteen weeks, the ultrasound said boy.
Julian treated Vale like a miracle worker.
I never asked what exactly the medication had changed.
Now Evelyn told us.
Dr. Vale had not helped me conceive.
I had already conceived before our first appointment.
His role was something else.
Monitoring.
“Monitoring what?”
Evelyn looked at Julian.
“The Mercer male line.”
Julian laughed bitterly.
“That sounds insane.”
“It is insane.”
Good.
At least she admitted it.
Then she explained the family history.
For seventy years, certain Mercer sons were born with the same red crescent.
Not naturally.
It began with Julian’s grandfather, Arthur Mercer.
Arthur funded experimental hereditary research through a private medical foundation.
The “birthmark” was actually a harmless pigment characteristic linked to a manipulated genetic marker.
Not a superpower.
Not a disease.
A signature.
A way to identify male descendants belonging to a specific engineered line.
I felt sick.
“You’re telling me your family marked children?”
“Arthur did.”
“Why?”
Money.
Of course.
Arthur Mercer created a trust controlling hundreds of millions in industrial holdings.
One condition governed inheritance:
The principal voting shares passed through a biologically verified male line tied to his private genetic records.
It was grotesque.
Old-money obsession transformed into laboratory-backed succession.
Julian stared at his mother.
“You told me Dad inherited because he was the oldest.”
“That was the story.”
“And me?”
“You were tested at birth.”
He stepped backward.
I had never seen my husband look small before.
Then I understood something worse.
“You tested my pregnancy.”
Evelyn nodded.
Without my informed consent.
Through Vale’s clinic.
The fetus carried the Mercer marker.
The red crescent should have been present.
But my newborn didn’t have it.
Julian whispered:
“Then he isn’t mine.”
I slapped him.
Hard.
Our daughters gasped.
“He is your son until a real test tells us otherwise.”
Julian held his cheek.
He looked ashamed.
Then Evelyn said:
“Claire is right.”
I turned.
She stared at the baby.
“The problem isn’t that this child isn’t Julian’s.”
“What?”
“The problem is that he is.”
Silence.
May you like
Then:
“But according to the test I saw last week, another newborn is Julian’s too.”
