Chapter 13 - The Voice From the Past
I answered.
A man spoke.
“Hello, Evelyn.”
I knew the voice.
Older.
Weaker.
But unmistakable.
My former husband.
James Shaw.
David’s father.
The man I believed had died twelve years earlier.
David heard him.
His face changed.
“Dad?”
Silence.
Then James whispered:
“David.”
My son stepped toward the phone as if the voice could become a body.
Thomas sat down.
He looked destroyed.
“You knew,” I said.
Thomas did not deny it.
James had been alive.
Hidden.
Protected by Thomas.
Again.
I wanted to scream.
Instead:
“Why?”
James answered through the phone.
“Because Voss wasn’t working alone.”
“Who?”
“Me.”
David closed his eyes.
James confessed.
He had helped create the earliest illegal version of Orpheus.
He believed the system could protect Shaw Meridian from financial threats.
Then Voss transformed it into surveillance.
James tried to leave.
Voss threatened David.
Thomas staged David’s death.
James disappeared separately.
I had been left grieving two people who were both alive.
“You let me bury you.”
“I know.”
“You let me blame myself.”
“I know.”
“You let me adopt another frightened child while believing my first was dead.”
James went silent.
Then said:
“I watched Adrian grow up.”
My blood chilled.
“What?”
James had monitored us from a distance.
He knew Adrian’s insecurities.
His resentment toward David’s memory.
His obsession with proving he was my “real” son.
And Celeste found James years ago.
She used his guilt.
His access.
His knowledge of Orpheus.
“Where are you?”
“Inside.”
“Why?”
“Celeste needs me to restore the original biometric authorization.”
David stepped forward.
“We’re coming in.”
“No!”
A violent crash sounded through the phone.
Celeste screamed in the background.
Then Adrian shouted.
The call disconnected.
Federal agents breached the facility.
Inside, servers hummed beneath emergency lights.
We found Samuel tied but alive.
Adrian lay injured but conscious beside a shattered security panel.
Celeste was gone.
James was gone.
The core server was missing.
Voss, transported separately, had somehow triggered a contingency escape before federal teams could fully secure the network.
Everything fractured at once.
But Adrian had done one thing.
He had unlocked Samuel’s restraints before Celeste attacked him.
Samuel survived because Adrian stayed behind.
At the hospital, Adrian woke handcuffed to his bed.
I sat beside him.
He looked at me.
“Are you here because you forgive me?”
“No.”
He nodded.
“Fair.”
“I’m here because you saved Samuel.”
“I almost got him killed.”
“Yes.”
He looked away.
Then whispered:
“I knew Celeste changed your medication.”
“I know.”
“I knew she wanted you weak.”
“I know.”
“I told myself you’d recover.”
“But you hoped I wouldn’t.”
He began crying.
“Yes.”
There it was.
Truth.
Ugly.
Late.
But truth.
“I loved you,” I said.
Adrian covered his face.
“I know.”
“No.”
I rolled closer.
“You knew I provided for you. You knew I rescued you. You knew I paid for everything.”
He lowered his hands.
“But I don’t think you ever understood that I loved you.”
His mouth trembled.
Then an FBI agent entered.
“Mrs. Shaw.”
“What?”
“We found Celeste.”
“Where?”
He hesitated.
“At your mansion.”
I stared.
The home where this began.
“What is she doing?”
May you like
The agent answered:
“Waiting for you.”
