Chapter 8 - Margaret's Promise
Margaret had not created Embryo 6.
Malcolm did.
Records finally proved it.
He used Sophie’s stored egg and reproductive material belonging to Thomas Whitmore.
He then froze the embryo.
Sophie discovered its existence weeks later.
She demanded destruction.
Malcolm refused.
Then Sophie became ill.
The dispute disappeared beneath cancer treatments.
Years passed.
Sophie died.
Malcolm died.
Embryo 6 remained.
Margaret learned about it while settling paperwork after Sophie’s death.
Why implant it?
Her private diary gave the first real answer.
Ethan is drowning.
He believes Sophie's death erased every future they imagined.
I know this embryo is not his.
That is precisely why I cannot give it to him.
He would mistake grief for fatherhood.
That contradicted the theory that Margaret wanted Lily for Ethan.
Another entry:
Anna understands that the child must never be used as a replacement for Sophie.
Anna volunteered.
Not forced.
Not paid into pregnancy.
She agreed to carry the embryo because Thomas Whitmore was her father.
Embryo 6 was biologically connected to Anna’s family too.
Margaret believed giving Anna control of the embryo was better than leaving it in a clinic where someone might exploit it for the Reed trust.
Anna planned to carry Lily and raise her herself.
So why had Margaret later tried to keep Lily near Ethan?
A final diary entry answered:
Anna found Sophie's letter.
Now she believes Ethan deserves to know.
I begged her to wait.
He has finally begun living again.
Eleanor is in his life.
I cannot let a dead future destroy a living one.
Ethan closed the diary.
For the first time, Eleanor reached for his hand.
He did not pull away.
His mother had not been trying to give him Sophie’s child.
She had been trying to keep Lily’s existence from him.
Then Anna died.
Everything reversed.
Margaret saw newborn Lily facing foster placement while Maria fought for guardianship.
She supported Maria.
But she also demanded Lily remain geographically close to Ethan.
Why?
Guilt.
Margaret had hidden Sophie’s last surviving biological child from the man Sophie once loved.
She wanted Ethan near Lily without telling him why.
A cowardly compromise.
Human.
Damaging.
But not a kidnapping conspiracy.
The major mystery seemed solved.
Then Maria remembered the sentence Lily had said in the hallway.
“She said I can’t tell.”
Ethan assumed Lily meant Eleanor.
But had anyone asked?
That evening Ethan sat beside Lily at Claire’s house.
“Sweetheart, when you pointed down the hallway and said, ‘She said I can’t tell’…”
Lily looked at him.
“Who said that?”
Lily’s brows pulled together.
“Miss Eleanor.”
Ethan’s stomach tightened.
“What couldn't you tell?”
Lily whispered:
“About Mommy.”
“Being sick?”
Lily shook her head.
“About the medicine.”
Ethan went still.
“What medicine?”
“The blue one.”
Maria had no blue medication.
Ethan called the hospital.
The doctor checked her toxicology panel.
A sedative was present in Maria’s bloodstream.
A prescription sedative.
Not enough to kill her.
Enough to make her weak, confused and sleepy.
Maria had never been prescribed it.
Ethan slowly turned toward Eleanor.
May you like
The blue folder was no longer the most frightening blue object in the mansion.
Someone had been drugging Maria.
