Chapter 9 - THE CHILD BENEATH THE DAM
Emergency generators activated after forty seconds.
The maintenance shaft led twenty feet below the station.
Agents descended first.
Alexander had been chained to a pipe.
Cynthia stood beside Elena, who was in active labor.
Julian held a detonator.
Explosives had been placed near the dam’s old support structure.
“If anyone enters, the lake comes through this room,” he warned.
Dr. Bell was brought to the shaft entrance.
He confirmed that Elena needed immediate medical attention.
Her contractions were too close together.
She had also been given medication intended to accelerate labor.
Cynthia wanted the child born before the trust documents could be legally challenged.
Alexander begged Julian to release Elena.
“You already stole three years from her.”
“I stole nothing,” Julian replied.
“Father stole my future.”
Richard Whitmore had discovered Julian’s theft decades earlier.
He threatened to remove him from the family trust.
Margaret Lane overheard their argument.
She planned to expose Julian.
Cynthia believed Richard killed her mother.
Julian encouraged that belief.
The truth was worse.
Julian had pushed Margaret from the balcony.
Cynthia stared at him.
“You said Richard did it.”
“I said Richard was responsible.”
“You told me he murdered her.”
“Your mother chose the wrong side.”
Cynthia’s face changed.
For twenty-five years, she had served the man who killed her mother.
Julian saw the realization too late.
Cynthia struck his hand.
The detonator fell.
Alexander kicked it beneath the surgical table.
Agents entered the chamber.
Julian grabbed Elena and placed the knife against her stomach.
“No one moves.”
Elena was crying, but her voice remained steady.
“This child will never belong to you.”
“It is my blood.”
“You are only the man who used a laboratory to create it.”
Cynthia stepped behind Julian.
She lifted a metal instrument from Dr. Bell’s tray.
Then she struck him across the head.
Alexander pulled Elena away.
Agents tackled Julian.
The detonator slid across the floor.
Dr. Bell rushed toward Elena.
The baby’s heartbeat was falling.
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There was no time to move her.
The child had to be delivered beneath the dam.
