🔥 CHAPTER 7 — The Girl They Tried to Erase
The warehouse exploded into chaos.
Bullets shattered windows.
Smoke swallowed the corridors.
Agents stormed every entrance while frightened teenagers ran in every direction, screaming for help.
"Elias!"
Josephine grabbed my arm.
"We have to get Lily!"
"Lily?"
"My little sister!"
I froze.
"You don't have a sister."
Josephine's face crumpled.
"They told you she died when she was a baby."
My stomach twisted.
Rebecca had once told me she'd miscarried our second child thirteen years ago.
We buried an empty casket.
I had cried over a daughter who never lived.
Or so I thought.
Josephine dragged me through a steel door hidden behind the medical wing.
The deeper we ran, the colder the air became.
Rows of locked rooms lined the hallway.
Each held another child.
Some no older than eight.
Others teenagers.
Some stared blankly.
Others flinched whenever an adult walked past.
None of them spoke.
Josephine stopped at Cell 17.
A tiny blonde girl sat curled in the corner, hugging a faded teddy bear.
She looked up slowly.
"Jo..."
Josephine collapsed beside her.
"I came back."
The little girl burst into tears.
"They said you were dead."
"I lied so they would stop hurting you."
I felt something inside me break.
This child had my eyes.
My father's nose.
My mother's smile.
I didn't need a DNA test.
She was mine.
I wrapped her in my arms.
"I'm your dad."
She hesitated.
Then whispered the words I'd waited thirteen years to hear.
"Daddy?"
Before I could answer—
A slow clap echoed through the hallway.
Nathan stepped from the shadows.
"You finally found her."
He wasn't smiling anymore.
He looked almost... disappointed.
"You ruined twenty years of work."
Behind him stood six armed guards.
Rebecca walked beside him, her face pale.
She looked at Lily.
Then at me.
May you like
And for the first time...
She cried.
