Chapter 1 - THE LIARS IN WHITE
The heavy oak doors of the restaurant clicked shut behind them, locking out the gasping crowd, but the silence inside Victor Hale’s armored limousine was far more suffocating.
Sophie refused to let go of Evelyn’s uniform. The two-year-old girl, who had not uttered a single sound since the day she was brought to Victor's mansion, was now buried deep in Evelyn’s lap, her small shoulders shaking with rhythmic, exhausting sobs. Evelyn’s hands, still smelling faintly of the vanilla, rose, and lavender oils she had worn for years, caressed the child’s soft hair. Tears streamed down Evelyn’s face. Every instinct in her body, dormant and aching for two agonizing years, screamed that this child belonged to her.
Across from them sat Victor Hale. The golden light of the passing streetlamps illuminated the sharp, terrifying angles of his face. He wasn't looking at Evelyn with anger anymore; he was looking at her like a math problem he couldn’t solve, a man realizing he had been chess-pieced by someone else.
"Bern," Victor said, his voice a low, gravelly vibration that cut through the sound of the rain against the bulletproof glass. "L’Hôpital des Cieux. July 14th, two years ago. Tell me everything."
Evelyn swallowed the lump in her throat, her voice trembling but resolute. "I was a surrogate... or so I thought. I was approached by an agency when I was desperate, drowning in my mother's medical debts. They paid for everything. I flew to Switzerland. But the night I gave birth, the alarms went off. The doctors panicked. They put an oxygen mask over my face. When I woke up, the head physician, Dr:// Kenneth Vance, stood over me with a clip board. He told me the umbilical cord had wrapped around her neck. He said she was gone. They wouldn't even let me see the body. They said it was standard protocol for high-risk foreign surrogacies to handle cremation immediately."
Victor’s hands gripped his silver-headed cane so tightly his knuckles turned stark white. "Dr. Kenneth Vance," he repeated, the name tasting like poison on his tongue.
"Why?" Evelyn cried out, her grip tightening around Sophie. "Why does your daughter have my face? Why did she speak to me? Victor, who gave you this child?"
Victor leaned forward, the shadow of his large frame enveloping her. "Two years ago, my wife, Eleanor, died in a private clinic in Bern while attempting to give birth. I was told the baby survived, but Eleanor did not. The clinic was managed by Dr. Kenneth Vance. I was handed Sophie in a sterile room, wrapped in silk, with a birth certificate bearing my name and my late wife's. I paid three million dollars in 'procedural and medical fees' to Vance's private foundation."
Evelyn gasped, the horrific truth pieces falling into place. "She wasn't Eleanor's baby. She was mine. They stole her from my womb, told me she died, and sold her to you to cover up the fact that your real child died with your wife."
Victor didn't deny it. His jaw clenched so hard a muscle ticked in his cheek. He looked at Sophie, who had finally stopped crying, her dark, watchful eyes darting between Evelyn and the man she had known as her father. For two years, Victor had thought his daughter’s silence was a manifestation of grief for a mother she never knew. Now he realized it was the trauma of a stolen soul, recognizing that the world she was living in was a lie.
The limousine violently lurched to a halt. The privacy glass slid down. Victor’s head of security, a towering man named Marcus, turned around with a pale face.
"Sir, we have a problem," Marcus whispered. "The medical registry files for L’Hôpital des Cieux... I just tried to access the secure backup server we use to monitor Sophie’s health records. The server is being wiped in real-time. Someone knows we left the restaurant. Someone knows Evelyn is alive."
Victor’s eyes flashed with a lethal, predatory fire. "Trace the deletion source."
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"It's coming from inside the city, sir. A private residence in the diplomatic district. Belonging to Dr. Kenneth Vance. He landed in the country four hours ago."
Victor turned his gaze back to Evelyn, his voice dropping to a deadly whisper. "It seems the ghosts of Bern have followed you to my city, Evelyn. And I don’t leave loose ends."
