Chapter 5 - The Trap Closes"He knows who I am," Sebastian said, his voice terrifyingly calm, the voice of a predator realizing he's walked into a hunter's crosshairs.
"Who? Harrison?" I asked, my heart hammering against my ribs.
"More than Harrison," Sebastian replied, gently rocking Baby Boy Miller, who stirred slightly at the sudden tension in the room. "The people who burned down St. Jude's seventeen years ago weren't just low-level thugs. They were part of a syndicate—politicians, real estate developers, and federal judges who wanted those downtown blocks cleared out for urban renewal. Harrison was their cleanup boy. He took their money, falsified the death certificates, and trafficked the surviving infants to high-paying adoptive families—or worse, used them as leverage."
"Leverage?" I echoed, horror washing over me. "You mean... Baby Boy Miller isn't just an abandoned newborn?"
"Look at the mother's intake notes on this manifest," Sebastian pointed a scarred finger at the screen. "A seventeen-year-old girl named Clara Miller. Granddaughter of federal judge Thomas Miller—one of the founding partners of the St. Jude's redevelopment project."
The puzzle pieces clicked together with terrifying clarity.
"Clara got pregnant," I whispered. "She had the baby in secret, and when she tried to keep him, Harrison and her grandfather tried to make the baby disappear—just like they did seventeen years ago."
Suddenly, the overhead lights in the NICU flickered violently.
Bzzzzzt.
The automated hum of the incubator systems cut out for a fraction of a second before switching over to the auxiliary generator backup.
At the same moment, the heavy double doors at the entrance of the ward clicked, followed by a mechanical clunk.
The electronic security locks had just engaged from the outside.
We were locked in.
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"They're sealing the wing," Sebastian said, his eyes darting toward the observation windows.
Outside in the hallway, shadows moved against the frosted glass. Not hospital staff. Men in dark tactical gear, moving with military precision, weapons drawn, silently forming a perimeter around our section of the NICU.
