The man on the screen looked enough like my husband to make my stomach turn.
Not twins.
Not exactly.
But blood.
Unmistakably.
The real Brad Sullivan stood beneath the sterile lights of the Lake Geneva archive while the man I had married faced him across a room filled with servers.
Ricardo whispered something.
The audio feed sharpened.
“Brad?”
The stranger smiled.
“You remember me now?”
Ricardo’s face collapsed.
“No.”
“You should.”
Brad—the man beside Ricardo, my Brad—looked between them.
“You know him?”
Ricardo shook his head too quickly.
The stranger laughed.
“Not consciously.”
Harris kept her weapon trained on him.
“Hands where I can see them.”
He lifted both hands.
“No weapon.”
Victor moved on the floor.
One agent helped him sit against a cabinet.
Blood ran from a cut near his hairline.
“What did you do to him?” Brad demanded.
The stranger shrugged.
“Victor tried to stop me from opening my own archive.”
“Your archive?”
“My family’s.”
Ricardo whispered, “You were transferred.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
The stranger’s smile disappeared.
“To Matthew Reed.”
Vale’s grandfather.
Orpheus’s founder.
The meaning hit everyone at once.
Ricardo looked physically ill.
“They raised you.”
“They studied me.”
The stranger’s voice remained calm, which made it worse.
“They called the building a home when I was young. Later I learned it was simply the residential wing.”
My Brad stared.
“How did nobody know?”
“Because legally I died before my first birthday.”
Ricardo covered his mouth.
The stranger looked at him.
“Your father signed the papers.”
“My father told me you were dead.”
“He preferred efficient lies.”
Harris stepped closer.
“Why authenticate as Daniel Sullivan?”
The stranger looked at my Brad.
“Because that’s who the system thinks he is.”
Silence.
My husband went still.
The stranger walked toward a terminal.
Harris raised her weapon higher.
“Stop.”
He stopped.
“You wanted the truth.”
“From where you are.”
He smiled faintly.
“Fine.”
He looked at Brad.
“You were born first.”
My husband’s breath caught.
“Daniel.”
“Yes.”
The stranger pointed toward himself.
“I was born second.”
“Brad.”
“Yes.”
Brad swallowed.
“And Nathaniel Reed?”
The stranger’s face changed.
“The boy your parents brought home with you.”
Everyone went quiet.
The brother my husband had grown up with—the man he had mourned as Daniel—had actually been Nathaniel Reed.
No Sullivan blood at all.
Brad closed his eyes.
For years he had thought his twin died.
Then he learned the identities had been switched.
Now he was learning something even crueler.
The boy beside him throughout childhood had never been his twin biologically.
Yet the grief on Brad’s face did not lessen.
“He was my brother.”
The real Brad nodded.
“Yes.”
No argument.
No correction.
Just yes.
Ricardo sank into a chair.
“So the infant I raised as Daniel…”
“Nathaniel Reed.”
“And the child I raised as Brad…”
“Daniel Sullivan.”
My husband looked at his father.
For the first time, the birth-name confusion resolved cleanly.
He had been born Daniel Sullivan.
He had been raised as Brad Sullivan.
His true biological twin, Brad Sullivan, had been taken by Orpheus.
The boy raised beside him as Daniel had been Nathaniel Reed.
Three infants.
Three names.
One deliberate catastrophe.
Harris asked, “Why?”
The real Brad looked toward the servers.
“Because Matthew Reed wanted access to a Sullivan child without Sullivan supervision.”
“So he took you.”
“He traded.”
Ricardo whispered, “Nathaniel.”
“Yes.”
The stranger’s jaw tightened.
“His grandson replaced me in your home. Matthew Reed got the Sullivan infant he wanted. Your father got two living babies and no public scandal.”
Ricardo shook his head.
“My father would never—”
Victor laughed from the floor.
“Stop saying what Father would never do.”
Ricardo fell silent.
My Brad looked at the man across from him.
“Where have you been for thirty-six years?”
“Here. Then Zurich. Boston. Montreal. Wherever Orpheus moved.”
“You could have come to us.”
The real Brad smiled.
“You think I knew who you were?”
“When did you find out?”
“Eight years ago.”
The same period Nathaniel—the brother raised as Daniel—had begun investigating Orpheus.
My Brad understood.
“You contacted him.”
“Yes.”
“He knew.”
“Eventually.”
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Because he was trying to get me out.”
Brad’s eyes filled.
The real Brad continued.
“Nathaniel found evidence of the substitution. He thought exposing it immediately would get all three of us killed.”
“All three.”
“You. Me. Him.”
Brad looked away.
“So he died trying to free you.”
“No.”
The stranger’s voice broke for the first time.
“He died because I made him come here.”
Brad turned back.
“What happened?”
“I told him I had proof Vale was restarting the maternal-line program.”
Clara.
My mother.
Elias.
“He came alone,” the real Brad continued. “Vale knew. Nathaniel never left the grounds.”
Brad looked toward Vale, who had been brought into the archive under guard and now stood cuffed beside the doorway.
Vale smiled faintly.
The real Brad’s face turned cold.
“You ordered it.”
Vale shrugged.
“Nathaniel Reed was Matthew Reed’s grandson. Sentiment made him unreliable.”
The real Brad lunged.
Harris intercepted him.
Brad moved too.
For one wild second both Sullivan brothers tried to reach Vale.
Agents forced them apart.
Vale laughed.
“Finally. A family resemblance.”
I wanted to reach through the screen and strike him myself.
Harris steadied everyone.
“Enough.”
She looked at the real Brad.
“You authenticated twenty minutes ago. Why?”
“To copy the archive.”
“To where?”
“External servers.”
“Whose?”
“Mine.”
Harris’s expression hardened.
“That evidence belongs in federal custody.”
“So does everything Vale already buried through federal contacts.”
“You don’t trust us.”
“No.”
“Then why reveal yourself?”
The real Brad looked at my husband.
“Because Elias was born.”
My grip tightened.
He looked directly toward the hidden camera again.
He knew I was watching.
“I spent years believing Orpheus ended with us.”
My blood chilled.
“When Clara became pregnant, the program activated old protocols.”
“You knew about me?” I asked aloud even though he could not hear.
Then the speaker beside my screen clicked.
He could.
“Yes, Clara.”
I froze.
“You’ve been listening?”
“Since you opened the feed.”
I stood despite Teresa’s protest.
“You knew Brad was alive.”
Both men looked toward the camera.
The real Brad answered.
“I knew Daniel was alive.”
My husband flinched at the name.
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because Vale was tracking every attempt to approach you.”
“Everyone uses that excuse.”
“Yes.”
His answer was almost sad.
“But in my case, I was still inside his network.”
“Did you access my prenatal records?”
“No.”
“Kessler did.”
“Yes.”
“Did you stop her?”
“I tried.”
“Not enough.”
“No.”
At least none of these men defended failure anymore.
I looked at my husband through the screen.
“Brad.”
Both men answered.
“Yes?”
For one bizarre second no one moved.
Then my husband almost laughed.
The real Brad did too.
It was the first human moment between them.
I pointed toward the man I married even though he could only see me through the camera.
“You.”
His face softened.
“Yes.”
“You come back as Brad.”
The real Brad watched him.
My husband whispered, “Clara.”
“I know what you were born.”
He looked at the floor.
“I know what the records say.”
I touched Elias’s blanket.
“But I married Brad.”
The real Brad was silent.
Then he nodded once.
“I expected that.”
My husband looked at him.
“You don’t mind?”
“I’ve lived without the name longer than you’ve lived with it.”
“What do people call you?”
A pause.
“Adam.”
Vale laughed quietly.
“Another borrowed name.”
Adam ignored him.
I repeated it.
“Adam.”
He looked at the camera.
“That works.”
Harris stepped toward the server console.
“What exactly did you copy?”
“Everything.”
“Medical records?”
“Yes.”
“Payment trails?”
“Yes.”
“Deaths?”
“Yes.”
“Vale’s command logs?”
Adam looked at him.
“Especially those.”
Vale stopped smiling.
Harris said, “Give me the copy.”
“No.”
“Adam.”
He reacted slightly to the name.
“You said federal contacts were compromised,” Harris continued. “Fine. We make redundant transfers. Inspector general. Multiple courts. Medical regulators. International partners. You keep a copy too.”
Adam studied her.
“You’re negotiating.”
“I’m avoiding another thirty years of secret guardians deciding what everyone else gets to know.”
My husband looked toward the camera.
That sentence hit him.
I could tell.
Adam noticed too.
Finally he nodded.
“All right.”
He entered a command.
Servers began transferring.
Progress bars appeared.
Vale watched.
His calm finally disappeared.
“No.”
No one answered him.
He stepped forward against the agents holding him.
“You have no idea what you’re releasing.”
Adam looked at him.
“Evidence.”
“Research.”
“Evidence.”
“Treatments that could save thousands.”
“Built from crimes.”
Vale’s voice rose.
“You think history cares how discovery happens?”
Teresa spoke beside me.
“No.”
Everyone on the feed heard her.
“It cares because people remember who paid for it.”
Vale stared toward the camera.
Teresa leaned closer.
“My mother paid.”
Silence.
“My husband paid.”
Vale’s jaw tightened.
“My daughter paid.”
She touched Elias’s blanket.
“And you do not get my grandson.”
The transfer reached seventy percent.
Kessler suddenly moved.
She knocked the guard beside her backward and lunged for the emergency cutoff panel.
Harris shouted.
Adam ran.
Brad ran too.
Kessler reached the switch.
Victor, still on the floor, threw himself across her legs.
She fell.
Her hand struck the panel.
The lights died.
My video went black.
“No!”
Teresa grabbed my arm.
“Wait.”
Emergency power came on in the vehicle.
The feed returned.
The archive room glowed red.
Agents restrained Kessler.
Victor lay flat on his back laughing painfully.
Harris checked the terminal.
“Transfer?”
Adam stared.
The progress bar resumed.
Seventy-eight.
Eighty-one.
Vale closed his eyes.
He knew.
Orpheus was ending.
At ninety-six percent, an alarm started.
Adam’s expression changed.
“What?”
He typed.
Ricardo stepped beside him.
“Temperature?”
“No.”
Another alarm.
Adam looked toward a glass wall at the rear of the archive.
“Sample storage.”
Vale opened his eyes.
Then smiled.
Brad turned.
“What did you do?”
Vale’s smile widened.
“Fail-safe.”
Ricardo went pale.
“No.”
Harris demanded, “What fail-safe?”
Adam answered.
“If the archive is breached, the biological vault incinerates.”
I exhaled in relief.
“Good.”
Adam looked toward the camera.
“Not good.”
“Why?”
“The vault isn’t empty.”
Teresa stiffened.
“You said the samples were destroyed.”
“Clara’s line was.”
“What’s inside?”
Adam stared at the locked vault.
“Living subjects.”
Everything inside me went cold.
“How many?”
He checked the terminal.
Then looked at Harris.
“Fourteen.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 15: When the Orpheus Vault Began to Burn, Brad Chose the Family He Had Built Over the Bloodline That Had Controlled Them
The Doctor Cried When He Saw My Newborn Son—Then He Told Me My Husband Was Never Gone
Part 14 of 15
