Michael would not let me open the door.
Neither would Lily.
But Elaine Porter kept standing outside in the darkness, saying my name with the same calm tone I remembered from the hospital.
“Susan, I know you're in there.”
I stared at the back door.
“How do we know it's really her?”
Michael whispered, “We don't.”
Lily stepped closer to the glass.
“Elaine?”
Silence.
Then the woman's voice answered.
“Yes.”
Lily's face changed.
“You're alive.”
“I've been alive.”
“Why did you disappear?”
“Because I wanted to stay that way.”
Michael glanced at me.
I had never seen him so uncertain.
“Show yourself,” he called.
Elaine stepped into the weak light from the side gate.
She was older, thinner, and her hair was almost completely gray. But I recognized her immediately.
She had been the nurse who held the cup of water to my lips after surgery.
The woman who had stared at Michael.
The woman whose face had haunted a memory I could never explain.
Michael unlocked the door but kept the chain in place.
Elaine looked through the opening.
“I don't have much time.”
“Neither do we,” Michael said.
Her eyes moved to me.
“You look like your father.”
I felt a chill.
“What happened to my daughter?”
Elaine looked at Lily.
“You were never supposed to know.”
“I know enough.”
“No,” Elaine said. “You know what people wanted you to know.”
She reached into her coat.
Michael immediately stepped between us.
Elaine pulled out a small recorder.
Nothing else.
“I brought this.”
“What is it?”
“Dr. Harris's voice.”
Michael stared at it.
“Where did you get that?”
“From the storage unit.”
“The same one we're supposed to visit?”
“Yes.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Because someone knows about the unit.”
I looked at Lily.
She lowered her eyes.
Elaine continued.
“They know about the key.”
I touched the small metal key in my pocket.
“How?”
“Someone talked.”
Michael looked at Lily.
She shook her head.
“It wasn't me.”
Elaine looked at him.
“No.”
That single word seemed to carry a warning.
“Then who?”
Elaine looked at me.
“Your husband.”
I turned toward Michael.
He went pale.
“I never told anyone.”
Elaine's expression hardened.
“You told one person.”
“Who?”
“Your brother.”
I stared at him.
“My brother?”
Michael nodded slowly.
“David.”
I had not spoken to David in months.
He lived three states away.
“What does David have to do with this?”
Michael didn't answer.
Elaine did.
“He helped move the original records.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“Because Dr. Harris paid him.”
Michael shook his head.
“That isn't possible.”
“It is.”
“You're lying.”
Elaine looked at him.
“I kept the payment record.”
She handed me a photocopy.
There was David's name.
Three payments.
The dates were from 2010, 2011, and 2012.
I stared at the paper.
Michael whispered, “I didn't know.”
Elaine looked at him.
“You didn't want to know.”
He flinched.
I folded the copy.
“Why would David help them?”
“Because he believed your father had hidden money.”
“What money?”
“The account.”
I looked at the key.
“Did my father hide money?”
“No.”
Elaine shook her head.
“He hid evidence.”
“What evidence?”
“Names.”
“Of everyone involved?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't he go to the police?”
“He tried.”
“What happened?”
“He was warned.”
“By Dr. Harris?”
“By people above him.”
I felt my throat tighten.
“Who?”
Elaine shook her head.
“I never learned the names.”
“You knew enough to disappear.”
“Yes.”
She looked at Lily.
“And I knew enough to understand what would happen to her if they found her.”
Lily stepped forward.
“Who took me?”
Elaine's face softened.
“Your father.”
“My biological father?”
“Yes.”
I looked at her.
“Daniel?”
Elaine nodded.
“He didn't abandon you.”
“What happened?”
“He came back for you.”
Michael closed his eyes.
“When?”
“After you were born.”
I looked at him.
“Why didn't he take her?”
“He tried.”
Elaine's voice lowered.
“He was killed before he could.”
Silence filled the kitchen.
“Who killed him?”
“I don't know.”
“But it wasn't an accident.”
“No.”
Michael looked at Elaine.
“You said the storage unit contains the evidence.”
“Yes.”
“What kind?”
“The original birth records.”
Lily inhaled sharply.
“My birth records?”
“And your mother's.”
I stared at her.
“What do you mean?”
“Your original hospital file.”
My heart began pounding.
“The missing pages.”
Elaine nodded.
“They're there.”
“Why would Dr. Harris keep them?”
“Because he regretted what he did.”
“What did he do?”
“He transferred the embryo without your mother's consent.”
I felt numb.
“He admitted it?”
“On the recording.”
Elaine held up the recorder.
I reached for it.
She pulled it back.
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
“Because once you hear it, you will understand why people are still looking for that key.”
I stared at her.
“What is on it?”
“Names.”
“Whose?”
“The people who arranged the transfer.”
Lily asked, “My mother?”
Elaine looked at her.
“No.”
She turned toward me.
“Your father.”
I felt tears burn my eyes.
“My father arranged it?”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“He tried to stop it.”
“Then why did Dr. Harris do it?”
“Because he was being paid.”
“By whom?”
Elaine's eyes shifted toward the dark window.
“That's the part I never discovered.”
Michael stepped closer.
“Then we need the recording.”
Elaine nodded.
“But first, we need to leave this house.”
“Why?”
“Because they know you're here.”
As if summoned by her words, headlights swept across the kitchen wall.
Lily grabbed my arm.
Elaine extinguished the lamp.
The car stopped outside.
Nobody moved.
A second vehicle pulled up behind it.
Michael whispered, “Two cars.”
Elaine nodded.
“They came sooner than I expected.”
“Where do we go?”
“The hospital.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
“Because there is a room beneath it that doesn't appear on the public plans.”
“Room 14?”
“No.”
She looked at Lily.
“Room 17.”
The number on my key.
We left through the side door.
Michael went first.
Elaine followed.
Lily held my hand.
We crossed the backyard and slipped through the narrow gate.
The night air was cold against my face.
A vehicle door slammed behind us.
“Move,” Michael whispered.
We reached his truck.
The engine started.
I climbed into the back with Lily.
Elaine sat beside Michael.
We drove without headlights for the first block.
Then Michael turned them on.
Nobody spoke.
Finally I asked Elaine, “How long have you been protecting Lily?”
“Since she was nine.”
“Where was she before that?”
“With Margaret.”
“Why did Margaret take her?”
“Because Dr. Harris was afraid his wife would be targeted.”
“Was she?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“She was threatened.”
Lily stared out the window.
“She never told me that.”
“She wanted you to have a childhood.”
Lily laughed softly.
“I didn't.”
Elaine turned.
“You had more of one than you would have if they had found you.”
The hospital appeared ahead.
Michael pulled into the old service entrance.
The building was dark.
Elaine led us down a stairwell.
At the bottom, she stopped beside a concrete wall.
“There.”
I saw nothing.
She touched a section of brick.
A hidden panel opened.
Behind it was a narrow passage.
Michael stared.
“I never knew this existed.”
“That was the point.”
We followed Elaine.
The passage smelled of damp stone.
After about twenty yards, we reached a metal door.
She inserted a key.
The lock opened.
Room 17 was larger than Room 14.
Shelves covered three walls.
Boxes filled the floor.
At the center was a metal table.
Elaine placed the recorder on it.
“This is where Dr. Harris stored everything he couldn't destroy.”
I looked around.
“My entire life is in this room.”
“No,” Elaine said.
“Only the part someone tried to erase.”
She opened a box.
Inside were medical records.
My name was on the first file.
My hands shook as I lifted it.
The missing pages were there.
The operative report.
The transfer documentation.
The laboratory results.
And a photograph.
A photograph of an embryo under magnification.
Beside it was a handwritten note.
Embryonic tissue viable.
Preserve.
I stared at it.
“He saved it.”
Elaine nodded.
“He preserved the pregnancy.”
“Why?”
“Because Dr. Harris realized what was happening.”
“What was happening?”
“He discovered that your pregnancy was being used as leverage.”
“Against my father?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Your father had access to the account.”
I turned toward Michael.
“What was in it?”
He looked at Elaine.
She answered.
“A list of every person involved.”
“That's why they wanted it.”
“Yes.”
“And Lily?”
“She was proof.”
“Proof of what?”
“That the medical records had been falsified.”
I looked at the birth certificate.
Lily had been born with a false identity.
Her existence proved someone had taken an embryo from one woman, transferred it to another, and hidden the procedure.
That was enough to expose the entire system.
I looked at the recorder.
“Play it.”
Elaine pressed the button.
Static filled the room.
Then a man's voice.
Dr. Harris.
My heart began pounding.
His voice was older than I remembered.
“I should have stopped it sooner.”
Static.
“The child was never the objective.”
Another pause.
“The objective was the account.”
I looked at Michael.
The recording continued.
“David Miller was paid to locate it.”
Michael froze.
My brother.
Dr. Harris went on.
“Michael discovered the truth after Susan's hospitalization.”
I closed my eyes.
“He tried to protect her.”
The room seemed suddenly silent except for the recording.
Then Dr. Harris said something that made all of us stop breathing.
“Unfortunately, Michael was not the only one protecting her.”
The recording crackled.
“There was someone inside her family who had already given them access.”
The tape stopped.
Elaine stared at the recorder.
“What happened?”
“It ends there.”
I looked at Michael.
“Who had access?”
He shook his head.
“I don't know.”
Then Lily pointed toward the door.
“Someone's outside.”
We heard footsteps.
One.
Two.
Then several.
Elaine switched off the light.
Michael moved toward the door.
A shadow appeared beneath it.
A voice came from the corridor.
“Michael?”
I knew that voice.
I had heard it on the phone that afternoon.
My brother.
David.
Click here to continue reading: PART 7: My Brother Arrived at the Hidden Room With the Missing Records, and His Explanation Forced Me to Question Everything Michael Had Told Me
For Eighteen Years I Thought My Husband’s Silence Was Punishment, Until One Ordinary Medical Appointment Made Him Afraid
Part 6 of 12
