Ch.30: Patient X

He's in the adjacent room. The "staging area" for the incinerator.

It shares a wall with my recovery cell. A thick, cinderblock wall, but there are ventilation grates near the ceiling.

Aris didn't throw him in my cell. He wanted him isolated. Waiting for the fire.

I drag myself to the wall. The chains on my wrists clank against the metal bedframe. Aris doubled the restraints. I can barely move my hands, let alone sit up.

I turn my head. I press my good ear against the cold concrete.

"Thorne?" I whisper.

Silence.

Then, a faint, ragged cough.

"Elena?"

His voice sounds wet. Broken ribs. Maybe a punctured lung.

"I'm here," I say. "Are you... how bad is it?"

"Vest took the brunt," he wheezes. "Ribs are a mess. Can't feel my left arm. But I'm breathing."

I close my eye. Thank God.

"He thinks you're dead," I say. "He thinks he burned you."

"Good. Let him think it."

I hear him shifting. Groaning. He's trying to stand up.

"The door is mag-locked," he says. "Same as yours. And the furnace... the pilot light is on. It's getting warm in here."

Panic flares in my chest. If Aris activates the main burner...

"We have to get out," I say. "Before he comes back."

"I'm working on it," Thorne grunts. "But first... you need to know something."

"What?"

"I didn't just come here for you," he says. "I found files. In the judge's office. Halloway had a private stash. Insurance."

"Files about what?"

"About Aris. About the Vane Institute."

I hear a rustling sound. Paper? No. Plastic. He must have pulled something from his pocket before the guards tossed him.

"I thought this was about love," Thorne says, his voice hardening. "I thought he was a sick bastard obsessed with fixing his mistress. But it's bigger than that, El. It's so much bigger."

"What do you mean?"

"I found a ledger. Patient records. But no names. Just numbers."

He pauses. He coughs again, a wet, hacking sound.

"Patient Zero was a burn victim from Dubai. Total facial reconstruction. Paid ten million dollars."

"Aris does charity work," I argue automatically. "Orphans."

"That's the cover," Thorne spits. "The orphans are the product."

The room spins.

"Product?"

"He's not reconstructing them," Thorne says. "He's harvesting them. He takes the healthy tissue. The skin. The corneas. And he sells it."

I stare at the ceiling. The white tiles blur.

"Project Janus isn't a research grant," Thorne continues. "It's a catalog. 'Two faces'. He sells new identities to the highest bidder. Cartel bosses. Wanted terrorists. Billionaires who want to disappear."

My stomach turns. The diamond inside me feels like a stone.

"And Isabella?" I whisper.

"She's not the end game," Thorne says. "She's the prototype. The proof of concept. He needed a perfect match to prove the graft could take. To prove he could transplant an entire face, fully functional, with no rejection."

He pauses.

"You were the donor, Elena. But you weren't the only one. He's been doing this for years. Slicing up nobodies to fix the faces of monsters."

I think of the girls. The "orphans" Aris brought to the manor for "specialized care." The ones who disappeared. He said they were adopted. He said they found homes.

They found graves.

"But Isabella," I say, my mind racing. "He loves her. He wrecked our marriage for her."

"He doesn't love her," Thorne says. "He's using her. She's a walking billboard. Once the graft stabilizes... once he proves it works..."

"What?"

"He has a buyer lined up," Thorne says. "I saw the email chain. 'Client X'. They're arriving tonight."

My blood runs cold.

"Tonight?"

"That's why the house is in lockdown. That's why he needs you dead. He's clearing the inventory."

"Inventory?"

"You," Thorne says. "And Isabella."

"Isabella?"

"She's not keeping the face, El," Thorne says. "The client doesn't want *a* face. The client wants *your* face."

I try to process it.

Isabella isn't the mistress. She isn't the replacement wife.

She is a container. A temporary storage unit for the merchandise.

Aris didn't transplant my face to save her. He transplanted it to keep it fresh. To keep it vascularized and alive until the buyer arrived.

"He's going to skin her," I whisper.

"Yes," Thorne says. "He's going to harvest the face again. And then he's going to kill her. And you."

He hits the wall. A dull thud of frustration.

"We are in a slaughterhouse, Elena. This isn't a hospital."

I look at my hands. My scarred, ruined hands.

I thought I was fighting a jealous husband. I thought I was fighting for my identity.

But I am just a spare part. A biological asset in a transaction worth millions.

"The client," I ask. "Who is it?"

"Didn't say," Thorne replies. "But the transfer was wired from a shell company in the Caymans. fifty million dollars."

Fifty million.

That's what I'm worth. Not as a wife. Not as a scientist. As a mask.

I hear a sound from the hallway.

The heavy, rhythmic thud of the magnetic locks disengaging.

"Someone's coming," Thorne hisses.

I look at the door.

It slides open.

Aris isn't there.

A woman enters. She is tall, elegant, dressed in a white suit that costs more than my house. She is flanked by two massive bodyguards.

She walks into the room. She looks around the dirty, bloodstained cell with a sniff of disdain.

Then she looks at me.

She doesn't look at my injuries. She doesn't look at my fear.

She looks at my bone structure. She looks at my eye color. She looks at the shape of my skull.

She nods.

"Good bone structure," she says. Her accent is Russian. Cold. "The merchandise looks damaged, but the frame is intact."

She turns to the guard.

"Where is the face?"

"Upstairs, ma'am," the guard says. "Dr. Vane is preparing it for transfer."

She smiles. It is a shark's smile.

"Excellent. I have waited a long time to be beautiful again."

She looks back at me.

"And what is this? The leftovers?"

"Disposal," the guard says.

"Pity," she says. "She has nice hands."

She reaches out. She touches my hand. The hand with the missing finger.

"Maybe I take those too. As a spare set."

She laughs.

She turns and walks out.

I stare after her.

It's true. Everything Thorne said.

This is an auction house. And I'm Lot Number One.