Ch.52: The Daughter

I run.

Isabella is heading for the guest suite to confront the Buyer. Kael is on the roof with Thorne. Aris is writhing in the lab.

But there is one person missing.

Lily.

Aris dragged her into this. He used her as leverage against Greta. He kept her in the house, a little doll in a glass box.

I sprint down the hallway. My feet slip on the blood-slicked carpet. I am still holding the knife Isabella gave me, the handle warm and sticky.

Lily’s room is at the end of the corridor. The door is painted pink.

I reach the handle. Locked.

I kick it. Once. Twice.

The wood splinters. The door swings open.

The room is dark, illuminated only by a nightlight in the shape of a star.

"Lily?" I whisper.

"Mommy?"

A small voice comes from the closet.

I rush over. I pull open the closet doors.

Lily is huddled in the corner, clutching her stuffed rabbit. She looks up at me.

Her eyes widen.

She sees the monster. The raw, skinless face. The blood. The knife.

She opens her mouth to scream.

"It's me, baby," I say quickly, dropping the knife. I fall to my knees. "It's Mommy. It's Elena."

I hold out my hands. My ruined, shaking hands.

"Look at my eyes, Lily. Look at my eyes."

She stares at me. She is terrified, trembling like a leaf. But she looks. She searches the wreckage of my face for something familiar.

"Mommy?" she whispers.

"Yes. Yes, it's me."

I reach for her. I want to hold her. I want to shield her from everything.

But before I can touch her, a hand grabs my hair.

"Get away from her," a voice hisses.

I am yanked backward. I fall hard on my back.

I look up.

Petrova.

The Buyer.

She is standing over me. Her wig is askew. Her makeup is smeared. She looks like a melting wax figure.

And she is holding a gun. A small, pearl-handled pistol.

"You," she spits. "You ruined everything."

"Leave her alone," I say, struggling to sit up. "She's just a child."

"She is a spare," Petrova corrects me.

She reaches into the closet and drags Lily out by her arm. Lily screams, kicking and flailing.

"Let me go!"

"Shut up!" Petrova shakes her. She looks at me with cold, calculating eyes. "The Surgeon said the graft failed because the donor was old. Used."

She runs a hand over Lily's smooth, terrified face.

"But this one... this one is fresh. Young. Untouched."

My blood runs cold.

"No," I whisper.

"Why not?" Petrova asks. "The genetic match is perfect. She is your daughter. Her skin is your skin, but better."

She smiles.

"I paid fifty million dollars for a face. I am leaving with a face."

She drags Lily toward the door.

"And maybe," she adds, looking at Lily's small hands, "I will take the rest, too. A child's heart is strong."

Rage.

It isn't the chemical fire of the adrenaline anymore. It is something older. Primal.

It starts in my gut and explodes outward.

I don't think. I don't calculate.

I am not a scientist. I am not a victim.

I am a mother.

I grab the knife from the floor.

Petrova turns her back on me to drag Lily out. She thinks I am broken. She thinks I am beaten.

She is wrong.

I scramble to my feet. I ignore the pain in my chest, the burning in my lungs.

"Let her go!" I roar.

Petrova turns, raising the gun.

But I am already moving.

My motherly instinct overrode my pain. I lunged.