Chapter 36: Genetic Markers

The explosion wasn't cinematic. It was a dull, concussive thud that knocked the wind out of me. The hangar filled with smoke and the acrid smell of burning fuel. The plane's right engine was a fireball, the flames licking up the wing.

"Go!" Ben screamed, grabbing my arm. "Get him out!"

I scrambled toward the stretcher. Leo was still strapped in, his eyes wide with panic. The heat was intense, searing my skin.

Edith was gone. In the chaos, she had disappeared into the shadows.

But Thorne was still there. He was on his knees, coughing, staring at the fire he had helped create.

"Help me!" I shouted at him. "Help me lift him!"

Thorne looked at me. Then he looked at the boy on the stretcher. His grandson.

He stood up, his movements stiff and pained. Together, we lifted the stretcher and ran toward the open hangar door.

We collapsed on the grass outside, gasping for air. The fire inside the hangar was growing, feeding on the spilled fuel. Sirens wailed in the distance, getting closer.

"Is he okay?" I asked, checking Leo's pulse. It was fast, erratic.

"He needs a hospital," Thorne rasped. "Now."

"Where is she?" Ben asked, looking back at the burning building. "Where is Edith?"

We scanned the darkness. The silver sedan was gone.

"She ran," I said. "She left us to burn."

The police cars skidded into the lot, lights flashing. Officers poured out, guns drawn.

"Get down!" they yelled. "Hands in the air!"

I dropped to my knees, raising my hands. "We have a medical emergency! Please, help him!"

An ambulance followed the police cars. Paramedics rushed to Leo.

I watched them load him into the back. I watched them hook him up to IVs and monitors.

"I need to go with him," I said to the officer who was cuffing me. "I'm his mother."

"You're under arrest for kidnapping," the officer said. "And arson."

"I didn't start the fire!" I shouted. "Edith Sterling did! She's getting away!"

But they weren't listening. They put me in the back of a cruiser. I watched through the wire mesh as they arrested Ben. As they questioned Thorne.

And as the ambulance drove away, taking my son—my real son—to a hospital controlled by the Sterling Trust.

I spent the night in a holding cell. It was cold, sterile, and smelled of despair. I paced the small space, my mind racing. Edith had framed me perfectly. I was the unstable mother who kidnapped her son. I was the arsonist who burned down the family estate.

But I had something she didn't know about.

I had the cheek swab.

I had slipped it into my bra before the police searched me. It was small, plastic, easily missed.

It was my only weapon.

The next morning, I was allowed a phone call. I didn't call a lawyer. I called Dr. Patel.

"It's Sarah," I said when she answered. "Don't hang up."

"Sarah, the police are looking for you. They say you took Leo."

"I didn't take him. I saved him. Dr. Patel, listen to me. Leo has a genetic condition. But it's not leukemia."

"What are you talking about?"

"It's Von Willebrand's," I said. "Type 2N. It mimics hemophilia. And he got it from his grandfather."

"His grandfather?"

"Dr. Aris Thorne," I said. "He's Leo's grandfather. And he's my father."

There was a silence on the line.

"Sarah," Dr. Patel said slowly. "If that's true... then Leo's blood type... the O-Negative..."

"It comes from Thorne," I said. "I carry the gene. I passed it to Leo."

"But Sarah," she said. "If Leo has Type 2N Von Willebrand's... the treatment for leukemia could kill him. The chemotherapy... it destroys platelets. If he can't clot..."

"That's why he's getting worse," I said. "Edith isn't curing him. She's killing him. And she's using the 'leukemia' diagnosis to cover it up."

"Where is he?" Dr. Patel asked. Her voice was sharp, professional.

"St. Jude's," I said. "Edith moved him back there last night. Dr. Patel, you have to stop them. You have to test him for the Von Willebrand factor."

"I can't just order a test based on a phone call from a fugitive," she said.

"I have proof," I said. "I have a DNA sample. From Leo. And from me."

"Where?"

"I can't tell you," I said. "But if you test him... if you run the panel... you'll see. Please. He's dying."

There was a long pause.

"I'll run the panel," Dr. Patel said. "But Sarah... if you're wrong..."

"I'm not wrong," I said.

I hung up.

An hour later, my lawyer arrived. It wasn't the public defender I expected. It was a woman in a sharp gray suit, carrying a leather briefcase.

"My name is Elena Russo," she said. "I represent the estate of Clara Sterling."

"Clara?" I asked. "Is she...?"

"She's alive," Elena said. "She woke up this morning. And she's talking."

"What did she say?"

Elena opened her briefcase and pulled out a file.

"She said a lot of things," Elena said. "About a baby. About a theft. And about a sister who isn't really a sister."

She slid a piece of paper across the table.

It was a DNA report.

*Subject: Clara Sterling.*
*Subject: Sarah Sterling.*

*Relationship Probability: 0.00%*

I stared at the paper.

"Zero?" I whispered. "But... the 23andMe test. It said Parent/Child."

"It did," Elena said. "But it didn't say *who* the parent was."

She slid another paper across the table.

*Subject: Sarah Sterling.*
*Subject: Edith Sterling.*

*Relationship Probability: 0.00%*

I looked at her, confused. "If Clara isn't my mother... and Edith isn't my mother..."

Elena leaned forward.

"The test you took online," she said. "It matched you to a 'Clara Sterling.' But the sample wasn't from the woman in the nursing home."

"Then who was it from?"

"It was from a grave," Elena said. "In Canada."

"Canada?"

"The Sanctuary," Elena said. "The place where Edith sent the baby."

"She sent Leo there," I said.

"No," Elena said. "She sent a girl there. A baby girl who died in 1990."

She tapped the report.

"The DNA match wasn't for a living person, Sarah. It was for a database of unidentified remains. The 'Clara Sterling' in the system wasn't your mother. It was your *sister*."

I felt the room spin.

"My sister?"

"You're not a singleton," Elena said. "You're a twin. But you weren't born to Clara."

She pulled out a final document. An old, faded birth certificate from a hospital in Mexico.

*Date: June 15, 1988.*
*Mother: Maria Elena Rodriguez.*
*Children: Sofia and Lucia.*

"Thorne didn't just have one daughter with the housekeeper," Elena said. "He had two."

I stared at the names. Sofia. Lucia.

"Edith bought you," Elena said. "And she sent Lucia to Canada to die. To get rid of the spare."

"And Leo?" I asked. "Where does he fit in?"

"Leo is Clara's son," Elena said. "That part is true. But he's not your cousin."

"What?"

Elena looked at me with pity in her eyes.

"Sarah," she said. "Leo is your brother."

"That's impossible," I said. "Clara is a Sterling. Maria was..."

"Maria was a surrogate," Elena said. "Clara's eggs. Thorne's sperm. Implanted in the housekeeper."

The world collapsed.

Clara wasn't just my aunt. She was my biological mother.

And Leo... the boy I had raised... the boy dying in the hospital...

He was my brother's son.

My nephew.

"Edith stole us all," I whispered. "She stole an entire generation."

"And now," Elena said, closing the file, "we're going to steal it back."