Chapter 8 - The Father's Sins
The drive from the police precinct to the Blackwood Estate took exactly forty-five minutes. For Daniel, it felt like a lifetime.
The estate was a sprawling, Gothic-style mansion located on a secluded peninsula on the outskirts of the city. Since his father's sudden death five years ago, the house had been abandoned. Daniel had refused to live there, preferring the modern penthouse in the city center, away from the suffocating memories of his demanding, cold-hearted father.
Now, he was returning to the belly of the beast.
He parked his heavily damaged SUV on the cracked cobblestone driveway. The storm had passed, leaving behind a thick, eerie fog that rolled off the dark waters of the bay, wrapping the mansion in a ghostly shroud.
Daniel stepped out of the car, gripping a heavy Maglite flashlight in his uninjured right hand. He walked up the marble steps, unlocking the massive oak front doors with a key he hadn't used in half a decade.
The air inside was stale, smelling of dust, old wood, and secrets. Furniture was draped in white sheets like ghosts waiting in the dark.
He didn't bother turning on the main lights. He knew exactly where he needed to go.
He walked through the grand foyer, his boots echoing loudly on the marble floor, and headed straight for his father’s private study in the west wing.
The study was exactly as Arthur Blackwood had left it. A massive mahogany desk, walls lined with leather-bound books, and an imposing oil portrait of Arthur staring down with judgmental eyes.
Daniel approached the grand fireplace. According to the notes hastily scribbled on the back of the Project Genesis file, there was a secondary, hidden location on the property.
He reached under the heavy stone mantle, feeling for a hidden latch. His fingers brushed against a cold piece of metal. He pressed it.
With a deep, mechanical groan, the entire back wall of the fireplace—a solid slab of iron—slid sideways, revealing a dark, narrow stone staircase leading deep underground.
Daniel clicked on his flashlight. The beam cut through the absolute darkness, illuminating steps covered in thick dust. No one had been down here in years.
He descended slowly, careful not to jar his injured shoulder. The air grew colder, taking on a sterile, chemical scent that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
At the bottom of the stairs, he faced a heavy steel door, resembling a bank vault. It had an electronic keypad.
Daniel pulled the Genesis file from his coat pocket. He looked at the serial number assigned to the embryo: V-089.
He punched in the numbers: 0-8-9.
The keypad beeped green. The heavy steel door popped open with a hiss of pressurized air.
Daniel stepped inside.
He had expected a dusty basement filled with old tax records. Instead, he found a nightmare.
The room was massive, brightly lit by automatic fluorescent lights that hummed to life as he entered. It was a fully equipped, state-of-the-art medical laboratory. Rows of stainless steel tables, empty glass incubation tubes, and high-tech computer servers lined the walls.
In the center of the room was a large glass display case. Inside it wasn't a piece of art, but a series of hard drives and physical medical files.
Daniel walked over to the desk beside the display. He opened the first drawer. It was filled with photographs.
He picked them up. They were surveillance photos.
There were hundreds of them. Photos of Valeria as a child, playing in a park. Photos of Valeria in high school. Photos of her at university. Every single milestone of her life had been documented, categorized, and filed away by his father’s organization.
"My god..." Daniel whispered, dropping the photos onto the desk.
She had never had a choice. Her entire existence was a cage built by a billionaire.
He opened the next file folder on the desk. It was labeled: The Vanguard - Delivery Protocols.
He began to read. Veronica hadn't lied. The contract was terrifyingly clear. Upon the birth of the third-generation heir, the child was to be surrendered immediately to Vanguard operatives for "advanced genetic harvesting and proprietary ownership."
If Arthur Blackwood or his descendants resisted, The Vanguard was authorized to execute all parties involved.
Daniel felt a white-hot rage building in his chest. His father had sold his unborn grandchild to a black-market cartel just to cure a genetic flaw in his bloodline.
Suddenly, the silence of the underground lab was shattered by a sound so unexpected it made Daniel jump.
Ring. Ring.
It was an old, red rotary telephone sitting in the far corner of the desk.
Daniel stared at it. The mansion had been disconnected from the city’s telecom grid for five years. This phone had to be on a secure, independent line.
Ring. Ring.
Someone knew he was here.
Daniel slowly reached out, his hand trembling slightly. He picked up the heavy red receiver and brought it to his ear.
"Hello?" Daniel said, his voice cold and steady.
For a moment, there was only the sound of static. Then, a man’s voice, smooth, aristocratic, and utterly terrifying, spoke through the receiver.
"You shouldn't have opened that door, Daniel."
"Who is this?" Daniel demanded.
"We are the architects of your future," the voice replied calmly. "And we see that the storm didn't claim our investment tonight. A pity. It would have saved us a trip."
"If you come anywhere near my wife or my child, I will kill every last one of you," Daniel swore.
The man on the phone chuckled softly.
"You can't kill a shadow, Mr. Blackwood. Enjoy your reunion with your wife. We will be coming to collect the baby very, very soon."
Click.
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The line went dead.
Daniel stood in the underground lab, holding the disconnected phone. The hunt had officially begun. And the enemies were no longer just greedy family members. They were monsters lurking in the dark, and they were coming for his family.
