Chapter 7 - THE DEAD PATRIARCH
Thomas Bennett smiled like he had arrived for dinner.
“Look at this.”
His eyes moved across the room.
“My whole family together again.”
David whispered, “You were supposed to be in Zurich.”
Thomas laughed.
“And you were supposed to control your wife.”
Margaret raised her gun.
“Take one more step.”
Thomas barely looked at her.
“You always were emotional.”
“No,” Margaret said. “I’m just old enough to stop pretending monsters deserve manners.”
Noah stood beside his mother.
“So you started the medical program.”
Thomas looked at him.
“Started?”
He smiled.
“I built it.”
Noah felt sick.
“Why?”
“Because medicine costs money. Discovery costs lives.”
“They weren’t volunteers.”
“They were people no one would miss.”
Evelyn tried to sit up.
“You mean poor people.”
Thomas shrugged.
“Society makes those choices every day.”
Lily stared at him.
“You’re evil.”
The room went silent.
Thomas chuckled.
“Children are refreshingly direct.”
David stepped forward.
“Enough.”
Thomas’s smile faded.
“You don’t give orders here.”
“This is over.”
Thomas looked at his son.
“You said that fifteen years ago.”
David froze.
Noah caught it.
Fifteen years.
The year Noah was born.
“What happened fifteen years ago?”
Nobody answered.
Noah looked at his mother.
She knew.
“Mom.”
Evelyn’s eyes filled with pain.
“Your father tried to expose Thomas once.”
Noah stared at David.
“What?”
“He gathered evidence,” Evelyn said. “He went to federal investigators.”
David looked away.
Thomas laughed.
“And then he discovered the cost of courage.”
Margaret’s voice was sharp.
“What did you do?”
Thomas turned to Noah.
“I showed your father the video.”
“What video?”
David suddenly shouted, “Stop!”
Thomas smiled.
“The video of infant Noah Bennett in a hospital crib.”
Noah’s skin went cold.
Thomas continued.
“And I explained that babies are terribly fragile.”
Lily grabbed Noah’s arm.
David looked destroyed.
“He threatened you?” Noah asked.
David nodded once.
“I backed down.”
Thomas corrected him.
“You joined me.”
David’s face twisted.
“I protected my son.”
“You protected yourself.”
Noah didn’t know what to believe.
Evelyn reached for his hand.
“Your father was trapped at first.”
“At first?”
She nodded.
“Then the money came.”
David closed his eyes.
Noah understood.
Fear became cooperation.
Cooperation became profit.
Thomas stepped closer.
“And now we will do what families always do.”
“What’s that?” Noah asked.
“Survive.”
A security alarm sounded.
Thomas looked annoyed.
One of his men spoke into an earpiece.
“Sir, federal agents are at the south gate.”
Thomas turned slowly toward Margaret.
“You called them.”
Margaret smiled.
“No.”
Evelyn did.
Everyone looked at her.
Evelyn reached beneath the mattress and pulled out a tiny transmitter.
“I’ve been transmitting audio for twenty-three minutes.”
For the first time, Thomas Bennett stopped smiling.
May you like
Then the lights died.
And automatic locks slammed shut around them.
