Chapter 31 - THE PHOTOGRAPH IN THE SAFE
Daniel could not take his eyes off the photograph.
His breathing slowed as memories he had buried for years began surfacing one by one.
"I was eleven," he said quietly. "One afternoon my father caught me inside his private study."
Alex listened without interrupting.
"I wasn't looking for anything important. I was hiding during a game of hide-and-seek while relatives visited the house."
Daniel gave a faint smile that disappeared almost immediately.
"I accidentally opened his safe."
Inside, there had been stacks of confidential documents, old medals, several sealed envelopes...
...and one framed photograph.
"The same woman?"
Daniel nodded.
"My father grabbed it before I could get a good look."
"What did he say?"
"He told me she had died many years earlier."
"Who was she?"
"I asked."
Daniel looked at the picture in Alex's hands.
"He answered only once."
'Some sacrifices must never be remembered.'
Silence settled over the nursery.
Detective Bennett carefully examined the back of the photograph.
"There’s writing."
She tilted it toward the light.
Most of the ink had faded, but one sentence remained readable.
Keep both boys alive until Phase Two.
Alex frowned.
"Both boys?"
Daniel noticed it at the same moment.
"There were two children."
Bennett slowly looked around the abandoned nursery.
"If Orion involved multiple infants..."
"...then Alex may never have been the only child hidden."
Before anyone could continue, a metallic drawer beneath the crib slid open automatically.
Inside rested two hospital identification bracelets.
One read:
ETHAN VALE.
The other...
...had no name.
Only one designation.
SUBJECT B.
Nobody spoke.
Somewhere beyond the nursery, footsteps echoed again.
This time...
May you like
...they were getting closer.
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