CHAPTER 18 THE THIRD CHILD
They took shelter inside a closed roadside clinic while Nathan arranged transportation to the coast.
Claire sat on an examination table.
A doctor had warned her that she was risking severe complications by leaving the hospital.
She had listened without changing her mind.
Evelyn sat across from her.
For several minutes, neither woman spoke.
Then Claire pulled the collar of her hospital gown aside.
A pale crescent-shaped birthmark rested beneath her left shoulder.
Evelyn stopped breathing.
Gabriel noticed.
“What is it?”
Evelyn covered her mouth.
Claire stared at her.
“You’ve seen this before.”
Evelyn began to shake.
“When Gabriel was born, he had a mark behind his right knee.”
Gabriel looked confused.
“What does that have to do with Claire?”
“The little girl had one beneath her shoulder.”
Claire’s hand tightened around the fabric.
“What little girl?”
Evelyn looked toward the rain-covered window.
“Thirty-eight years ago, I was taken to St. Orla after I went into labor.”
“You said you had two sons,” Gabriel said.
“I had three children.”
The room went silent.
“Two boys,” Evelyn continued. “And one girl.”
Gabriel stared at Claire.
Evelyn’s voice broke.
“They allowed me to see them for less than one minute. One boy had dark hair. The other barely moved. The little girl cried louder than both of them.”
Claire climbed down from the examination table.
“What happened to her?”
“They told me she died.”
“And Gideon?”
“They told me he died too.”
Gabriel stepped away from his mother.
“You kept me.”
“No. They returned you to me after six weeks. By then, you had a scar on your shoulder and a different hospital bracelet.”
Vanessa looked at the scar Gabriel had shown her.
“You were selected to go back.”
“Selected by whom?” he demanded.
“Cole.”
Nathan remained beside the door.
His face had become unreadable.
Claire approached Evelyn.
“My original birth certificate listed St. Orla. My adoptive parents said it was an administrative error.”
“It wasn’t.”
“You think I’m your daughter.”
Evelyn looked directly into her eyes.
“I think Cole took two of my children and built new lives around them.”
Claire shook her head.
“No.”
“Claire—”
“No. My parents loved me.”
“That does not mean they knew where you came from.”
Nathan moved toward Claire, but she lifted a hand.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
Gabriel opened the leather file they had taken from the hospital.
Inside were scanned records from St. Orla.
Most names had been erased.
One page contained three infant identification numbers.
S-01. Male. Released.
S-02. Male. Retained.
S-03. Female. Transferred.
Beside the third entry was a small photograph of a newborn girl.
A crescent-shaped mark was visible beneath her left shoulder.
Claire turned away.
Nathan read the line beneath the image.
“Transfer family approved by Margaret Whitmore.”
Claire slowly faced him.
“Your mother chose my family?”
“I didn’t know.”
“She put me in your path.”
“I didn’t know.”
Gabriel continued reading.
Another document had been clipped behind the first.
It was a trust summary.
The Shaw family assets had not disappeared after Evelyn’s parents died.
They had been hidden under a private succession agreement.
Control would pass to the youngest verified female descendant of Evelyn Shaw.
Gabriel looked toward Claire.
“That was you.”
Nathan stared at the bracelet.
“Until our daughter was born.”
Claire pressed both hands against the examination table.
They had not taken the baby merely to punish Nathan.
They had taken her because she had inherited something.
Something Cole and Margaret had spent thirty-eight years trying to control.
Vanessa searched through the final pages.
A recent photograph slipped onto the floor.
Nathan picked it up.
Margaret stood outside a church.
In her arms was an infant wrapped in a white blanket.
On the back, someone had written:
CLAIRE SHAW — PLACEMENT COMPLETE.
Below it was a second message.
May you like
NEXT CONTACT: NATHAN WHITMORE.
The date was twenty-four years before Claire and Nathan had supposedly met by chance.
