Chapter 7 - THE CHOICE AT THE EDGE
Celeste’s fingers slipped.
Maren dropped several inches before Celeste caught her again.
The fire below roared through collapsed timber. Smoke climbed into Maren’s face, burning her eyes and throat.
“Help!” Celeste screamed.
Nora appeared through the dust and grabbed Celeste around the waist. Eleanor’s security officer reached for Maren but could not get close enough.
The beam cracked again.
“Maren, swing toward me,” Nora shouted.
“I can’t.”
Her legs hung uselessly beneath her.
Celeste’s face twisted with pain.
“I’m losing her.”
Maren looked up at her sister.
Every memory seemed to exist at once.
Celeste at five, afraid of thunderstorms.
Celeste at twelve, crying after their mother’s funeral.
Celeste at twenty-nine, laughing while Maren suffocated.
“Let go,” Maren said.
Celeste shook her head violently.
“No.”
“You can’t hold me.”
“I’m not letting you die.”
“You already tried.”
Tears cut through the dust on Celeste’s cheeks.
“I know.”
The security officer lowered a strap.
Maren caught it with one hand, but her grip was weak. Nora wrapped the other end around a stone column.
“On three,” Nora said.
They pulled.
Maren rose slowly while Celeste held on.
The beam broke beneath them.
Nora dragged Celeste backward as the officer pulled Maren over the edge.
All four collapsed onto the floor seconds before the remaining section fell into the flames.
Eleanor reached them.
“We have to move.”
They escaped through the rear corridor as the church roof began to collapse.
Outside, medical personnel treated burns, cuts, and smoke inhalation. Anna sat inside an armored vehicle, guarded by two officers.
Celeste stood apart from everyone.
Her palms were bleeding from splinters. Her robe from the previous night had been replaced by borrowed clothes, but she still looked stripped of every protection she once possessed.
Maren rolled toward her.
Celeste did not look up.
“You could have let me fall,” Maren said.
“I almost did.”
The honesty surprised her.
“Why didn’t you?”
Celeste finally met her eyes.
“Because I heard Mom’s voice in my head.”
Eleanor stood several yards away but pretended not to listen.
“What did she say?” Maren asked.
“Something she told us when we were little. That one terrible choice doesn’t have to become the rest of your life.”
Maren remembered.
Their mother had said it after Celeste stole money from a school fundraiser at age nine. She had made Celeste return every dollar and apologize publicly.
“You made more than one terrible choice.”
“I know.”
“You poured peanut oil into my food.”
Celeste began crying silently.
“Reed told me you would sign control of the trust if we frightened you. He said the injector was in his pocket. He promised he would use it.”
“And when he didn’t?”
“I froze.”
“You laughed.”
“It came out wrong.”
Maren’s face hardened.
“There is no right way to laugh while your sister dies.”
Celeste looked toward the burning church.
“I hated you.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t. You were everything I was supposed to become. After Mom disappeared, Dad looked at you like you were the only strong person left. Teachers compared me to you. Friends wanted introductions to you. Men dated me because they wanted access to your world.”
“So you decided to take it.”
“At first, I only wanted something that belonged to me.”
“Reed?”
Celeste closed her eyes.
“He made me feel chosen.”
“He used you.”
“I let him.”
Maren wanted to hate her without complication.
It would have been easier if Celeste had remained cruel, smiling, unrepentant. But the woman standing before her was weak, damaged, and finally aware of the horror she had helped create.
Awareness did not equal forgiveness.
“You will tell the police everything,” Maren said.
Celeste nodded.
“You will confess to poisoning me.”
“Yes.”
“You will identify every account, message, and meeting.”
“Yes.”
“And you will not ask me to protect you.”
Celeste swallowed.
“I won’t.”
Maren turned away.
Behind them, officers loaded Voss into an ambulance under guard. He had survived the gunshot.
Anna asked to speak with Maren.
Inside the armored vehicle, she examined Maren with clear gray eyes.
“You were not supposed to come to the church.”
“You sound like everyone else.”
“Your father said the same thing when he met me. He was terrible at following instructions.”
“What is inside the implant?”
“Records of the original network. But the device stopped functioning years ago.”
“Then why does Adrian want you?”
“Because he believes I copied the information before it failed.”
“Did you?”
Anna smiled faintly.
“Your father taught me never to answer a question when the question itself reveals more.”
Maren leaned back.
“Did Adrian create the Circle?”
“He created its modern form. The network existed before him, but he transformed it into something more disciplined.”
“He has represented my family for thirty years.”
“That was how he controlled Charles.”
“Why didn’t Dad expose him?”
“Because Adrian had leverage.”
“What kind?”
Anna looked toward Eleanor.
“Ask your mother about the night Celeste was born.”
Maren’s skin chilled.
“What happened?”
“That story is hers to tell.”
Eleanor approached the vehicle.
“We need to leave. Drone fragments suggest military-grade equipment.”
“Owned by whom?” Maren asked.
“Shell companies connected to Cross Global Security.”
Adrian’s private investment firm.
The evidence was no longer a warning in a letter. It was a trail.
Maren looked at her mother.
“What happened the night Celeste was born?”
Eleanor stopped.
Anna watched her.
Eleanor closed the vehicle door behind her and sat opposite Maren.
“Celeste was born six weeks early,” she said. “There were complications. The hospital lost power during surgery.”
“A storm?”
“No. Sabotage.”
Maren frowned.
“Why?”
“Adrian wanted your father to sign over Eden Laboratories’ research patents. He threatened to let Celeste die if Charles refused.”
Maren felt sick.
“Did Dad sign?”
“He gave Adrian a copy of the tracking system.”
“And Celeste lived.”
“Yes.”
“So Adrian saved her?”
“No. A nurse restored the emergency generator. Adrian’s people had disabled it, but she discovered what they had done.”
“Who was the nurse?”
Eleanor looked at Anna.
“Her mother.”
Anna’s voice remained calm.
“My mother died three days later in a staged car accident.”
The story connected the families in blood and betrayal.
Maren looked at Celeste through the window.
From the first night of her life, Celeste had been used as leverage by a man who later helped place Reed beside her.
“Did Celeste know any of this?”
“No,” Eleanor said.
“Adrian may have told her enough to gain her trust.”
Anna nodded.
“He often recruits people by showing them a wound, then convincing them he is the only one who understands it.”
A security officer opened the door.
“Ma’am, we intercepted a transmission.”
He handed Eleanor a tablet.
A live video appeared.
Reed sat tied to a chair in a windowless room. Blood covered one side of his face. A digital clock behind him counted down from eleven hours.
Adrian Cross stepped into the frame.
He looked exactly as he had in Maren’s hospital room: composed, fatherly, impeccably dressed.
“Maren,” he said, “I’m disappointed you read Charles’s letter without consulting me.”
Her body went cold.
“You have something I need. I have someone who knows where your sister hid the rest of your money.”
Reed lifted his head weakly.
Adrian continued.
“Bring Anna to the Whitaker Foundation gala tonight. Come with Eleanor and Celeste. No police, no games.”
He smiled.
“And wear something beautiful. The press will be watching.”
The screen went black.
Maren stared at her reflection.
Adrian did not merely want an exchange.
May you like
He wanted them displayed in public.
Whatever he planned, he intended the entire world to see it.
