Chapter 7 - The Missing Embryo.
By sunrise, Adrian had three legal teams working on three different emergencies.
One team prepared an injunction preventing Harrison from transferring or destroying any reproductive material connected to Khloe.
One team pursued forensic access to Red Canyon's records.
The third traced the cryogenic transport company that had moved the missing embryo.
Mara handled the fourth problem herself.
Bianca Mercer had disappeared.
Her apartment was empty when investigators arrived with authority to preserve electronic devices connected to the courthouse footage.
Her yellow courthouse dress lay across the back of a dining chair.
Her suitcase was gone.
Her passport was gone.
Her phone sat powered off inside a kitchen drawer.
That was the detail Mara disliked most.
People escaping embarrassment took phones with them.
People escaping tracking left them behind.
At 7:12 a.m., Mara called Adrian.
"Bianca is gone."
Adrian was standing outside the NICU watching Khloe through glass as she sat beside Noah.
"Harrison?"
"Still at his house."
"You certain?"
"Car is there, security camera caught him entering at eleven forty last night, and a process server confirmed him at six twenty this morning."
"Could he have arranged transportation for her?"
"Almost certainly."
"Airports?"
"No ticket under her name."
"Private aviation."
"Checking."
Adrian looked through the glass.
Khloe had one hand inside Noah's incubator.
Her mouth moved as she whispered something to him.
"Find her before she leaves the state."
"Working on it."
"And the missing embryo?"
"Transport company finally answered."
"Where did it go?"
"A clinic in Bethesda."
Adrian frowned.
"Maryland?"
"Yes."
"Name?"
"Evergreen Fertility Partners."
"Who's the receiving physician?"
Mara paused.
"Nathan Voss."
Adrian's grip tightened around the phone.
The disgraced therapist whose false statement had been attached to Harrison's emergency custody petition was now connected to a fertility clinic receiving Khloe's missing embryo.
"Voss isn't a reproductive endocrinologist."
"No."
"Then why is he listed?"
"I intend to ask."
Adrian turned from the NICU glass.
"Get a preservation order before anyone moves anything."
"Eli is drafting."
"File in federal court if we need interstate jurisdiction."
"Already thought of that."
Adrian almost smiled.
"That's why I pay you."
"You pay me because your personality drives normal investigators away."
"That too."
The joke lasted less than a second.
Khloe came through the NICU doors in a wheelchair pushed by a nurse.
She looked exhausted.
"What happened?"
Adrian ended the call.
"Bianca left her apartment."
Khloe's eyes narrowed.
"Ran?"
"Looks that way."
"Then Harrison helped her."
"Possibly."
"Stop saying possibly when we both know what he is doing."
Adrian crouched slightly so he was closer to eye level.
"Knowing and proving are different things."
"I married him."
Khloe looked through the glass toward Noah.
"I spent seven years translating his cruelty into excuses because I thought loyalty meant giving him the best interpretation."
She turned back.
"I am done giving him the best interpretation."
Adrian nodded slowly.
"Fair enough."
Khloe's phone, newly replaced after the courthouse incident, buzzed in her lap.
The protective order prohibited Harrison and Bianca from contacting her.
The incoming message came from an unknown number.
Khloe opened it.
A photograph filled the screen.
Bianca stood beside a black SUV at an unfamiliar roadside station.
Her pregnancy was clearly visible beneath a loose gray sweater.
The photograph had been taken from a distance.
Beneath it was one sentence.
ASK YOUR BROTHER WHAT HAPPENS IF SHE CROSSES STATE LINES.
Khloe handed the phone to Adrian.
He read it once.
"Do not respond."
"Who sent it?"
"We'll trace what we can."
"Is she trying to leave?"
"Maybe."
Khloe gave him a look.
"Fine."
Adrian corrected himself.
"Almost certainly."
The nurse waited discreetly several feet away.
Khloe lowered her voice.
"If Bianca gives birth somewhere else, can Harrison keep me from the baby?"
"Not if we establish the embryo was transferred without your consent."
"How long does that take?"
Adrian did not answer quickly enough.
Khloe understood.
"Longer than two weeks."
"Potentially."
"She's thirty-two weeks."
"Yes."
"And I just delivered six weeks early because she pushed me."
Adrian's expression changed.
Khloe saw the same thought arrive in both of them.
Bianca did not need two weeks.
A high-risk pregnancy could become a delivery at any time.
At 9:05 a.m., Judge Bell signed a temporary injunction prohibiting Harrison, Bianca, Red Canyon, Evergreen Fertility Partners, and any intermediary from transferring, destroying, implanting, or modifying reproductive material belonging to Khloe.
At 9:22, the order reached Evergreen.
At 9:31, Evergreen's attorney called Adrian's office.
At 9:34, Adrian took the call.
"Mr. Harrington, we do not possess any embryo belonging to your client."
"Your facility signed for a cryogenic transport container yesterday at 4:17 p.m."
"The container arrived empty."
Adrian went still.
"Explain."
"Our receiving technician documented a broken internal seal."
"Where is the container now?"
"Secured."
"Do not touch it."
"We have no intention of doing so."
"Who delivered it?"
"A driver from Eastline Medical Transport."
"Name?"
"Daniel Reeve."
Mara was already typing as Adrian repeated the name.
The Evergreen attorney continued.
"There is another issue."
"What?"
"Dr. Nathan Voss is not employed here."
"Then why was he the receiving physician?"
"We don't know."
Adrian looked at Mara.
She turned her laptop toward him.
Daniel Reeve had no medical transport license.
He was a private security contractor.
More importantly, he had worked for Harrison Cole's company for four years.
Adrian returned to the call.
"Preserve every camera feed from yesterday."
"We already have."
"Send the affidavit to my office."
He hung up.
Mara's phone rang immediately.
She answered.
Her face became still.
"Where?"
She listened.
"Do not approach her."
She ended the call.
"We found Bianca."
Adrian stood.
"Where?"
"A private airfield outside Frederick."
"Plane?"
"Charter filed for Toronto."
"Departure?"
"Thirty minutes."
Khloe heard the conversation from her wheelchair.
"Can she leave?"
Adrian looked at Mara.
"Assault investigation alone may not stop international travel without a warrant."
"Then get one."
"We need probable cause beyond the shove for flight restrictions."
Khloe's phone buzzed again.
Another photograph appeared.
This one showed a silver cryogenic transport case on the back seat of a black SUV.
The timestamp was from the previous night.
A second message followed.
SHE IS NOT THE ONLY THING LEAVING.
Adrian stared at the image.
The missing embryo had never reached Evergreen.
Someone had intercepted it before delivery.
And now Bianca was standing beside a plane bound for Canada.
The photograph of the cryogenic case changed how Adrian treated the unknown sender.
Until then, he had assumed someone was taunting Khloe.
Now he considered the possibility that the sender was trying to help without exposing themselves.
Mara examined the image metadata.
Most of it had been stripped.
One fragment remained.
The photograph had been taken on a device registered years earlier to Cole Strategic Consulting.
Not Harrison's phone.
Not Bianca's.
A company device.
Mara pulled the inventory list.
The serial number belonged to an old tablet assigned to Harrison's executive assistant, Natalie Grant.
Natalie had resigned three days earlier.
Adrian called her.
The number went straight to voicemail.
Mara searched airline records and found no departure.
Her apartment manager said Natalie had left with two suitcases but had not surrendered the lease.
"Fifth person," Adrian said.
Mara nodded.
"Maybe."
"Or someone using her device."
"Also maybe."
Adrian hated maybes.
Yet the message sender knew the embryo was moving before investigators did.
That meant someone inside Harrison's organization had decided the plan had gone too far.
Adrian sent one text back to the anonymous number.
KHLOE AND BOTH BABIES WILL BE PROTECTED IF YOU TELL THE TRUTH.
No response came.
Five minutes later, however, Mara received an encrypted email containing a floor plan of Harrison's office.
One room was circled in red.
ARCHIVE NODE B.
May you like
The sender had not disappeared.
They were guiding Adrian toward the place Harrison feared most.
