Chapter 19 - REBECCA TELLS THE LAST TRUTH
Rebecca Stanton requested another interview.
Alexander almost refused.
Then prosecutors said she had asked specifically to correct earlier testimony.
He went.
Rebecca looked different without the cream blouse and carefully arranged nanny persona.
No warmth.
No authority.
Just a tired woman in detention clothes.
Alexander sat.
“What did you lie about?”
“Who designed Henry’s protocol.”
“You said Eleanor.”
“She administered it.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Rebecca looked down.
“Victor designed the selection model.”
Alexander said nothing.
Rebecca explained that Eleanor specialized in memory intervention.
Lucas specialized in succession assessment.
Victor created the broader theory.
He believed human leadership could be improved across generations by quietly shaping environments.
Not mind control.
He considered that crude.
Instead:
Select.
Observe.
Influence.
Stress.
Reward.
Remove memories that destabilized desired attachment when necessary.
Then measure which subjects still developed independent judgment.
Alexander felt disgust.
“He wanted resistance.”
“Yes.”
“Then why drug Henry?”
“To see what survived.”
Alexander’s hands tightened.
Rebecca’s voice shook for the first time.
“Henry kept choosing you.”
Even after Rebecca told him his father preferred work.
Even after she separated him.
Even after medication.
Even after carefully designed questions.
Dad.
Who protects you?
Dad.
Who stays?
Rebecca.
Who should you trust?
Dad.
Victor became interested.
“He said Henry was the first child since Lucas who understood the manipulation while it was happening.”
Alexander remembered Lucas’s words.
Henry learned to pretend he forgot.
“What was Victor going to do with him?”
Rebecca looked sick.
“Eventually?”
“Yes.”
“Take him.”
Alexander stood.
The guard moved.
Rebecca raised both hands.
“Not now. Years later.”
That did not help.
Victor intended Henry to grow normally for a period.
Then an engineered crisis would separate him from Alexander.
Loss.
Scandal.
Death if necessary.
Meridian would appear afterward as structure and purpose.
Exactly what it had done with Lucas.
Alexander’s voice turned quiet.
“Was Julia’s death an engineered crisis for me?”
Rebecca hesitated.
“Yes.”
The room went still.
“Eleanor killed her.”
“Eleanor executed it.”
“Who ordered it?”
Rebecca started crying.
Not loudly.
Alexander felt no sympathy.
“Who?”
“Victor.”
There.
The final responsibility.
Eleanor had remotely interfered with Julia’s vehicle through the diagnostic system Nathan installed.
Lucas had tried to stop it.
Nathan deleted evidence afterward to protect himself.
But Victor had authorized Julia’s death because her investigation threatened what he called generational continuity.
“Why leave me alive?”
Rebecca looked at him.
“Because Julia’s death changed you in useful ways.”
Alexander nearly crossed the table.
Security stepped forward.
He stopped himself.
Victor had watched him grieve his wife.
Called him.
Comforted him.
Mentored him afterward.
All while studying what the loss did.
Rebecca continued.
“Eleanor wanted to eliminate Henry once Julia hid the key.”
Alexander’s vision narrowed.
“Victor refused.”
“Why?”
“He said a child who could unlock Julia’s system was too valuable to waste.”
Alexander walked out before he did something irreversible.
In the corridor, Sarah waited.
One look at him told her enough.
“Victor?”
Alexander nodded.
She closed her eyes.
Then Alexander said:
“We don’t chase him.”
Sarah looked surprised.
“He expects rage.”
“Yes.”
“What do we do?”
Alexander looked through the window toward the federal team.
“We take away the thing he believes makes him untouchable.”
Not money.
Not reputation.
May you like
Not even Meridian.
Secrecy.
