Chapter 5 - Subject Seventeen
Sabrina had spent her life believing her childhood medical history was
ordinary. The document in the storage locker turned that belief into
another carefully constructed lie.
She called Dr. Shaw, who agreed to review the records.
“These codes are old research identifiers,” Dr. Shaw said. “But nothing
here proves an illegal trial.”
“What does long-term follow-up mean?”
“It means someone expected to monitor you.”
“For thirty-six years?”
Dr. Shaw looked uneasy. “Possibly.”
Sabrina remembered annual blood tests Richard had insisted on throughout
her childhood. He had called them executive health screenings.
She confronted him that night.
Richard did not deny it.
“You were born prematurely,” he said. “There was an experimental
treatment.”
“Experimental how?”
“It was supposed to help infants with severe respiratory failure.”
“Was Mom told?”
“Yes.”
“Was she told my records would be sold?”
Richard looked away.
Sabrina’s anger sharpened. “That’s why Northstar started.”
“No. Northstar came later. Vale realized old trial participants could be
followed through insurance data.”
“And you let him.”
“I stopped him when I learned.”
“You keep saying you stopped things that somehow never stopped.”
Richard flinched.
Justin found that Subject 17 appeared in encrypted Northstar
spreadsheets beside payments to Kenneth’s shell companies.
Kenneth had not only known Sabrina’s family before meeting her. He had
known her medical identity.
At a temporary board hearing, Sabrina presented enough evidence to
freeze Kenneth’s voting authority. Grant attacked her credibility.
“Mrs. Rollins has admitted marital conflict and has engaged in
increasingly erratic conduct.”
Sabrina’s attorney, Naomi Price, leaned toward her. “He’s baiting you.”
Sabrina kept her voice calm. “Then let’s discuss documents instead of my
marriage.”
The board ordered an independent forensic audit.
Outside, Grant approached her.
“You’re very much like Elaine.”
“You knew she was alive.”
“I knew she was frightened.”
“Where is she?”
“Ask Kenneth.”
“You’re his attorney.”
Grant smiled. “I have represented many people.”
Naomi stepped between them.
That evening, Sabrina received security footage from the Evergreen
cabin. The men who had searched it arrived in a vehicle registered to a
company owned by Maya’s father.
Sabrina drove straight to Justin.
He stared at the registration.
“Maya’s dad has been retired for ten years.”
“Apparently not.”
Maya agreed to meet at a diner.
When Sabrina showed her the vehicle record, Maya turned pale.
“My father introduced me to Kenneth.”
Justin’s voice became dangerously quiet. “What?”
“Not like that. He told me Kenneth could help with an investment
problem.”
“When?”
“Two years ago.”
The affair had begun eight months later.
Maya admitted her father, Victor Hale, had pressured her to obtain
information about Justin’s inherited shares.
“You spied on me?” Justin asked.
“I thought Dad was trying to protect our finances.”
“You copied my documents.”
Maya nodded, crying.
Sabrina suddenly understood. “Kenneth didn’t seduce you because he
wanted you. He wanted access to Justin.”
Maya covered her mouth.
Justin stood and walked outside.
Later, Sabrina received a call from an unknown number.
Elaine.
“I have five minutes.”
“Where are you?”
“Safe for now.”
“Why am I Subject Seventeen?”
Elaine explained that Sabrina had received an experimental neonatal
therapy funded by a predecessor company connected to Vale’s family. Most
children survived. Some later developed unusual reproductive
complications.
Sabrina’s breath caught.
“My pregnancy.”
“I don’t know.”
“Did Kenneth sterilize me because he was afraid I’d discover the trial?”
Elaine began crying.
“That is what I think.”
Sabrina’s rage became almost unbearable.
“Come home.”
“I can’t until I know who is still inside Northstar.”
“Dad?”
“No.”
“Kenneth?”
“Partly.”
“Grant?”
A pause.
“Grant is the gatekeeper.”
“Then who is above him?”
Elaine whispered, “Someone on your board.”
The call ended.
The next morning, the forensic auditor assigned to Northstar was found
unconscious in his car.
He survived.
Before being taken into surgery, he managed to send Sabrina one
photograph.
It showed a page from the company ledger.
At the top was a handwritten authorization:
R. ROLLINS.
But Sabrina knew her father’s signature.
This one was not Richard’s.
The initial belonged to another Rollins.
Her aunt Rebecca, Richard’s estranged sister, had supposedly left the
company twenty years ago.
Sabrina had not seen her since childhood.
According to corporate records, Rebecca Rollins had died in 2012.
Sabrina stared at the screen.
Apparently, dead women were becoming a family tradition.
As the events surrounding subject seventeen unfolded, Sabrina kept
returning to one rule: nobody would make the next decision in her name.
At night, Sabrina sometimes remembered the woman she had been before
Kenneth: decisive, ambitious, impatient with anyone who confused
confidence with cruelty. Marriage had not erased that woman. It had
trained her to whisper. Each new truth brought the old voice back, not
louder for the sake of drama, but clearer. She no longer needed to win
every room. She needed to remain herself when the room turned against
her.
As the events surrounding subject seventeen unfolded, Sabrina kept
returning to one rule: nobody would make the next decision in her name.
The silence after each revelation had become familiar to Sabrina, but
familiarity did not make it easier. She had learned to distinguish shock
from fear: shock froze her, while fear tried to make decisions for her.
Now she refused to let either one speak first. She wrote down names,
dates, contradictions, and every question nobody wanted answered. That
habit had once made her an exceptional CFO. Now it was helping her
survive her own family.
As the events surrounding subject seventeen unfolded, Sabrina kept
returning to one rule: nobody would make the next decision in her name.
Justin had a different way of processing disaster. He paced, argued,
made coffee he forgot to drink, then returned to the same question from
a new angle. Their disagreements became sharper as the stakes rose, but
Sabrina trusted the fact that he challenged her. Too many people in her
life had called obedience love. Justin, even furious, still allowed her
to say no.
As the events surrounding subject seventeen unfolded, Sabrina kept
returning to one rule: nobody would make the next decision in her name.
Denver continued around them with insulting normality. Traffic crawled
along wet streets, restaurants filled for dinner, and strangers
complained about weather while Sabrina’s world kept rearranging itself.
She began to understand why secrets survived so easily. Catastrophe
rarely announced itself to everyone. Most of the time, it happened in
one room while the rest of the city ordered dessert.
As the events surrounding subject seventeen unfolded, Sabrina kept
returning to one rule: nobody would make the next decision in her name.
Naomi repeatedly reminded Sabrina to separate what she could prove from
what she believed. “Suspicion is a direction, not a destination,” she
said. Sabrina wrote the sentence in the margin of her notebook. She had
May you like
spent years accepting other people’s conclusions. Now she wanted
evidence, even when the evidence embarrassed her.
