Chapter 8 - The True Mastermind
The realization that Dr. Yates had kidnapped my children hit me harder than any bullet ever could.
I grabbed Vane by the throat and hauled him up against the concrete wall.
"Where does that ventilation shaft lead?" I roared into his bleeding face.
Vane coughed up blood and looked at me with genuine, unfeigned confusion.
"I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about," Vane choked out.
He swore that Dr. Yates did not work for his syndicate.
I dropped Vane to the floor, my mind racing to connect the horrifying dots.
Prescott had poisoned Clara, Vane had breached the gates, but Yates had orchestrated the final theft.
Yates had been the one administering the daily treatments to my twins for two years.
He was the true mastermind who had been keeping them sick all along.
I grabbed a flashlight from a fallen mercenary and crawled into the dark ventilation shaft.
I dragged my battered body through the narrow metal tunnel, following the faint scuff marks in the dust.
The shaft eventually dropped me into the massive underground parking garage of the estate.
Dr. Yates was desperately trying to load Jonah and Blythe into the back of an armored medical van.
Clara was lying unconscious on the concrete, bleeding heavily from a nasty head wound.
I raised my pistol and aimed it directly at the doctor's back.
"Step away from my children, Franklin," I commanded, my voice echoing loudly across the empty garage.
Yates froze, but he did not raise his hands in surrender.
Instead, he turned around with a maniacal, victorious smile plastered across his face.
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He pulled a small detonator from his white lab coat and held his thumb over the button.
"If you shoot me, the explosive charges I planted under their stretchers will detonate instantly," Yates threatened.
