Chapter 3 : The Bloodline Trap.

POV: Alexander

"Repeat that," I said. My voice was so quiet the chief medical officer on the other end of the line stopped breathing for a second.

"The name on the emergency medical manifest is yours, Chairman," Dr. Harrison stammered. "Alexander Vance. She coded the entire shipment under your private insurance registry from before the divorce. If anyone looks at the federal shipping logs, it looks like you are the one receiving terminal gene therapy for bone marrow failure."

"Why would she use my name?" I demanded, walking out of the boardroom and slamming the heavy oak door behind me. I pushed past my assistants, my shoes clicking like gunshots against the marble. "Is she trying to fraud the company?"

"No, sir. I think she is hiding the true identity of the patient from the global medical registry. If the board finds out a child with Vance DNA has a terminal genetic defect, the company stock drops thirty percent by morning. She is using your name as a shield."

The phone felt heavy in my hand. I ended the call without another word and threw myself into the private elevator.

She wasn't trying to steal from me. She was protecting the empire from a market crash while trying to save our boy. And she had done it completely alone in a foreign country for five years.

By the time the elevator hit the underground parking garage, my phone buzzed again. This time it was an unlisted text message. A photo.

I opened it and my blood turned to absolute ice.

It was a picture of Leo. He was sitting in the back of a black Mercedes sedan, his little round glasses sliding down his nose as he slept. But there was a man sitting next to him in the dark. A man wearing a tailored gray suit, his face partially shadowed, holding a small silver vial right next to Leo's arm.

The text below read: The boy has excellent bone marrow markers, Alexander. A shame his mother thinks Vance Medical is the only option. Tell her to cancel the merger, or the child doesn't wake up from his nap.

"Mark!" I roared, throwing the car door open. My head of security rushed over, his face pale. "Trace this number right now! Someone has my son. They are in a black Mercedes near the airport sector!"

"Sir, we are already tracking Dr. Lin's car," Mark said, his fingers flying across his security tablet. "She just changed her route. She isn't heading to her hotel. She is driving directly into the industrial shipping district near the old docks."

"She received the same photo," I growled, stepping on the gas before Mark could even get into the passenger seat. The tires screamed against the concrete as I tore out of the garage. "She thinks she can handle this alone. She is going to get herself killed."

---

POV: Elena

The steering wheel felt wet under my palms. I was sweating through my emerald blazer, my eyes wide as I stared at the dark, rusted warehouse at the end of Pier 4.

My phone was propped against the dashboard, the speakerphone blaring with a distorted, disguised voice.

"Park by the crane, Dr. Lin," the voice static scratched against my ears. "Come inside alone. If I see a single Vance security uniform within two blocks, the boy gets the air bubble in his line."

"I am alone!" I screamed, slamming the car into park. I grabbed my leather bag, my hands shaking so badly I dropped my car keys on the floor mat. "Don't touch him. He needs his temperature regulated. If his fever spikes, his blood will clot!"

"Ten minutes, Doctor. Clock is ticking." The line went dead.

I threw the door open, the freezing Capital rain hitting my face instantly. I didn't care about the mud ruining my expensive shoes. I ran toward the small metal side door of the warehouse, my chest burning with a terror I hadn't felt since the night I left Alexander.

I pushed the door open. The inside was massive, dark, and smelled of rotting wood and diesel fuel. A single yellow spotlight was turned on in the center of the room.

Under the light sat a metal chair. And sitting in that chair, tied with heavy nylon ropes, was Vivian.

Her white designer dress was torn at the shoulder, her perfect hair damp and messy. She was sobbing, a piece of black duct tape hanging off her lower lip.

"Vivian?" I stopped, blinking through the darkness. "Where is Leo? Where is my son?"

"Elena!" Vivian shrieked, her voice echoing off the high steel rafters. "Thank god! You have to help me! They took him, they took the boy into the back rooms, but they tied me up here. They said they were going to kill us both to ruin Alex!"

"Who took him?" I ran toward her, my eyes scanning the dark corners of the warehouse. "Vivian, look at me! Who has my baby?"

"I don't know!" she wailed, her eyes wild with a strange, frantic energy. "A man in a gray suit. He said you brought a virus into the city. He said your son's blood is worth billions on the black market."

I reached into my bag, pulling out a small medical scalpel I always carried for laboratory samples. I leaned down, quickly cutting through the ropes around Vivian's wrists. "Get up. We need to find the back exit. Where did they take him?"

The moment the ropes fell away, Vivian didn't stand up. Instead, her hand flew out, her fingers wrapping tightly around my forearm. Her grip wasn't weak from fear. It was incredibly strong.

Before I could pull away, I felt a sharp, burning sting in the side of my neck.

I gasped, dropping the scalpel. I reached up, my fingers brushing against the plastic casing of a small, empty syringe sticking out of my skin.

Vivian stood up slowly, smoothing down her torn white dress. The terrified sob vanished from her face, replaced by a cold, twisted smile that made her look like a completely different person.

"You always were too soft, Elena," Vivian said, stepping over the fallen ropes. "You cooked his meals, you cleaned his house, and you actually thought he loved you. And then you come back five years later with a bastard child to steal my company?"

"You..." My knees buckled. A heavy, chemical grayness started to spread from the back of my brain, blurring my vision. "You sent the photo. You have Leo."

"Of course I have him," Vivian whispered, leaning down until her breath hit my ear. "He is currently in a very safe, very cold freezer box in the next room. His blood is perfect for the new medical tech line I am selling to the Swiss cartel. Alexander will think the European buyers kidnapped him, and you will be dead from an unfortunate overdose in this dirty warehouse."

I reached for her throat, but my arms felt like lead. I collapsed onto the cold concrete floor, my cheek pressing against the dirty water.

"Vivian!" a dark, roaring voice echoed from the main entrance.

The heavy metal doors were ripped open, and the headlights of an obsidian SUV cut through the darkness, blinding us both.

---

POV: Alexander

I didn't wait for the car to stop completely. I jumped out into the wet warehouse air, my gun drawn, my eyes instantly locking onto Elena's limp body on the floor.

Vivian froze, her hands flying up to her face as she instantly fell back onto her knees, her face twisting back into a mask of pure terror. "Alex! Oh my god, Alex, help me! She's crazy! Elena brought the kidnappers here! She tried to kill me with a knife!"

I didn't look at Vivian. I threw my gun into my waistband and dropped to the floor next to Elena, pulling her upper body into my lap. Her skin was freezing, her eyes half-closed and rolling back into her head.

"Elena, look at me," I growled, my hand cupping her face, my thumb digging into her jaw to keep her conscious. "Elena! Stay with me! What did she give you?"

"Leo..." Elena whispered, her small fingers weakly clutching the lapel of my gray suit. She wasn't fighting me anymore. She was holding onto me like I was her last anchor. "Alex... the back room... the freezer... save our baby..."

Her head fell back against my arm, her body going completely limp.

A cold, murderous rage flooded my chest, higher and darker than anything I had ever felt in my life. I looked up at Vivian, who was still trembling on the floor, trying to crawl toward my shoes.

"Alex, sweetheart, she's lying," Vivian sobbed, reaching out to touch my trousers. "She's trying to trap you again. She used that baby to get your money five years ago, and now she—"

"Touch me, Vivian, and I will forget your father ever existed," I said. My voice was completely devoid of human emotion.

Mark and four security guards burst through the door, their weapons drawn.

"Secure her," I ordered, lifting Elena into my arms. Her weight felt like nothing, her head resting against my collarbone. "If she moves a single inch, break her legs. Mark, get the medical team into the back storage rooms. Now! Find my son!"

I carried Elena toward the back corridor, my heart stopping with every second that passed. The warehouse was freezing, the air smelling of ice and industrial refrigeration. Mark kicked open a heavy steel door marked Storage 3.

Inside, sitting on top of a silver medical crate, was Leo.

He wasn't tied up. He was shivering violently, his little hands tucked into his navy coat, his face completely blue from the cold. A heavy padlock was securing the main electrical line of a large commercial cooling unit next to him.

"Mom?" Leo whimpered, his teeth chattering as his dark eyes landed on me. He saw Elena unconscious in my arms and his little face cracked, tears instantly freezing on his pale cheeks. "Mom!"

"I have her, Leo," I said, my voice cracking as I stepped into the room. I couldn't hold them both. I dropped to one knee, keeping Elena balanced against my chest, and reached out my left arm. "Come here. Get into my coat."

Leo hesitated for a split second, looking at my face, then scrambled off the crate and threw his little shivering body against my shoulder. I wrapped my heavy wool coat around him, trapping both my ex-wife and my son against my chest, my own body heat the only thing keeping them alive.

"Mark, get the car heater on max," I shouted over my shoulder. "We are going to the Premium Vault wing. Call Dr. Harrison. Tell him the Vance heir is coming in."

---

POV: Elena

The smell of lavender and expensive leather woke me up.

My eyes snapped open, my vision clear but my throat feeling like it was coated in sand. I wasn't in the warehouse. I was lying on a massive, circular bed with silk sheets, a soft golden light illuminating a bedroom that looked larger than my entire European apartment.

I bolted upright, a sudden panic making my chest heave. "Leo!"

"He is safe, Elena."

Alexander's voice came from the dark corner of the room. He was sitting in a leather armchair, his suit jacket gone, his white shirt unbuttoned at the collar and stained with dirt and dry blood. He had a glass of amber liquid in his hand, but he wasn't drinking it. He was just staring at me.

"Where is he?" I demanded, throwing the heavy duvet off my legs. I realized someone had changed me out of my wet emerald blazer into a soft, oversized gray t-shirt that smelled exactly like him. "Where is my son, Alexander? If you locked him in a lab, I swear to god—"

"He is in the adjoining room, sleeping under a thermal blanket," Alexander said, his voice flat and exhausted. He stood up, walking over to the side of the bed. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, metallic silver keycard, dropping it onto the mattress between my knees.

I looked down. It was the master encryption key to the Premium Medical Vault.

"You have your access," he said, his obsidian eyes locking onto mine with an intensity that made my breath catch. "Dr. Harrison already ran his blood work while you were out. I know about the Hypoplastic Anemia, Elena. I know what he needs to survive."

"Then let us leave," I whispered, reaching for the keycard. "We have the merger contract. I will take the data and we will go back to Europe."

"You aren't going anywhere," Alexander said, his large hand coming down over mine, pinning my fingers against the mattress. His skin was burning hot against my cold hand, his gaze dropping to my lips before rising back to my eyes. "Vivian is in a federal holding cell. The board thinks she went on an emergency vacation. But there is a bigger problem."

"What problem?"

Alexander reached into his back pocket, pulling out a printout of Leo's DNA sequencing sheet from our laboratory computer.

"Dr. Harrison ran the cross-match with my profile, just like I ordered," Alexander said, his voice dropping into a hollow, terrifying register. "The markers match yours, Elena. One hundred percent. He is your biological child."

"I told you he was mine!" I snapped, trying to pull my hand back.

"But he doesn't match me," Alexander whispered, his face coming down until it was inches from mine, his eyes wild with a sudden, devastating twist. "The paternal markers don't match the Vance line, Elena. He isn't my son. According to the database... Leo's biological father is my late grandfather, Nathaniel Vance."