Chapter 3 - THE NIGHT SLOAN DISAPPEARED TWICE
Griffin’s private security locked down the hospital floor within twelve minutes.
Sloan hated it.
Men in dark suits at the elevators.
Visitor names checked twice.
The twins moved to a room without exterior windows.
And Griffin Drake stood in the center of it all issuing orders like fear had turned him into something colder.
“Pull every camera from the west entrance.”
His security chief, Cameron Vale, nodded.
“Already doing it.”
“Parking garage?”
“Covered.”
“Staff entrances?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone who photographed the girls gets identified.”
Sloan watched from her hospital bed.
“This is exactly what I was trying to avoid.”
Griffin turned.
“No.”
His voice was flat.
“This is what you spent eight years pretending you could avoid.”
Hazel and Iris were with a child-life specialist down the hall.
That was the only reason Sloan answered honestly.
“I was keeping them invisible.”
“You were keeping them fatherless.”
The words hit.
He regretted them instantly.
Sloan looked away.
“I deserved that.”
“No.”
He rubbed his forehead.
“Damn it.”
For all the rage in him, Griffin did not want to hurt her.
That almost made it worse.
“I don’t understand the timeline,” he said.
“You left me ten years ago.”
“Yes.”
“Then Portland.”
“Nine years ago.”
“Why were you there?”
“For work.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“Because I had spent a year convincing myself leaving you was necessary.”
“Necessary because of Richard?”
“No.”
That surprised him.
“Then why?”
Sloan exhaled.
“Your mother.”
Griffin stared.
“My mother died eleven years ago.”
“I know.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“Three months before she died, she came to see me.”
Griffin stopped moving.
Eleanor Drake had been elegant, intimidating and fiercely protective of her son.
Sloan had always believed Eleanor disliked her.
Griffin had insisted she was imagining it.
Apparently not.
“She offered me money.”
His jaw tightened.
“How much?”
“Five hundred thousand.”
“For what?”
“To leave.”
Griffin laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
“I refused.”
“Then why did you go?”
“Because she didn’t only bring money.”
Sloan looked down.
“She brought your father’s autopsy.”
“My father drowned.”
“That’s what everyone was told.”
Griffin stared.
His father, Malcolm Drake, had died in a boating accident when Griffin was twenty-three.
“She said Richard caused it.”
For several seconds, Griffin seemed unable to process the sentence.
“My mother told you my uncle killed my father?”
“She believed he did.”
“Why would she tell you and not me?”
“She said because you would confront him.”
“She was right.”
“And Richard controlled half the family company. He knew your weaknesses.”
Griffin’s expression changed.
“You.”
“Yes.”
Sloan continued.
“Your mother believed Richard would use me against you. She wanted me gone before you began building Drake Labs.”
Griffin paced toward the windowless wall.
“And you listened.”
“Not immediately.”
She remembered those months too clearly.
Eleanor dying.
Griffin grieving.
Richard publicly supporting his nephew.
Sloan receiving anonymous calls.
Her apartment entered twice without anything being stolen.
Then someone mailed her a photograph of Griffin sleeping.
Taken through his bedroom window.
“I got scared.”
“You could have told me.”
“I was twenty-four.”
“So was I.”
“I know.”
“You decided I couldn’t handle the truth.”
“Yes.”
He looked at her.
“That seems to be a pattern.”
She accepted it.
Then came Portland.
One year after Sloan disappeared, she saw Griffin through a coffee shop window.
He was no longer the graduate student with impossible plans.
He had launched Drake Labs.
He looked exhausted.
She should have walked away.
Instead, she entered.
They argued for three hours.
He accused her of cowardice.
She accused him of becoming obsessed with proving everyone wrong.
Neither told the whole truth.
At 1:00 a.m., Griffin asked whether she had ever stopped loving him.
Sloan said no.
That was all it took.
The next morning she woke before him.
For one hour, she almost stayed.
Then a hotel envelope appeared beneath the door.
Inside was a photograph of Griffin entering the hotel.
Underneath:
HE SURVIVED YOU ONCE. DON’T MAKE HIM DO IT AGAIN.
Sloan left.
Two weeks later, she discovered she was pregnant.
“I planned to tell you,” she said.
Griffin sat slowly.
“When?”
“The day after the ultrasound.”
“Then you got the photograph.”
“Yes.”
“Two heartbeats.”
“Yes.”
“And you vanished again.”
“I moved to Boise first. Then Spokane. Then back to Seattle after the girls were born because Richard’s attention seemed to have moved elsewhere.”
“You lived in Seattle?”
“For six years.”
He stared at her.
“I’ve been twenty minutes away from my daughters for six years.”
Sloan’s eyes filled.
“Yes.”
Griffin stood.
He walked away because staying near her while processing that was impossible.
He had attended product launches fifteen minutes from Hazel and Iris.
Driven down Fremont Avenue.
Eaten dinner at restaurants blocks from their school.
His daughters had existed inside his city like ghosts he did not know to look for.
The door opened.
Hazel entered.
“Are you fighting?”
“No,” Sloan said.
“Yes,” Griffin said simultaneously.
Hazel sighed.
“Adults are weird.”
Iris appeared behind her.
“Are we actually his?”
Sloan closed her eyes.
There would be no gentler moment.
“Yes.”
The twins became still.
Hazel looked at Griffin.
“You’re our dad?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Sloan nearly laughed despite everything.
“We’ll explain biology when you’re older.”
“I know biology.”
“No, you know enough biology to make this conversation dangerous.”
Hazel ignored her.
She walked toward Griffin.
“You knew just now?”
“Yes.”
“So you didn’t leave us?”
Griffin’s face broke.
“No.”
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
Hazel wrapped both arms around his waist.
Griffin froze.
Then bent over her.
His eyes closed.
Iris stood three feet away.
More cautious.
Griffin opened one arm.
He didn’t ask.
Iris hesitated.
Then stepped into him.
Sloan watched the father of her daughters hold them for the first time.
There are moments too beautiful to survive without pain attached.
This was one.
Griffin cried silently into Hazel’s hair.
Eight years compressed into one embrace.
Later, after the girls fell asleep, Cameron returned with the hospital security report.
“We found the photographer.”
Griffin stood.
“Who?”
“A hospital contractor named Miles Reddick.”
“Connection to Richard?”
“None obvious.”
“Where is he?”
“Gone.”
Sloan frowned.
“Gone how?”
“Badge left in the parking structure. Apartment emptied.”
Griffin’s phone rang.
Cameron looked at the screen.
“Your uncle.”
Griffin answered.
“Richard.”
His uncle’s voice was warm.
“Griffin. I heard Sloan Callaway turned up.”
Griffin said nothing.
Richard continued.
“After all these years.”
“You knew.”
Silence.
Then Richard laughed softly.
“Knew what?”
“My daughters.”
Sloan felt cold.
Richard’s pause lasted half a second too long.
“That’s quite an accusation.”
“Are they why you threatened Sloan?”
“Sloan always was imaginative.”
Griffin’s fist tightened.
“Stay away from them.”
“From whom?”
“You know exactly who.”
Richard sighed.
“You’ve become emotional.”
“And you’re making a mistake.”
“No, Griffin.”
His voice changed.
“You are.”
The line disconnected.
Cameron immediately began tracing the call.
Then Sloan’s phone vibrated.
A new email.
No sender name.
One attachment.
She opened it.
A scanned legal document appeared.
PETITION FOR EMERGENCY REVIEW OF THE MALCOLM DRAKE DESCENDANT TRUST.
At the bottom was Richard’s signature.
Griffin read the first page.
His face went white.
“What?”
Sloan whispered.
He looked at the sleeping twins.
“My father left forty-one percent of the original company to my biological children.”
Sloan stared.
“How much is that worth?”
Griffin answered quietly.
“Today?”
A pause.
“More than four billion dollars.”
And suddenly the reason someone had been watching Sloan’s pregnancy became brutally clear.
Hazel and Iris had not only been hidden children.
May you like
They had been standing between Richard Drake and a fortune.
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