Chapter 23 - VICTORIA’S BARGAIN
Victoria entered the prison interview room in a beige uniform.
Age had changed her face but not her posture.
She looked at Natalie without greeting.
“You opened the Crown Room.”
“Yes.”
“Then Adrian has already moved the witnesses.”
“Who are they?”
Victoria smiled faintly.
“Still direct.”
“Still imprisoned.”
The smile disappeared.
Victoria demanded a transfer to a secure federal facility and protection from Cross’s network.
In exchange, she would reveal the second site.
Rachel warned that prosecutors controlled any agreement.
Victoria understood.
She wanted Natalie’s support because public pressure mattered.
Natalie asked, “Why protect witnesses now?”
“I am protecting information.”
“People again.”
“People are temporary.”
Natalie leaned back.
“Then you have nothing I trust.”
Victoria’s eyes narrowed.
“You think your morality makes you stronger than Adrian.”
“No. It makes his methods visible.”
Victoria revealed that the second site was called the Conservatory.
Blackwell and Meridian families sent inconvenient relatives there.
Spouses.
Heirs.
Accountants.
Patients.
People whose legal capacity had been removed.
Some were listed as dead.
Others lived under court-appointed identities.
The Conservatory held them until their signatures, testimony, or silence were no longer needed.
“Where?” Natalie asked.
“On an island.”
“Which island?”
“Adrian changed routes every year.”
Victoria offered the original navigation cipher.
In return, she wanted Julian removed from federal prison and placed in protected custody with her.
Natalie almost laughed.
“You ordered Victor to kill him.”
“I ordered the line closed if he betrayed the family.”
“That means yes.”
Victoria showed no shame.
“He is still my son.”
“No. He is still useful to you.”
The interview ended without agreement.
Julian listened to the recording from prison.
He did not ask Natalie to accept Victoria’s bargain.
“Do not put me with her.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
He looked relieved.
Then ashamed of the relief.
Julian knew part of the navigation cipher.
The Blackwells named routes after wedding traditions.
Something old.
Something new.
Something borrowed.
Something blue.
The island changed, but the sequence of shell companies followed the rhyme.
Claire traced “old” to a century-old maritime trust.
“New” to a recently incorporated medical charity.
“Borrowed” to leased aircraft.
“Blue” to oceanographic research permits.
The current site operated under Blue Mercy Research Foundation.
It leased an island off the California coast.
Officially, the foundation studied dementia in isolated environments.
Unofficially, no research had been published in nine years.
Agent Reed assembled a federal task force.
The island’s ownership records showed a private clinic, residential cottages, a dock, and an emergency airstrip.
Satellite images revealed more buildings beneath camouflage netting.
Natalie asked Victoria one final question through counsel.
“Is Ethan Marlow there?”
Victoria answered with three words.
He never left.
The man arrested at the rehabilitation center was not Marlow.
Biometric analysis confirmed he was Lucas Fen after surgical alteration.
The real Dr. Marlow had remained hidden.
He had directed Saint Aurelia and Golden Crest remotely.
Cross managed systems.
Marlow managed minds.
The Conservatory was his laboratory.
Before the task force could depart, Blue Mercy issued a distress call.
A fire had broken out on the island.
Patients were trapped.
The call ended with a woman screaming one name.
May you like
Natalie.
The voice belonged to Evelyn Moore.
