Chapter 2: The Red Keycard
Rain lashed violently against the windshield of the SUV as Adam tore down the winding coastal driveway. In the passenger seat, Lily clutched her mother’s silver locket—a relic she had recovered alongside the tablet.
"Are we going to save Mommy?" she asked quietly, her hazel eyes reflecting the dashboard lights.
"We are," Adam promised, though his knuckles were bloodless against the leather steering wheel. "We aren't coming home without her."
While backing out of the estate gates, Adam had noticed Victoria desperately dialing someone on her private cell. A coordinated cover-up didn't work through one person alone; it required medical accomplices, falsified logs, and guards who were paid to keep quiet.
He opened the glove compartment, retrieving a magnetic access card Lily had found tucked inside the tablet case. It was crimson, marked only with an insignia: *St. Jude’s Neurological Annex - Level B*.
St. Jude’s was an abandoned private asylum decommissioned eight years ago, nestled deep in the foggy pine forests outside the city. It was the perfect place to hide a living person from the world.
"How long have you had that video, sweetheart?" Adam asked gently, trying to keep his trembling voice level.
"Two days," Lily whispered. "I heard Victoria arguing on the phone with a man named Marcus. He said the medication was running out, and that she had to pay double or he would pull the plug. That’s when I broke the desk drawer."
A cold fury settled into Adam’s chest. Elena hadn’t died in an accident. She had been sedated, declared legally dead, and stashed away so Victoria could claim Elena’s inheritance and marry into the Vance fortune unopposed. It was calculated cruelty at its most inhuman scale.
May you like
"Hang on, Lily," Adam said as he turned onto the unpaved logging road, tires spraying mud into the darkness. "We're almost there."
---
