Chapter 4 - The Ghost of St. Jude's
Late into the night, the rain beat heavily against the reinforced glass windows of Damien’s private study.
Damien sat behind his massive mahogany desk, his black suit jacket removed, his dark shirt sleeves rolled up to reveal dark tattoos lining his forearms. On the large computer monitor before him, the contents of the encrypted flash drive were displayed in sharp white text.
Beside him stood Marco, holding two glasses of scotch.
Damien’s jaw was tight, his dark eyes staring at the screen in utter disbelief. The files Selene had tried to steal were not mafia ledgers, shipment routes, or bank account numbers.
They were sealed medical records from St. Jude’s Private Hospital, dated six years ago.
"This doesn't make sense, Marco," Damien whispered, his voice thick with a deep, suppressed pain. "These are Clara's medical files."
Clara had been Damien’s beloved wife. Six years ago, she had suffered severe complications during an emergency labor at St. Jude's Hospital. The attending physicians had informed a devastated Damien that his wife had passed away on the operating table, and that their newborn baby girl had been stillborn.
"Look closer at the secondary attachment, Boss," Marco said softly, tapping the screen.
Damien clicked the secondary file. It was an unredacted pediatric delivery log from the exact night Clara died.
According to the official record, the infant delivered that night was not stillborn. The baby girl had been born healthy, weighing six pounds and four ounces, with dark curly hair and a pristine heart rate. Stamped across the bottom of the document was an official adoption discharge order signed by Dr. Harrison Vance—the head of obstetrics at St. Jude's.
Damien’s hands began to shake violently. The heavy crystal tumbler in his hand rattled against the desk.
"My daughter didn't die," Damien whispered, his voice cracking with a terrifying mixture of hope and fury. "They lied to me."
"There’s more, Damien," Marco said, pulling a secondary background folder from his jacket. "I ran a background check on Eva Bennett three hours ago when she started working here. Six years ago, before she became a housemaid, Eva worked as a pediatric nursing assistant in the newborn unit at St. Jude's Hospital."
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Damien stood up so fast his leather chair slid backward against the wall. He stared at Marco, his mind racing through the clues like wildfire. The dark curly hair. The large expressive eyes. The protective instinct he had felt the second he saw the five-year-old child standing in his dining room.
"Bring Eva to my study," Damien commanded, his voice trembling with emotion. "Now."
