Chapter 9 - The Company That Sent Him AwayCarter Industrial Health was not owned by James.
The name came from founder Malcolm Carter, no relation to him.
James had worked there for eleven years managing hospital construction contracts.
The company recently acquired Hawthorne Medical Management through a confidential subsidiary.
James had signed several approval forms without seeing the underlying facility names.
His signature appeared on renovation orders for Ward N, the island clinic, and the hidden room beneath his own house.
“I approved my daughter’s prison,” he said.
Marcus corrected him.
“You approved construction codes presented under false projects.”
“I still signed.”
“You were deceived.”
“So was everyone who says they were protecting us.”
James refused to excuse himself completely.
He had ignored Natalie’s fears.
Trusted Norma.
Accepted company travel without questioning why his family was excluded.
The patterns appeared only after violence made them impossible to overlook.
Federal investigators identified Malcolm Carter’s successor as CEO Graham Vale.
Vale was Norma’s maiden name.
Norma had always claimed no relationship to the company.
Records showed Graham was her half-brother.
The scheme connected family, employer, hospital, and research foundation.
Norma did not act only as an overbearing grandmother.
She held a concealed financial interest in the twins’ biological patents.
If Mercer’s experiment succeeded, her shares would become extraordinarily valuable.
Marcus confronted her with the records.
Norma remained silent until shown the aircraft photograph.
Then she whispered:
“Graham will kill them before he lets the trial become evidence.”
“Where is the plane going?”
“I don’t know.”
“You arranged this.”
“I arranged treatment.”
“You arranged kidnapping.”
“I was trying to save Emily.”
“And profit?”
Norma looked away.
Her cooperation began only after Marcus threatened to reveal her account records publicly.
She provided a flight code used by Carter Industrial Health.
The aircraft had filed a false plan for Toronto but turned west after takeoff.
Military radar located it near the Appalachian Mountains.
Its destination was likely a private airstrip beside a research campus in West Virginia.
Natalie’s phone briefly connected there.
Then disappeared.
Chris returned from the island with Frank Reynolds in custody.
Frank had been found injured inside a drifting emergency boat five miles offshore.
He claimed Elise attacked Mercer at the lighthouse and helped Natalie escape.
Then Graham’s security team arrived and forced everyone onto the aircraft.
“Where is Mercer?” Marcus asked.
Frank shook his head.
“I don’t know if he’s alive.”
The blood at the dock matched both Frank and Mercer.
Elise may have attempted to stop the plan.
But she still stood behind Natalie on the aircraft.
Whether guard, ally, or prisoner remained unclear.
Sarah listened to James explain that Emily was being moved.
“I want to talk to her.”
“We can’t call the plane.”
“She’ll be scared.”
“So are you.”
Sarah nodded.
“That’s why she needs me.”
James saw the bond forming before the sisters shared a room.
Not magical.
Not automatic.
Built from recognition that adults had lied to both.
The hospital child psychologist helped Sarah record a message.
“My name is Sarah. I know you didn’t steal anything from me. I don’t want them to hurt you. Dad is looking for you.”
Federal agents transmitted the recording on emergency aviation frequencies.
No response came for twelve minutes.
Then a child’s voice answered through static.
“Sarah?”
James stood.
“Emily?”
“She can hear you,” the controller said. “Keep talking.”
Sarah leaned toward the radio.
“Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where’s Mom?”
“Sleeping.”
“Did they hurt her?”
A male voice shouted in the background.
The transmission weakened.
Emily spoke quickly.
“There are red mountains outside and a white tower with no windows.”
Chris recognized the description.
Carter Industrial Health maintained a pharmaceutical-testing site near Red Hollow, West Virginia.
The campus included a white environmental chamber.
Federal teams moved.
Before the connection ended, Emily whispered:
“Sarah, Dr. Mercer says Dad knew about the project before we were born.”
James froze.
“What?”
The radio went silent.
Marcus looked toward him.
James denied it immediately.
But investigators found an old Carter Industrial personnel form signed nine years earlier.
James had volunteered for a company fertility-benefit study while he and Natalie struggled to conceive.
He remembered giving blood and genetic samples.
The consent form described routine reproductive screening.
A hidden attachment authorized “future compatible biological development.”
His samples may have been used to design the twins before Natalie’s pregnancy.
James had not fathered children through an ordinary conception.
The company may have selected him as part of the experiment.
A second attachment contained Natalie’s signature.
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Unlike the others, this one appeared genuine.
👉 Norma’s financial link exposed the family’s profit motive, while an old fertility-study consent form suggested both James and Natalie had been drawn into the twins’ creation before either child was conceived.
