Chapter 17
Blake’s knuckles went white gripping the door handle.
Leukemia?
Stella died from hereditary leukemia.
Then he heard Mrs. Reed’s bitter voice: “Stella was a fucking curse. She just died and now your dad has leukemia. That bitch’s ghost is haunting us.”
“I’m gonna find some psychic to destroy her soul completely.”
Sophia looked uncomfortable. “Mom, that’s bullshit. We need to focus on Dad’s treatment.”
Blake frowned and walked out of the coffee shop.
His cop instincts were screaming that something wasn’t right about this.
Back at the station, he started digging into what went down five years ago.
After Sergeant Martinez pulled the surveillance footage, he saw that twenty-six years ago, the nanny Sarah had definitely switched the two babies.
But Blake spent all night going through everything, and caught Sarah on a bodega security cam switching the babies back.
so how the hell could Sophia’s DNA match Mrs. Reed’s?
The only sketchy part was that paternity test.
ilake immediately headed out to track down the doctor who ran the original test.
When he found Dr. Thompson at the hospital and flashed his badge, the guy started looking shifty as hell.
lis voice was trembling: “Officer Morrison, uh… what’s this about?”
lake’s tone was ice cold: “Stella Parker. You ran a paternity test on her five years ago. Remember that?”
hey talked for thirty minutes.
lake quickly caught Dr. Thompson in two major lies.
irst, this guy ran dozens of DNA tests daily-no way in hell he’d remember Sophia’s name that clearly.
When Blake pushed him, Dr. Thompson said he used to be into Sophia back in the day.
ut when Blake asked for the original test results, Dr. Thompson couldn’t produce shit.
Which meant the paternity test was never officially logged.
fter Blake kept grilling him, Dr. Thompson finally cracked,
Sophia’s biological mom confessed on her deathbed that she’d swapped the babies. When Stella got her cancer diagnosis and was stuck at the hospital, Mrs. teed tracked her down and spilled everything about the switch.”
Then Mrs. Reed came to me bawling, begging me to fake the DNA results.”
Sophia’s life has been hell. I really just wanted her to have something good…”
I’m so sorry, Officer Morrison…”
3lake’s head was spinning. This crushing sadness hit him like a freight train, making it impossible to breathe.
Stella was such a sweet girl, and she died thinking it was all her fault that Sophia suffered. For five whole years-how much pain did she go through?
Blake staggered backward, voice completely shot: “Where’s the real test?”
Dr. Thompson just stood there.
Blake punched the wall hard. “The fucking report. Hand it over!”
Dr. Thompson tore through cabinets and files until he finally dug up the actual results.
Blake’s car sat parked outside Sophia’s house, his hands death gripping the steering wheel.
No matter how fucked up life gets, truth is truth. You can’t bury it.
You don’t get to destroy someone else’s life just because yours is shit.
He knocked. When Sophia opened the door and saw him, she smiled a little. “Blake? What brings you here?”
Blake walked right past her, heading straight for Mrs. Reed on the couch.
He placed the real DNA test results in her hands, dead serious.
