CHAPTER 84: FOUND A CLUE

Eleanor’s POV

As the servants carried his unconscious wife away, Mr. Moore finally found his voice, though it was a stammering, terrified thing. "Y-You... monster..."

I retracted my claws, the sharp points sliding back into my fingertips. The gesture did nothing to calm him.

"I didn’t come here for revenge," I stated, my voice flat. "Not for any of the things you’ve done. I just want information about the day I was born. I want to find my real family. So you shouldn’t hesitate to give it to me. You don’t want anything to do with me, and this is the fastest way to make that happen."

His fear twisted into a familiar, ugly authority. "Guards!" he shouted, his voice cracking. "Someone call the police! I will not be under the same roof as a monster!" He pointed a trembling finger at me. "You’ll be locked away! Don’t you know the rules? Supernaturals aren’t to reveal themselves! I’ll have you taken! That will be your punishment for how you’ve always treated my real daughter!"

I knew then that talking, reasoning, trying to make him see sense was utterly futile. This conversation was over.

I took a step toward him. He scrambled back, his eyes wide. "Where are the security?!"

I didn’t run. I simply walked, but my speed was no longer human. One moment I was several feet away, the next I was inches from his face, my movement a blur. He let out a shrill, undignified scream.

"I won’t repeat myself," I said, my voice low and deadly calm. "If you do not want to feel my wrath, you will give me the information I want. Now."

He crumpled, all his bluster vanishing. "Alright! Alright, I’ll do it! Just... don’t hurt me."

I rolled my eyes. The irony was staggering. The man who had emotionally tormented me for years was now begging for mercy after five seconds of real fear.

I followed him to the master bedroom, my senses on high alert. He went to a wall safe, his hands shaking so badly he could barely work the combination. He pulled out a sleek, black briefcase and shoved it toward me.

"It’s all in there," he stammered. "Your birth certificate. There’s... there’s a memory card, too. We took videos that day."

As I opened the case, he sank to his knees, a broken man. "My real child... my baby is out there somewhere. What have they done with my child?"

The words were a sharp, unexpected prick in my heart. So he could summon that much emotion for a child he’d never met, but for me, the one he’d raised, there was nothing but contempt. I shoved the feeling down. I should just be grateful I’d survived living under their roof long enough to escape and learn to take care of myself.

"Your phone," I demanded.

He pointed a trembling finger toward the nightstand. I grabbed it, inserted the memory card, and began to play the videos while simultaneously scanning the birth certificate. Evergreen Hospital.

The first video showed a much younger Mrs. Moore, exhausted but radiant, holding a newborn. I paid close attention to the baby.

That’s their actual child.

I opened another file. This one showed the woman holding a different infant, and I just knew that was me. Their biological child had a small, strawberry-shaped birthmark on her neck, barely noticeable unless you were looking for it.

But it was the looks on my parents’ faces as they gazed at me, the newborn impostor, that truly struck me. There was wonder there. Love, even. It was probably the first and last time my mother had ever looked at me with anything resembling affection, all before Priscilla was born and solidified my role as the family scapegoat.

The bedroom door burst open. Security flooded in, their expressions grim.

"Seize her!" Mr. Moore shrieked, finding his courage again now that he had an audience. "Bundle her up and take her away! She’s a monster!"

One of the security guards, a large man with a cold stare, gestured for me to move. "Come on. Let’s go."

"I was already leaving," I said, my voice flat, holding the phone.

"Bundle her!" my father shrieked from behind the wall of security. "Don’t just let her walk! Monsters are meant to be bundled and taken away! She’ll come back and kill me in my sleep!"

The lead guard sighed, as if dealing with a hysterical child. "Miss, you’ll have to come with us to the station peacefully, or we will be forced to make you."

"I’m a registered racer for Vexxon Tech," I stated, clinging to the one piece of legal protection I had. "My status grants me immunity from human apprehension for my supernatural identity."

"She’s lying!" my father screamed. "She forged her way in! There’s no way a creature like her could be a racer for a company like that!"

The guards seemed to believe him. Before I could react, a searing, debilitating pain shot through my body. A taser. My muscles locked, and I crumpled to the floor, the phone skittering away from my numb fingers. They roughly hauled my twitching body up, slapping cold, heavy handcuffs around my wrists.

"Good riddance!" my father shouted as they dragged me away. I didn’t look back at the servants and their faces, a mix of fear and grim satisfaction. I didn’t care. My mind was a single, focused beam of light in the agony: Go to the Evergreen hospital and find my real family, and why i was switched.

They dragged me out the front door into the cool night air. Just then, the blinding white headlights of a new arrival cut through the darkness, a low, powerful engine purring to a stop.

A car door opened and slammed shut. A familiar, authoritative voice, laced with icy fury, cut through the chaos.

"What," the voice demanded, "is going on here?"

My heart stuttered. Was I hallucinating from the pain? That sounded like... Keith.

"She was disrupting the peace, sir," one of the guards stammered, his bravado instantly deflated.

"And this is how you handle an employee of Vexxon Tech?" Keith’s voice was dangerously quiet.

Immediately, the men began fumbling over themselves, uncuffing me and trying to help me stand straight. But Keith was already there, his arm going around me, pulling me from their grasp. I stumbled against his chest, the solid, warm muscle an unexpected anchor in my spinning world. Wait. His chest? I was leaning on sir Keith.

I heard my father’s voice, which had been shouting obscenities moments before, transform into a sycophantic gush. "Mr. Vexxon! What an honor to have you grace our humble home!"

Keith’s gaze was a physical weight. "Is this how you treat your own daughter?"

"My daughter?" my father laughed, a high, panicked sound. "That... that woman came here to harm me! After all the years I spent caring for her, raising her, this is the thanks I get! I was merely protecting myself! My wife has fainted from the shock of her cruel behavior!"

Lies. All of it.

My father wrung his hands. "Is it true, sir? Is she really a racer under your company?"

Keith didn’t dignify him with an answer. He simply turned, his arm a firm support around me, and guided me toward his car. My father started babbling apologies behind us. "This is clearly a misunderstanding! A terrible misunderstanding!"

Keith opened the passenger door and helped me inside. Before closing it, he turned back, his voice dropping to a lethal whisper that carried on the night air. "If I ever see you near her again, I will ensure the Moore family name ceases to exist. Do you understand?"

My father’s stammered "Y-yes, sir!" was followed by a pathetic, "I hope this won’t affect our future collaborations..."

Keith got into the driver’s seat, the powerful engine purring to life.

"I have a memory card i need to get" I whispered, my voice hoarse. "It’s in his phone."

Without a word, Keith got back out of the car. I watched through the window as he strode back to my cowering father. He said something, and a servant came rushing out with the phone.

Keith took it, and with a sickening crunch, he crushed the device in his hand as if it were made of paper. He plucked the memory card from the wreckage, ignoring my father’s frantic orders to the servants to clean up the mess and fetch a first aid kit.

He returned to the car and handed me the small piece of plastic. He didn’t demand an explanation. He didn’t accuse me of causing trouble. He had just... helped. Without question. The simple, decisive act of protection touched a part of me I thought had been calloused over.

But as he pulled away from the curb, the questions finally broke through my daze.

"Mr. Keith... how did you know I was here? And why did you come here?"