Chapter 5 - Room Twelve
Willowbrook House stood behind a high stone wall at the edge of a wooded property.
Its windows were dark. Ivy covered the entrance, and a faded sign hung crookedly above the gate.
Sebastian arrived with investigators and a medical team.
He refused to let his men enter first.
“If she's alive, I don't want her frightened by armed strangers.”
The lead investigator nodded.
They entered through the main doors.
The building smelled of dust, disinfectant, and damp plaster. A generator hummed somewhere below the ground.
A nurse's station stood empty.
On the desk lay a stack of patient charts.
Sebastian searched the labels.
Room 12.
He found the corridor and walked toward the last door.
It was locked.
An investigator opened it with a key recovered from the station.
The room beyond was small and bare. A narrow bed stood beneath a window with reinforced bars. Beside it sat a woman in a gray cardigan, staring at a photograph.
She looked thinner than Sebastian remembered.
Her hair fell loosely over her shoulders, and a pale scar crossed her left temple.
But when she lifted her eyes, he knew.
“Isabella.”
She stood so quickly that the photograph fell from her hands.
For one terrible second, she seemed unable to recognize him.
Then she whispered, “Sebastian?”
He crossed the room.
She backed away.
“Don't come closer.”
He stopped immediately.
“It's me.”
“They told me you were dead.”
His heart broke.
“They told me you were dead.”
Isabella's eyes filled with tears.
“They said you had married Vanessa. They said you knew I was here and had chosen to leave me.”
“No.”
“They showed me pictures.”
“Forged pictures.”
“They said you didn't want the baby.”
Sebastian swallowed hard.
“I didn't know she existed until three days ago.”
Isabella stared at him.
“Our daughter?”
“She's alive. She's healthy. Her name is Lily.”
Isabella pressed a hand over her mouth.
For several seconds, she could not speak.
Then her knees buckled.
Sebastian caught himself before reaching for her, remembering her fear.
“May I help you?”
She nodded.
He gently supported her as she sat on the bed.
“Lily,” she whispered. “She's really alive?”
“Yes.”
“Can I see her?”
“Of course.”
Isabella began to cry.
“I thought they had taken her away forever.”
Sebastian sat beside her, leaving enough space between them for her to breathe.
“I'm sorry.”
She looked at him.
“Why are you apologizing? You didn't know.”
“I should have answered your calls. I should have come to the hospital.”
“They made sure you never received them.”
“I still should have found you.”
Isabella reached toward his hand, then hesitated.
He waited.
Finally, she took it.
Her fingers were cold.
“I never stopped loving you,” she whispered. “But I don't know how to trust anyone anymore.”
“You don't have to trust me today.”
He looked into her eyes.
“Just let me get you somewhere safe.”
The medical team examined Isabella and confirmed that she was severely dehydrated and had been given sedating medication without a clear medical justification. Her records showed that she had been kept under an assumed diagnosis and denied contact with the outside world.
An investigator found a locked cabinet containing medication logs and signed orders.
Several bore the name of Dr. Marcus Hale, the physician who had overseen her confinement.
But the most important discovery was a small recorder hidden behind a loose panel near the bed.
Isabella had concealed it herself.
“I recorded conversations,” she explained. “They thought I was too sedated to understand what they were saying.”
Sebastian took the recorder carefully.
“What's on it?”
“Vincent. Richard Sterling. Dr. Hale.”
She looked at him.
“They weren't just trying to hide the money.”
“What else?”
“They were planning to make Lily disappear permanently.”
Sebastian felt his blood turn cold.
Isabella gripped his hand.
“They said that if you ever found me, they would claim the baby had died. They thought you would eventually stop searching.”
Sebastian closed his eyes.
He imagined a world in which Clara had not kept her promise, in which Lily had vanished into an institution's records, in which Isabella had spent the rest of her life believing he had abandoned her.
When he opened his eyes, his voice was steady.
“They will never get near either of you again.”
Isabella looked at him.
“Promise me something.”
“Anything.”
“Don't become the man they expect you to be. Don't burn down the world just because they hurt us.”
Sebastian bowed his head.
“I promise.”
He helped her leave the room.
For the first time in eight months, Isabella walked out into the open air.
May you like
But before they reached the gate, Marco called.
Lily was missing.
