the highest bidder. He came to New Orleans to retrieve it. That ended badly for him. He should have trusted his son instead of his greed.”
Furness began reading, carefully at first then so swiftly the words blurred together. Finally, the paper dropped from trembling hands to desktop. “This can’t be true.”
“It is,” Susanna assured him. “I’ve tested dozens of samples just to be sure. This is what Genevieve was looking for, why she founded this place, conducted all that research in the North, to find this unique link, whether to use it or destroy it, I don’t know. This is the connection to our past before it separated. The one pure source from which we all sprang.”
“And that source?” Furness asked, his usually strong and purposeful voice faint.
“Is you. There’s no mistake.” The Chosen doctor interrupted his gathering argument. “The markers are there, plain to see. Max was the closest Genevieve could find until the experiments that produced the Brady girls provided the only real clue. Genevieve was trying to create a future generation from her own genetic material. Hers with you produced Olivia.”
The pseudo-priest spoke in a labored monotone. “She and I never—”
“No,” Susanna supplied, voice surprisingly kind. “But once there was a plan for you and Marie Savorie. Your samples were taken after both families insisted on a test for purity of line and virility. Then she disappeared with Rollo. The samples were never destroyed. Genevieve kept them for study. And then for her own ambitious purposes.”
Michael Furness had gone very still. “You’re quite the detective yourself, Dr. Duchamps.”
“LaRoche,” she corrected.
Finally, after a bout of spiritual squirming, Furness sighed and admitted, “Ophelia is my child with Sister Catherine’s—Mary Kate’s—mother.” Whom he’d obviously loved and had tried to protect from Genevieve’s jealous machinations. “I wanted to guide and protect her without her guessing the truth. Not easy or possible with that gift of hers.”
Cee Cee summarized the conversation in the Towers between the four females, sliding an apologetic glance her mate’s way for keeping those newly discovered facts a secret.
“Genevieve,” Furness continued, “used that knowledge to secure my allegiance when I’d have broken away from her madness. Instead, I watched over both Brady girls, the same way I did Mary Kate and Charlotte. With her gone, they’ll be safe now.” That settled in, strengthening his posture and his resolve. “Everything’s changed.”
“So, it’s you, Michael,” Max said again, this time as fact not suggestion. “You’ll become the power in the North, and you’ll use it to unite all our people. With the Terriots’ help, we’ve locked down the docks. Rueben Guedry has frozen all military assistance. When word spreads that my aunt is dead, her men defeated, there’ll be a scramble for control if no one worthy steps up. It’s time for you to step up, Michael, to stop hiding in those robes and do good for all our people.”
His eyes closed, reflecting on his failures. “I wasn’t strong when I needed to be.”
“Be strong now,” Cee Cee urged, reaching for his hand as he’d often done hers for that firm squeeze of support. “You’ll be that figurehead for all that’s good, what we all can aspire to be. No divisions of class. No separation that would put any of our kind in bondage to another. Yours’ll be a message many have waited their whole life to hear. You’re the Chosen One.”
As his features twisted, her voice softened. “This is the mark you’ve always wanted to make, one of service and humility. Make your amends by lifting all of us up so we stand together.”
Furness took a deep breath and looked to each of them in turn. “I can’t do it alone.”
“You have Rueben and Cale. And me.” Max pressed a hand upon his shoulder. “We’ll be there for whatever you need, not to police or punish or demand, but to provide, to strengthen and guide.” His smile slowly unfurled, “And you’ll be that good shepherd who cares for us all.”
EPILOGUE
Carmen Blutafino entered his office on the second floor of The Sweat Shop eager to start siphoning his poor deceased partners’ shares into his own till. He sighed in brief regret at their passing then shrugged philosophically. A tender heart wouldn’t pay for that house being built in the Caymans. New Orleans was getting too hot for comfort since Savoie and his little woman wouldn’t oblige him and carelessly die by accident or design.
Closing the door behind him, he scowled, good humor plunging. His massive desk chair was turned so