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Chapter 286
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2024-09-01 23:54:29
VictoryAnne ViceAnd onward they go! I hope they make it in time!
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Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 287
[Cordelia]There isn't much to see or do in Bakersfield. This isn't a town I'd go out of my way to see. Lined on either side with factory farms and large fields, the growing town has a constant smell of dying animals and manure.It's the perfect place to hide something or someone you don't want anyone else to notice. The address took me to a shopping center across the street from a large office complex. The air is dry and dusty, the wind doing nothing to cool the late afternoon heat. The smoggy haze in the distance makes the blue sky look a dingy brownish gray, darkened by the pollution from nearby LA. But soon I'll have Jasper in my arms and it will be worth it. All of this struggle will finally be worth all the pain. Atlas should be here any moment. Theo borrowed someone else's phone to text me on her phone that Atlas and Clark were on their way in a beat-up car from the 1980s.That's what I was expecting to see pull up into the parking lot. Not a semi-truck with a chicken on the
Last Updated : 2024-09-02Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 288
[Jude]I've been prepared for this day for weeks now. It was waiting to see how far Magnus would take things before she was pushed hard enough to seek the truth. Cordy is a smart woman. I knew she would eventually figure out how to draw Magnus out and force him to show his hand. I only wish it had been a little sooner. Even with treatment, Jasper isn't doing well. "Hey there, little guy," I gently lift him from his crib. He's sleeping, but these days he's almost always sleeping, his lungs are too weak to allow him to do much more. "I'm going to take you to your mommy now."Scooping him up, I place a set of infant-sized sound-canceling headphones on his tiny ears and swaddle him carefully into the baby carrier on my back. He's getting too big for this carrier. Even with his weak lungs, he's been gaining weight. In my right pocket, I place several vials of his current medication. In my left pocket, a detonator for a device I put together from lab equipment. It will create a spark in
Last Updated : 2024-09-02Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 289
[Cordelia]Falling hard onto my knees, I watch in stunned silence as all of my hopes for the future are dashed beyond any hope of recovery. Jude and Jasper were supposed to be by our side before the building was destroyed. Henri and Sydney were supposed to be in police custody and not at the bottom of a pile of rubble. And across the rubble, staring at us all is a face I'll never forget. Magnus. With a tip of his hat, he gets back in his car as a slim blonde moves to give him room in the back seat.Sydney. "Clark, pull in the drones. It's too late. Magnus knows," I point to the black sedan driving away. "Wait a minute," Clark follows the car with a drone as he looks through a visual display. "Almost got it. Yes!"Just as he takes his photo, the drone, and all the others, fall to the ground. Clark pulls off his glasses and curses. "Damn EMP. He just shorted all the electromagnetic pulses within a mile radius.""So our phones won't work either," I moan. "Do you think Jude and Jasp
Last Updated : 2024-09-03Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 290
[Cordelia]"Jasper," my voice catches as I place a hand on his tiny chest, praying for it to move, just once. "Baby, Mama's here."I pull him out of the carrier and place him in my arms as Jude checks for his breathing. "He's still with us, his breathing is just very shallow," he informs us as he pulls out a syringe. "This is just a bit of adrenaline. It will help. It's part of his treatment. Once he's more responsive I'll give him the medicine I developed, but we need to get him to a hospital quickly. ""Preferably under a different name," Atlas adds looking around anxiously. "And not here."My chest hurts as we all pile into the back of the chicken truck. Every bump and lurch as we travel down the highway hits me like a bomb. My life exploded in front of me again and a part of my soul died. Even though Jasper is not dead, I might never fully recover from the shock of believing he was gone. Even holding him now, smelling his hair, isn't enough to calm my nerves. When we arrived at th
Last Updated : 2024-09-05Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 291
[Jude]Jasper Steele, even with my interventions, is weaker than he should be, so I tested his blood. His white blood count is abysmally low, even with all of the infusions and immune boosters. He is no longer responding well to this therapy. Something needs to be done, and soon. Thankfully, the Jaxon and Susanna Steele were innovators in their field. Having access to Susanna Steele's notes is like taking a doctorate-level course on genetics. She was brilliant, and looking at her photos around the office, extremely beautiful. The face and smile of a model framed with blonde hair that cascades down her shoulders in gentle waves. There is something familiar about her eyes. They are a dark, piercing blue bordering on black that reminds me of someone. Setting her photo back on her desk, I repress a shiver as I rotate the frame to face the wall away from me. She has an unusual office. I'd expect the geneticist to have a clean, orderly space, but hers is cluttered and dusty. She has a r
Last Updated : 2024-09-06Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 292
[Cordelia]Jude's words pierce me like an arrow to my gut. "There is no cure," he explains his voice booming through the room as the three of us listen on speakerphone. "Or at least not a simple one. From what I'm reading here, it is a series of treatments. It has a very high success rate and is the closest to a cure that anyone has come to so far for your son's very rare type of illness."My words catch in my throat. I want to question how this can be possible after so much struggle and pain."I've synthesized the first treatment," Jude continues, "the serum from the notes you found, but it wasn't the miracle you were hoping for. I'm sorry." He then tells us about the clues. "I'll be sending her video to you. I wish you could just come to the lab and see it yourself. Your mother had a unique mind. I think it'll take the sons of Susanna Steele to figure out what she's had been trying to communicate," he admits. "She's far too clever for me to figure this out on my own, and she must
Last Updated : 2024-09-07Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 293
[Atlas]If I hadn't received Cordelia's message, I would have rushed out to be by her side when I heard her open the door and scream at the press about what had happened to our son. But then I saw that she was doing it for us. That she did it for us. Clark and I took the back way out. Walking as quickly as we could, we didn't look back as we headed to his parked car several blocks away, out of the view of the press or any other prying eyes. Quietly, we ducked into his car and drove away, headed to the other side of the city to Steele Labs which is nestled in the hills just beyond the city. When we arrived, Jude was waiting for us. Even though he is the only person I know capable of helping my son, my fists itch with the desire to punch his teeth down his throat for all the pain he caused my wife. "Jude," I grunted as we passed through the doors. "Where is my son?"He guides us through the lab to a small infirmary that he set up with Jasper in the center of a bed far too large for
Last Updated : 2024-09-08Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 294
[Cordelia]I only had to lie there and pretend to pass out for about 10 minutes before I was swept away by an ambulance. The press was so busy watching me scooped off the ground that they didn't notice Clark and Atlas leaving out the back door. Mission accomplished. Unfortunately, now that the hospital has me in their grasp, they have no plans of letting me go. "Based on your medical history, Mrs. Steele, we are requiring you to stay overnight," the nurse relayed the doctor's message as she inserted an IV I did not need into an arm that did not want to receive it. "I'm perfectly capable of drinking water with my mouth," I inform her, wincing as the catheter finds it's way into my vein. "There is no need for you to hook up an IV.""Oh, this isn't for hydration, this is for your anemia." She grins and explains very slowly that when they did my blood panel, they discovered my iron levels were dangerously low. "Have you been eating regularly?""Of course," I huff. "I eat." She gives m
Last Updated : 2024-09-08
Latest chapter
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 407
[Cordelia] Today is our 20th second anniversary. We've lost count of the first one, forgetting it entirely as a moment of sadness. Instead, we honor the day when we took our vows and meant them, 7 years later in Napa. Usually, we leave Los Angeles and take the week for just the two of us. Even after two decades, we haven't lost our hunger for one another and I look forward to our time away where we can just be two people together and in love. But this year, my husband is feeling a bit nostalgic. This is why I'm in the lobby of the Steele Hotel and Resort, recreating a memory I wish I could forget. When he sent me the cryptic text this afternoon, I confess I was more than a little bit confused. Why, of all places, would he want me to meet him there? At least this time I'm not wearing a hoodie with a dress tucked into a pair of loose sweats. And while my face is covered with large sunglasses, it's more to protect my identity and not draw too much attention. I am far too recogniza
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 406
[Clark] "Come on. Dad!" My daughters pull me along by my arms. I've never been able to deny them anything they wanted but tonight they are asking too much. "It's only a blind date!" "Girls," I admonish, "What have I said, I'm not ready to let someone new into my heart. Your mother was more than enough for me." Cassie stares up at me with her starlight eyes, as deep and black as her mother's, and doesn't relent. "You promised you'd let us have anything we want for our birthday. Grandma helped us pick her out. You have to try, Dad. For us!" "Grandma Suzanna or Grandma Jenny?" I grump, "Who do I need to send a thank you note." "Both!" the girls giggle. "You owe us, Dad," Cassie counters. Her red curls bounce as she stomps her foot. "Do you know how weird it is to look on a DATING AP for potential girlfriends for our father? It's so gross. You should be grateful" "Yeah," Maddie chimes in, swinging her hair over her shoulder as she twists her lips just like Tilly used to, her hand
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 405
[Jude]If the universe were fair, I wouldn't have lived to see today. If karma took her toll, I wouldn't be friends with Clark and Atlas Steele, our children growing up side by side. Once the shadow of Magnus was lifted from our shoulders, and Angelica and I were finally able to go about our lives the way we always should have been able to do, It became easier to make good with my life. Angelica and I were married shortly after Mathilda's funeral. It was a small ceremony on the family medical boat, just before the two of us set sail with our daughters, Melanie and Veronica. When the DNA showed that they were indeed my children, and NOT Magnus', that his experiment had never stuck, it was easy to adopt them. In their mind, Angelica is their mother. When they are old enough, we'll tell them the truth about Aunt Sydney, but for now, we are sparing them the burden of her insanity.And we give them love, all the love of a couple who has always wanted children of their own.Angelica, it tu
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 404
[Cordelia]15 hours later I place my feet back in LA for the first time in 6 months. We have been gone for so long that I had forgotten how loud it is, or how oppressively hot it can be in summer. Clark met us at the runway alone, the girls with their grandparents. "I hope you don't mind, but I wanted to drive you home. We could have sent a driver but," he explains, "I wanted to be the one to welcome you home." He does his best to smile, but as his melancholy grin drifts to how I hold on to my husband's hand, I can see how much this is costing him. "I'm glad it was you," I reach forward to give him a hug. "Thank you." Atlas, who has been receiving a slew of messages from Theo as soon as we landed, asks to be dropped off at the new Steele Industries building. "Looks like they need me," he apologizes, kissing my hand. "I'll make it up to you tonight," he whispers in my ear and I shiver in anticipation. "I'm going to hold you to that," I whisper discretely in his ear, trying to be mi
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 403
[Cordelia]The rest of that day went by in a blur. I insisted we rush back to the compound even though everyone had received the news that Tilly was gone. I couldn't believe it. My mind couldn't process the possibility of a world without Mathilda Madison. She wasn't just my best friend, she was my sister. So I couldn't let her go. Clark was distraught. He and Tilly took a while to find one another, and when they did finally make the right connection, they fell for one another hard. It was beautiful watching my two best friends fall in love--they were perfect for one another. But not all stories end with a happily ever after. That was a hard lesson for me to learn as well. I wanted nothing more than to watch Tilly raise her daughters. When we made it back an hour later, her body had already been collected. I had wanted to see her, to give it a chance to see if I could have brought her back: just one touch, one spark. I was convinced that I could have been the one to save her. The
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 402
[Sydney]Why can't they just let me die? It would be so easy, I'm already cut and bleeding. Why bother with the IVs and the monitors? It doesn't matter anymore. Did it ever matter?My entire existence has been a fraud. If my hands were free I'd count the ways on my fingertips all the ways I've been lied to and used.A madman altered my DNA and injected me into the wrong mother. I was raised believing I was special only to discover I was the offspring of my enemy. The man of my dreams was married to the daughter my mother was supposed to have, and I was just a cheap copy of the woman he once loved, my genetic twin, Angelica. Was this life ever really mine to begin with? Even now they aren't honoring my desire to die. "She needs more blood," the doctor announces over my head, her clear voice cutting through the din of the operating room chatter. "Her blood pressure has dropped to dangerous levels. We can't use the anesthesia. She'll need to be awake for the procedure."Procedure?"I d
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 401
[Clark]The dissection of Magnus' brain was one of the most intensely fascinating and uniquely horrifying things I have ever experienced. Using my computer to guide the charge, we attached wires to his brain, fed through a divide that my mother had retrieved from her vault. "This will disrupt his signal. It will keep him from making a full memory transfer. Hopefully whomever he's jumped into will have a fighting chance." Everything my mother has said since I volunteered for this task has sounded like something from a science fiction movie. The duplicates we had seen in Delilah's footage of her father's secret lab were all designed to hold Magnus's memories in an artificial extension of his life. Not all of them looked like his current body, as often it was useful for him to become someone entirely different for spying purposes. "Is this how he always seemed to know everything?" I ask aloud. We had wondered how he managed to get around all of our codes, to find ways to learn about wh
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 400
[Cordelia]"Wally?" Holding my hand above his head, I pause, hesitating. Just a moment before I was about to take this man's life without even the smallest shred of remorse. It was necessary to protect my family. My children and my husband. "Cordelia," He blinks, his eyes roving my face and the surroundings like a caged animal. Licking his dry, salty lips, his body is otherwise completely still. "I don't have much time. He's fighting me...I..."Wally's muscles spasm, shaking Atlas as well as he holds him in place. Closing his eyes, his body stills, as if the effort of keeping still is so great that he cannot do anything else at the same time. He whispers something that I can't quite make out, so I lean in, trying to capture his words.As my hair brushes his cheek, he repeats himself. "You need to end this, Cordelia. Don't let him escape to harm another. His other mind is gone, Suzanna saw to it, but he can still jump to someone else.""Wally, what are you saying," I shake my head. "No
Stealing the Heart of Mr. Steele Chapter 399
[Cordelia]Atlas and I raced down the hall to the exit, soldiers moving out of our way as we passed, nobody bothering to stop us as my husband's icy glare and dominant aura kept them pinned in place. Magnus is dead and I have never been more terrified in my life. The door to the outside pushes open and we are instantly blinded by the overhead sunshine that covers the beach with an oddly bright gray that stings the eyes. It is warmer than it had been earlier, the wind having died down, trapping the moisture of impending rain, held in place by the gathering storm. "Jasper," I call out gently, scanning the beach. "Wally?""Atlas do you see Jasper?" I grab my husband's arm. His pulse is rapid beneath my fingertips as we move forward as one and find the abandoned picnic blanket and Jasper's little galoshes next to a much larger pair. "Wally!" I scream out towards the waves and find him standing in the water, at the far edge of the beach. There is no sign of my son. None. It's as if the
