Elliot Monroe froze when she heard the small voice drift through the swirling winter snow: “You need a home, and I need a mommy.” It was so soft she almost believed she imagined it, but the little girl standing at the bus stop, looking up at her with wide dark eyes, made the words unmistakably real. Elliot turned sharply, phone still pressed to her ear, but every thought about her work call vanished the moment she saw the child.

The girl stood in the whipping wind, wearing a tattered coat, a faded scarf, and mismatched gloves. But what shocked Elliot wasn’t the clothing—it was the face. The little girl was nearly a perfect miniature of Elliot herself. The same arched brows, the same narrow nose, the same dimple on the left cheek that Elliot had always considered uniquely hers.

Impossible. Or at least, it should have been impossible. Elliot felt the cold pavement anchor her feet in place. Her heart pounded, pushing warmth into her chest even as the wind slapped at her face. Her manager’s voice called her name from the phone twice, then three times, but Elliot didn’t answer. The call disconnected on its own, leaving her in the raw silence of snow and fear.

Their eyes met—Elliot’s startled, the little girl’s steady. One belonged to a 27-year-old woman who fought hard for order in her chaotic life; the other belonged to a fragile, trembling child staring as though she had known Elliot for years.

Elliot crouched down, her knees slipping slightly on the icy pavement. “What did you just say, sweetheart?” she asked, her voice unsteady.

The girl didn’t look away. “You need someone to take care of,” she said simply. “And I need someone to call mommy.”

Two seconds. Three seconds. Five seconds. That was all it took for Elliot’s life to begin unraveling in a direction she never saw coming.

The winter bus was late, but today it felt impossibly slower. Elliot scanned the surrounding area—no parent, no guardian, no one who seemed remotely connected to the child. Just snow, wind, and a city too cold and rushed to care about a quiet little girl at a bus stop.

“Are you lost?” Elliot asked softly.

“No.” The girl shook her head. “I knew you’d come.”

The certainty in her voice twisted something deep in Elliot’s chest. It was too confident. Too knowing.

“What’s your name?” Elliot tried again.

The girl smiled—a small, warm smile that was so familiar it felt like a memory. “My name is Mara.”

Mara. The name struck Elliot like a physical blow. It was the name she had once chosen for her unborn child—the baby she lost three years ago in a traumatic accident. A secret she kept from everyone except her doctor and her journal.

Elliot swallowed hard. “Who named you?”

“My mother,” Mara answered. “My first mother. But she said… when I found the person who looks most like me, that person is my mother now.”

The person who looks most like her.

Elliot felt the blood drain from her face.

“Why are you here alone?” she asked, trying not to panic.

Mara’s fingers tightened around the frayed end of her scarf. “I was brought here. She said you take this bus at seven every morning. So I waited.”

Elliot’s pulse raced. She had never met this child. Never spoken about her morning routine to anyone outside her company. She didn’t post online. She didn’t share.

“Who brought you here?” Elliot demanded.

Mara hesitated. “I don’t know if you’ll believe me.”

“Try me.”

“Her name is Evelyn.”

Elliot’s heart seemed to stop.

Her mother’s name was Evelyn.

Her mother who died eight years ago.

Elliot straightened, chest tight. “Who did you say?”

“Evelyn Monroe,” Mara repeated clearly. “She brought me.”

“But my mother… she’s gone,” Elliot whispered.

“I know,” Mara said.

A gust of wind slammed against the bus shelter, rattling its metal frame. But the cold wasn’t what made Elliot shiver.

Elliot led Mara into the nearest café to escape the freezing air. The girl wrapped both hands around a cup of hot cocoa Elliot bought her, warming her trembling fingers. Under the café lights, the resemblance only grew sharper—the spiral of her hair, the faint birthmark near her left ear, the tiny mole under her collarbone.

“How old are you?” Elliot asked.

“Six.”

Six. The exact age Elliot’s lost child would have been today.

Her throat tightened painfully. “Where do you live? Who takes care of you?”

Mara stared into her cocoa, eyes clouding. “I don’t remember much. I remember dark rooms. And her. She told me to keep secrets. She didn’t let me go outside… except today.”

Elliot felt outrage simmer under her fear. Who kept this child locked away? Why? And why did she look so much like Elliot?

Before anger could fully rise, Mara whispered:

“Someone is looking for me. Bad people. She said I had to stay away from them. And that if I found you, I’d be safe.”

“Bad people?” Elliot leaned forward. “Who?”

Mara shook her head. “I don’t know their names. But they wear a symbol. Like a black flower. The same one from the door of the dark room.”

Elliot’s heart lurched violently.

She knew that symbol.

A black flower.

She had seen it in classified documents from her past job—an underground organization conducting illegal genetic experiments on children with unusual DNA profiles.

Children who resembled each other.

Children who resembled someone they were made from.

Mara didn’t just look like Elliot.

Mara might have been created from her.

Elliot placed her hand gently on the girl’s shoulder. “You’re safe with me. I promise.”

But Mara shook her head.

“No… they already found my trail.” Her voice dropped to a terrified whisper. “They’re coming.”

Elliot’s stomach plunged. She snapped her gaze toward the café window.

A black SUV rolled to a stop at the curb.

Three men stepped out.

Dark coats.

Cold expressions.

And on each of their sleeves—impossible to miss—was the symbol of the black flower.

Elliot shot to her feet, pulling Mara close.

“We’re leaving. Now,” she said, voice razor-sharp but low.

The man in front lifted his gaze to the window.

His eyes locked onto Elliot’s.

And then he smiled.