Chapter 9 - The False Adelaide
The voice recording was authenticated through old interviews, family videos, and forensic analysis. Experts found no evidence of editing or artificial reconstruction. Thomas Mercer had been alive at least eighteen months after his funeral.
His warning shattered the clearest part of the case.
The woman outside the hospital looked like Adelaide. Her DNA relationship to Emma seemed established through the sample recovered from a coffee cup she left at the farmhouse. Yet Thomas claimed she was not his sister.
Mara requested a second laboratory and a full genomic comparison. The answer revealed the deception.
The woman’s DNA was closely related to Emma, but not as a mother. She was an aunt.
Adelaide had an identical twin.
No official birth certificate existed for the second child. Old family letters referred to a sick infant named Evelyn who supposedly died before baptism. In reality, the Mercers placed her in private care because of a congenital heart defect and later erased her from inheritance records.
Evelyn grew up outside the family, aware of wealth she could never claim. Linda found her as a young adult and brought her into Briarwood. Hale’s records identified an “E.M. senior” who assisted with patient control and impersonated Adelaide during legal evaluations.
The woman pursuing them was Evelyn Mercer.
Emma’s biological mother, Adelaide, remained missing.
Rachel was horrified. “The woman who took me from the farmhouse said she was Adelaide. She knew everything about the birth.”
“Because she was there,” Mara said. “She may have helped Linda organize it.”
Hale changed his story when confronted. Evelyn, not Adelaide, caused Nora’s crash and abducted him. She had spent years moving between Linda’s side and her own agenda. She wanted control of the Mercer assets but needed Emma alive to establish a claim.
“Then why poison Emma at the hospital?” Daniel asked.
Hale looked toward the guard. “Evelyn is obsessed with purification. She believes suffering proves whether a person deserves the family name. She might have wanted to frighten Emma, weaken her, or make Daniel turn against Linda.”
Mara did not accept speculation as fact.
The team searched for Evelyn through medical records related to her heart condition. A private cardiology clinic reported a recent patient using forged identification but matching her age and appearance. The woman had an implanted defibrillator that transmitted diagnostic data to a remote monitoring service.
For the first time, they had a moving location.
The signal placed Evelyn at an abandoned Mercer Medical warehouse near the river.
Agents entered at dusk. Inside, they found a temporary command center: surveillance photographs of Emma, Daniel, Linda, Rachel, Sophie, Mara, and Dr. Wells. There were maps of the hospital and Mercer estate, copies of trust documents, and an entire wall devoted to Thomas.
At the center hung a recent photograph of a thin, gray-haired man seated beside a window.
Thomas.
Alive.
The photograph’s background showed mountains and a distinctive clock tower. Federal analysts identified the location as Saint Orison Recovery Center, a private neurological facility across the Canadian border.
Daniel could barely breathe. “How recent?”
“The newspaper on the table is from six weeks ago,” an agent said.
A burner phone began ringing on a desk.
Mara answered on speaker.
Evelyn’s voice filled the warehouse. “You finally learned to follow the right ghost.”
“Where is Thomas?” Daniel demanded.
“Safe from Linda. Safe from Victor. Not safe from time.”
“Let me speak to him.”
“You will, after Emma chooses.”
Emma was listening through Mara’s secure connection from the hospital. “Chooses what?”
“Whether she wants the truth or the inheritance.”
“I want my mother.”
A pause followed.
“Adelaide is alive,” Evelyn said. “But she will not survive another transfer.”
“Where is she?”
“Linda knows.”
The call ended.
At that same moment, a guard at Victor Hale’s hospital room found the bed empty. A ceiling tile had been removed above the bathroom. Hale had escaped through a maintenance corridor with help from someone wearing a federal contractor badge.
On the pillow lay a folded note.
Daniel opened it with gloved hands.
Your father is alive because I kept him useful. Find Linda before Evelyn does.
May you like
Below the message was an address.
It belonged to a chapel where Thomas and Linda had married thirty-eight years earlier.
