Chapter 7 - THE DAUGHTER ERASED FROM THE FAMILY
Margaret sat down because her legs would no longer support her.
“Our daughter died,” she said.
Arthur shook his head.
“No.”
Twenty-eight years earlier, Margaret had given birth to a girl named Rebecca.
The baby arrived six weeks early.
Margaret remembered the hospital room, the green walls, the rain against the windows, and the nurse who would not meet her eyes.
She remembered Arthur standing beside the bed when the doctor told them their daughter’s lungs had failed.
She remembered the tiny white coffin.
Unlike Arthur’s coffin, Rebecca’s had been open.
Margaret had touched the baby’s cheek.
Cold.
Still.
Real.
“You are lying,” she said.
Arthur knelt beside her.
“The child in the coffin was not Rebecca.”
Margaret struck him.
Then she struck him again.
“You let me bury someone else’s baby?”
“I did not know until years later.”
“Explain.”
Arthur looked toward the deputies.
Evelyn closed the dining-room doors.
The children had been taken upstairs by a female officer.
Linda sat in the hallway under guard.
Only Margaret, Edward, Arthur, Evelyn, and Deputy Reynolds remained.
Arthur began.
“The hospital where Rebecca was born was part of a financial network connected to Calvin’s group. They falsified deaths and adoptions. Infants from vulnerable families were transferred through private agencies.”
Margaret could barely breathe.
“Why?”
“Money. Influence. Some children went to wealthy couples. Others were placed with families connected to judges and politicians.”
“And Rebecca?”
“I found her name in a sealed ledger fifteen years ago.”
“Where was she?”
“Living under another identity.”
Margaret stood.
“Where is she now?”
Arthur looked toward the bloodstained folder.
“She became Witness Seven.”
Evelyn spoke carefully.
“Rebecca discovered the truth about her adoption while working as a records analyst. She traced her documents back to the hospital and eventually to the property network.”
Edward stared at them.
“You found my sister and didn’t tell us?”
Arthur nodded.
“She asked me not to.”
Margaret laughed once, but there was no humor in it.
“My dead daughter asked you not to tell me she was alive?”
“She believed you were being watched.”
“By whom?”
“Linda.”
In the hallway, Linda shouted.
“That is not true!”
Deputy Reynolds ordered her to remain quiet.
Arthur continued.
“Rebecca did not know whether Linda was still working for Calvin. Neither did I.”
Margaret moved toward the staircase.
“I want to see the folder.”
Deputy Reynolds blocked her.
“The chamber is now a secured scene.”
“It is beneath my house.”
“It may contain evidence of a violent crime.”
Arthur touched Margaret’s arm.
She pulled away.
“Do not touch me.”
He lowered his hand.
Edward looked at his father.
“Is Rebecca alive?”
Arthur’s silence answered before his words.
“I don’t know.”
“When did you last see her?”
“Six months ago.”
“Where?”
“Inside the chamber.”
Margaret looked down at the opening.
“What happened?”
“She had obtained an updated version of the list. She said someone within the protection unit was compromised.”
Evelyn frowned.
“You never told me that.”
“She did not trust you.”
Evelyn’s face hardened.
“Did she trust anyone?”
“She trusted Margaret.”
Margaret stared at him.
“She never met me.”
“She watched you.”
Arthur reached into his coat and removed a photograph.
Margaret stood in a grocery-store parking lot loading bags into her car.
The picture had been taken from across the street.
On the back was a handwritten message.
She still buys the same tea.
Margaret recognized the handwriting.
Not because she had seen it before.
Because the shape of the letters resembled her own.
Arthur handed her another photograph.
Margaret was sitting beside Noah at a school play.
On the back:
She looks happy when the boy sings.
Another.
Margaret walking through the cemetery carrying flowers.
She still visits the wrong grave.
Margaret pressed the photograph against her mouth.
Edward turned away.
“She was here,” Margaret whispered.
“She came to Willow Lane many times,” Arthur said. “She could not risk approaching you.”
“Because of Linda?”
“Because of everyone.”
A deputy entered the room carrying a sealed evidence bag.
Inside was a silver necklace.
Margaret recognized it immediately.
She had placed that necklace around baby Rebecca’s neck before the nurse carried her away.
The hospital returned it after the funeral.
Margaret had kept it in Arthur’s desk for thirty years.
It vanished the same night the brass key disappeared.
The deputy looked at Arthur.
“We found this beside the blood.”
Margaret turned toward Linda.
“You took it.”
Linda’s eyes filled with terror.
“No.”
“You had the key.”
“I never entered the chamber.”
“Then how did the necklace get there?”
Linda looked at Arthur.
“You tell her.”
Arthur’s expression became grim.
Linda leaned forward against the deputy holding her.
“Tell her who opened that chamber six months ago.”
Arthur said nothing.
Linda smiled through her tears.
“It wasn’t me.”
May you like
She looked at Margaret.
“It was Edward.”
