Chapter 10 - the sister nobody mentioned)
Her name was Rebecca.
Mark had never heard it.
Margaret spoke the name as though it had been waiting behind her teeth for thirty years.
“Rebecca Carter.”
Mark stared at his mother.
“How old?”
“She would be forty one now.”
“Would be?”
Margaret looked down.
“We believed she died.”
“When?”
“As a baby.”
Mark laughed in disbelief.
“So Thomas had another child. She died. Why hide it from me?”
“Because nobody could prove she died.”
Hayes leaned forward.
“Explain.”
Margaret took a breath.
“Rebecca’s mother was a woman named Laura Bennett. Thomas had a relationship with her before me. Laura gave birth privately. Thomas acknowledged the child in legal documents but never publicly.”
“What happened to Laura?”
“Car accident.”
“And Rebecca?”
“The baby disappeared afterward.”
Mark stared.
“A baby disappeared and nobody called police?”
“Police were involved. There was an investigation.”
“Then why have I never heard about this?”
“Because the Carter family buried it.”
Mark stepped away.
Elena watched anger replace shock.
“My entire life is built on things nobody bothered to tell me.”
Margaret’s eyes filled.
“I wanted to protect you.”
“From what?”
“From becoming part of what destroyed everyone else.”
Hayes interrupted gently.
“Why does Rebecca matter now?”
“Because Thomas created the original trust for his biological children.”
“Mark and Rebecca.”
“Yes.”
“If Rebecca lived?”
“She or her descendants could claim half.”
Elena felt the pieces moving again.
“Does Victoria know?”
Margaret nodded reluctantly.
“I think so.”
Mark turned.
“You told her?”
“No. She already knew Rebecca’s name when she came to Boston.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
Hayes asked the obvious question.
“Could Marshall know?”
“Yes.”
“His father worked for the Carter family during the investigation.”
Mark sat slowly.
“If Rebecca survived…”
Hayes finished.
“She would be roughly forty one.”
Elena looked at the photographs recovered from Marshall’s hotel.
“Was there a woman in them?”
Hayes paused.
Then opened a digital file on her tablet.
One image had puzzled investigators.
A woman stood beside Marshall outside a train station.
She appeared around forty.
Brown hair.
Sunglasses.
Her face partly turned away.
Mark stared.
“Who is she?”
“We don’t know.”
Margaret leaned toward the screen.
Her hand began shaking.
“What?”
Margaret touched the image.
“She looks like Laura.”
Hayes became very still.
“Rebecca’s mother?”
“Yes.”
“But Laura died.”
“I know.”
“Could it simply be family resemblance?”
Margaret nodded.
“Of course.”
Yet her voice lacked conviction.
The investigation expanded.
Police sought the unidentified woman.
Financial analysts examined the Carter trusts.
Forensics continued processing hidden recordings.
And Mark’s attorneys began preparing for Victoria’s inevitable legal attack.
Victoria herself remained in a luxury hotel under the terms of the temporary order.
She denied everything.
Her attorney accused Mark of manipulating the criminal investigation to gain custody.
Then Victoria made one mistake.
She called Elena.
The number appeared as blocked.
Elena answered because Hayes had instructed her to record suspicious contacts.
“Elena.”
Victoria’s voice.
Smooth.
Controlled.
Elena immediately activated recording.
“You shouldn’t be calling me.”
“You always were dramatic.”
“You threw Sophie.”
“You caught her.”
The casual response chilled Elena.
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“I knew you would catch her.”
Elena froze.
“You knew?”
“You were standing right there.”
“So you admit it.”
“I admit nothing.”
Victoria laughed quietly.
“You think this story ends with me in handcuffs and you becoming the hero?”
“I don’t care about being a hero.”
“No. You care about Mark.”
Elena glanced toward the hallway.
Mark was not nearby.
“This isn’t about Mark.”
“Everything is about Mark.”
“You almost killed your daughter.”
A long pause.
Then Victoria said, “Sophie is not my daughter.”
Elena stopped breathing.
“What?”
Victoria laughed again.
“Ask Mark why the hospital records were changed.”
The call ended.
Elena stared at the phone.
She immediately contacted Hayes.
Within an hour Mark, Margaret and Hayes were gathered in the study.
Mark listened to the recording twice.
“Sophie is my daughter.”
Elena watched his face.
“I know.”
“She’s trying to destabilize us.”
“Probably.”
Hayes disagreed.
“Probably isn’t enough.”
She requested Sophie’s birth records.
Everything appeared normal.
Victoria Carter listed as mother.
Mark Carter listed as father.
Hospital in Boston.
Birth three months earlier.
Then Hayes checked the original electronic entry history.
The maternal record had been modified six hours after birth.
The original file was no longer visible.
Someone with administrator access had changed it.
Mark’s face emptied.
“Why would anyone change the mother’s record?”
Hayes did not answer.
Margaret whispered, “Where was Sophie born?”
“St. Matthew’s.”
Margaret looked terrified.
“That hospital treated Laura Bennett after the accident.”
Mark turned.
“That was forty years ago.”
“I know.”
Elena remembered Victoria’s words.
Sophie is not my daughter.
Mark stood.
“No.”
Hayes said, “We need DNA.”
Mark looked at Sophie sleeping in the next room.
“Do it.”
The samples were collected that night.
Mark.
Sophie.
Margaret.
Victoria’s sample would require legal process unless investigators obtained an existing medical reference.
Results would take time.
At 11:07 p.m., Elena’s phone received another message.
Unknown sender.
A photograph.
It showed Sophie in the hospital nursery on the day she was born.
Beside the bassinet stood Victoria.
And behind Victoria stood the unidentified brown haired woman from Marshall Vale’s photographs.
The message beneath the image read:
VICTORIA TOLD ONE TRUTH.
Elena looked toward Sophie’s bedroom.
May you like
A second message arrived.
BUT SHE LIED ABOUT WHICH DAUGHTER.
