Chapter 15 - THE NAME BENEATH THE FLOOR
By dawn, the mansion had become a sealed crime scene.
Police searched Richard’s office, the hidden archive, and every vehicle on the estate.
Daniel contacted the company board and froze all transactions linked to his father.
Thomas returned to the repair shop under protection.
Ashley remained in the mansion, no longer treated as a guest or an enemy, but as another person whose identity had been shaped by someone else’s plan.
Emily stood alone in the nursery that had once belonged to Daniel.
According to the old floor plans, Laura had stayed in this room during the final months before the accident.
The nursery had been renovated many times, yet one section of floor beneath the window appeared older than the rest.
Emily knelt.
A thin brass line ran between two wooden boards.
She inserted the key from the velvet box.
The floor panel lifted.
Inside was a narrow metal case.
Daniel entered as Emily removed it.
“You found something.”
“I don’t know.”
Ashley appeared behind him.
Neither woman objected to the other’s presence.
Emily placed the case on a small table.
Two locks were set into its lid.
The brass keys fit again.
Emily and Daniel turned them together.
Inside lay three objects.
A sealed laboratory envelope.
A child’s red bracelet.
And a cassette tape labeled:
FOR MY DAUGHTERS.
Ashley sat down.
“Daughters,” she repeated.
Emily picked up the bracelet.
A faded name was printed inside.
ANNA BLACKWOOD.
Ashley reached for it, then stopped.
Emily handed it to her.
The laboratory envelope contained old DNA test results.
Most of the page had been damaged by moisture, but several lines remained readable.
MATERNAL COMPARISON: CONFIRMED.
PATERNAL COMPARISON: EXCLUDED.
SUBJECT A AND SUBJECT E: NO BIOLOGICAL SIBLING RELATIONSHIP.
Emily stared at the result.
She and Ashley were not sisters.
Only one of them was Laura’s daughter.
Possibly neither.
Daniel found an old cassette player in the archive and brought it upstairs.
Emily inserted the tape.
Static filled the nursery.
Then Laura’s voice spoke.
“If you are hearing this, Richard has failed to destroy the last record.”
Ashley gripped the red bracelet.
Laura continued.
“There were not two children in the hospital plan.”
Emily looked at Daniel.
“There were three.”
A baby cried faintly in the background of the recording.
“Marianne took one child. Thomas protected another. I carried the third away from the Blackwood estate.”
Ashley whispered, “Three?”
Laura’s voice weakened.
“Richard believed the trust would pass to the child labeled Subject E. That was the lie I created to protect the true heir.”
Emily leaned closer to the player.
“The child called Emily was never Subject E.”
A knock sounded downstairs.
Then another.
Harder.
Daniel moved toward the nursery door.
The mansion’s intercom activated.
Mrs. Greene’s frightened voice filled the room.
“Mr. Daniel, there is a woman at the front gate.”
Daniel pressed the wall control.
“Who is she?”
“She says she is Marianne Laurent.”
Ashley stood.
The cassette continued playing.
Laura’s voice said:
“Marianne knows where I took the third child.”
Emily moved toward the window.
At the front gate, an older woman stepped out of a black car.
Even from a distance, Ashley recognized her.
“Mother.”
But the woman was not alone.
A tall man emerged from the opposite side of the vehicle.
Emily’s heart stopped.
He looked almost exactly like Daniel.
Not similar.
Not distantly related.
Almost identical.
Daniel stared through the window.
“I don’t have a brother.”
The cassette crackled.
Laura’s final recorded words filled the room.
May you like
“When the man wearing Daniel Blackwood’s face arrives, do not let him enter the house.”
Downstairs, the front door opened.
