Chapter 7 - the man margaret kept alive)
Peter Lang occupied room 204 of St. Vincent Continuing Care Center.
His records identified him as Paul Linden.
No photograph.
No family contacts.
Private payments made through a holding company called Harbor Ridge Consulting.
Detective Hart had followed the gate credential.
Its ancient security ID was connected to a Mercer family insurance file.
From there she found payments.
One every month.
Eleven years.
Margaret had not killed Peter.
She had hidden him.
Claire and Daniel were allowed to see him the following afternoon.
Peter was seventy four.
Thin.
Gray.
A stroke had weakened the left side of his body, but his eyes were alert.
When Daniel entered, Peter cried.
"I knew Robert's boy would find me."
Daniel stopped.
"Robert's boy?"
Peter smiled.
"He loved you."
Daniel moved closer.
"You knew my father?"
"I worked for his father first."
"Did Robert know I wasn't Margaret's biological child?"
Peter looked toward Claire.
"Eventually."
"When?"
"Sixteen."
Exactly what Michael had said.
Daniel sat.
"Why didn't he tell me?"
"Because he planned to."
Peter's hand shook.
"He was collecting evidence."
"About my birth?"
"About everything."
Claire leaned forward.
"What does everything mean?"
Peter looked at her carefully.
"You are Claire."
"Yes."
"Robert would have liked you."
Daniel almost laughed from the absurdity.
"You've never met her."
"I know what she did."
Claire frowned.
"What did I do?"
"You refused the waiver."
Claire looked at Detective Hart.
Hart looked equally surprised.
"How could you know that?"
Peter smiled faintly.
"News travels in rich families faster than infection in hospitals."
Daniel's patience thinned.
"Why did my mother hide you here?"
Peter's smile disappeared.
"I asked the wrong question."
"What question?"
"Who was the second baby?"
Claire felt the room become colder.
Michael had repeated Peter's strange sentence.
His mother wasn't the only woman pregnant that night.
Daniel moved closer.
"What second baby?"
Peter looked toward the door.
Detective Hart closed it.
Peter whispered.
"October 14. St. Matthew's Hospital. Two births were removed from the official registry."
"Mine and whose?"
"I don't know."
Daniel stood.
"How can you not know?"
"Because when I found the backup ledger, someone had torn out the identification page."
"Who?"
"I assumed William."
"My grandfather."
Peter nodded.
"He controlled everything."
Claire asked.
"Where is the ledger now?"
Peter's eyes moved to Daniel.
"Robert hid it."
"Where?"
"At the house."
"The hidden room?"
Peter shook his head.
"Margaret knew about the hidden room."
Daniel's face tightened.
"Then where?"
Peter looked almost amused.
"Where Robert said the Mercer family never looked."
Claire waited.
Peter closed his eyes.
He seemed exhausted.
"Below the thing they worship."
Daniel frowned.
"Money?"
Peter opened his eyes.
"Exactly."
Claire looked at Daniel.
"The safe?"
Daniel shook his head.
"Too obvious."
Peter whispered.
"Not a safe."
Detective Hart interrupted.
"Mr. Lang, we need to understand how you ended up here."
Peter looked away.
"After Robert died, I continued his investigation."
"Who were you working for?"
"Michael Reyes."
Daniel frowned.
"So Michael was telling the truth."
"About some things."
"What wasn't he telling the truth about?"
Peter looked at him.
"He said he was your father."
"He might be."
Peter shook his head.
"He might not."
Daniel's face went blank.
Claire spoke.
"You found another possibility."
"Yes."
"Who?"
Peter hesitated.
Then whispered.
"Robert."
Daniel stared.
"My father?"
Peter nodded.
"The man who raised you may also have been your biological father."
Daniel stepped backward.
"How?"
Peter looked toward the ceiling as though the answer had been waiting there for decades.
"Because Robert and Evelyn were together before Margaret married him."
Claire felt stunned.
Daniel seemed unable to speak.
Peter continued.
"Margaret knew."
"You're saying my biological mother may be Evelyn and my biological father may be Robert."
"Yes."
"Then Michael..."
"May have been wrong."
"Does Evelyn know?"
"I don't know."
"Does Margaret?"
Peter looked frightened again.
"She knows enough."
Claire asked.
"Why hide you instead of killing you?"
Peter gave a tired laugh.
"That is the question you should ask her."
Detective Hart said, "We will."
Peter suddenly grabbed Daniel's wrist.
His weakened fingers barely closed.
"Listen."
Daniel leaned down.
"If you find the ledger, don't take it to the police first."
Hart raised an eyebrow.
Peter ignored her.
"Why?" Daniel asked.
"Because there are names in it that still have power."
"Whose names?"
Peter's breathing became faster.
He looked at Claire.
Then at Daniel.
"The baby trade didn't stop with you."
Claire went cold.
"What baby trade?"
Peter released Daniel.
A nurse entered after the heart monitor changed rhythm.
The visit ended.
Outside the facility, Daniel leaned against their car.
Claire stood beside him.
"Robert could be my biological father."
"Maybe."
"Michael could have spent thirty five years believing I was his son."
"Maybe."
"My mother could be my aunt."
"Yes."
He looked at her.
"That's the only part we're certain about?"
Claire almost smiled.
"The DNA is strong."
Daniel laughed once.
Then he cried.
Claire held him.
Not because everything between them was repaired.
It wasn't.
But because some pain existed outside marriage arguments.
Some pain needed simple human contact.
That night they returned to the Mercer estate with Detective Hart and a court order permitting examination of several rooms connected to Peter's allegations.
Margaret watched from the foyer.
"You are destroying Robert's memory."
Daniel stopped.
"No. I'm looking for what he left me."
Margaret's eyes flickered.
There.
Claire saw it.
"Daniel."
He turned.
"She knows where it is."
Margaret's expression hardened.
Claire remembered Peter's words.
Below the thing they worship.
Money.
Not a safe.
Something they worshipped.
Daniel looked through the foyer.
A bronze statue of William Mercer stood on a marble pedestal.
The founder.
The man whose portrait hung in three rooms.
The man whose name was printed across the family foundation.
Claire walked toward it.
Margaret moved.
"No."
Too fast.
Too instinctive.
Daniel saw it.
They lifted the bronze statue.
Under the pedestal was a brass plate.
Daniel removed four screws.
Inside was a narrow cavity.
And inside the cavity lay a ledger wrapped in plastic.
Margaret closed her eyes.
Claire pulled it out.
May you like
Written across the cover were two words.
MATERNITY TRANSFERS.
