Chapter 15 - the child nobody had been searching for)
Daniel stared at the sentence until the letters seemed to shift.
There were never only two Mercer girls.
Mara entered the study ten minutes later.
She saw the photograph.
Her face changed instantly.
Daniel knew.
"You've seen this."
Mara did not answer.
He stood.
"No more secrets."
She closed the door.
"Daniel."
"No."
His voice was low so the children would not hear.
"We are done with everyone deciding what I can handle."
Mara slowly approached the desk.
She touched the photograph.
"I've never seen this exact picture."
"But you recognize the children."
"Lila. Sophie. Eli."
"And him?"
Her finger stopped above the fourth child.
A boy around six years old.
Blond hair.
Gray eyes.
Mara whispered.
"Lucas."
"Who is Lucas?"
"I don't know his last name."
"Where is he?"
"I thought he was dead."
Daniel laughed without humor.
"Nobody stays dead in this family."
"This isn't funny."
"I know."
Mara sat.
She explained that Sophie once talked about another child from the facility where she spent her early years.
Lucas.
They were tested together.
Moved together.
Sometimes punished together.
Mara had searched for him.
The records said he died at age five.
"Why is he in a photograph with Lila?"
"I don't know."
"Lila never lived at that facility."
"Not that we know of."
Daniel looked at the image again.
The background appeared to be a garden.
Date stamp had been removed.
Eli looked younger.
Lila and Sophie looked approximately four.
That meant all four children had met years before the Hollow Creek incident.
But Daniel had no memory of Lila ever being away long enough for such a meeting.
He called Lila downstairs.
He hated involving her.
But the photograph already involved her.
She looked at it.
Immediately she said.
"Lucas."
Daniel's heart sank.
"You remember him?"
"Yes."
"Where did you meet him?"
Lila frowned.
"School."
"What school?"
"The night school."
Mara and Daniel exchanged looks.
"What is the night school?"
Lila shrugged.
"The place Mommy took me when Daddy traveled."
Daniel slowly turned toward Mara.
Mara looked genuinely horrified.
"I never took her anywhere called that."
Lila stared at her mother.
"Yes, you did."
"No, sweetheart."
"Yes."
Lila became frightened.
"The other Mommy."
Daniel felt cold.
Evelyn.
While Daniel traveled for business, Evelyn sometimes impersonated Mara.
Mara covered her mouth.
"My God."
Lila continued.
"She said don't tell because it was a surprise."
"What happened there?" Daniel asked.
"We played games."
"What games?"
"Pictures. Colors. Needles sometimes."
Mara's face turned white.
Medical testing.
Project Juniper had reached Lila too.
Daniel crouched beside his daughter.
"Did Lucas talk about his family?"
Lila nodded.
"His daddy was doctor."
Mara whispered.
"Vale."
Daniel looked at her.
"You think Lucas is Adrian Vale's son?"
"Maybe."
The doorbell rang.
Everyone froze.
It was nearly midnight.
Marcus appeared on the security monitor.
He spoke into his radio.
"No vehicle. No person visible."
Daniel told the children to remain upstairs.
Mara stayed with them.
Daniel and Marcus opened the front door.
A small black package rested on the steps.
Inside was a flash drive.
Federal agents were called before anyone touched it.
The drive contained one video.
Timestamp: forty-eight hours earlier.
A man sat in a dim room.
Adrian Vale.
Older now.
Gray hair.
Thin face.
Alive.
He looked directly into the camera.
"Daniel Mercer."
Daniel's stomach tightened.
Vale smiled.
"By now you believe you understand Project Juniper."
He leaned toward the camera.
"You understand nothing."
Photographs appeared behind him.
Children.
Dozens of them.
"The project was never about fertility."
More photographs.
Medical scans.
Family trees.
"The children were not mistakes."
Vale's expression became almost proud.
"They were the objective."
Daniel clenched his fists.
Vale continued.
"Your father understood too late. Elizabeth Bennett understood too late. Thomas Reed understood too late."
A pause.
"And Mara still doesn't understand at all."
Daniel looked toward her.
Mara looked terrified.
Vale picked up a photograph.
The same photograph from Daniel's envelope.
Four children.
"Three of these children are currently inside your home."
Daniel's heart stopped.
Lila.
Sophie.
Eli.
Vale tapped Lucas's face.
"The fourth is coming."
The video ended.
Marcus immediately ordered the estate sealed.
Federal agents searched the grounds.
Nothing.
At 1:32 a.m., the security system detected movement near the eastern gate.
A boy stood beneath the camera.
Approximately twelve years old now.
Blond hair.
Gray eyes.
He carried no bag.
No coat despite the freezing night.
Daniel watched the screen.
Lucas.
The supposedly dead child.
Marcus spoke through the gate intercom.
"State your name."
The boy looked directly into the camera.
"Lucas."
Daniel rushed downstairs.
Mara followed despite his protests.
Lila and Sophie appeared at the top of the staircase.
Lila saw the monitor.
Her face lit with recognition.
"Lucas."
Daniel ordered her upstairs.
She did not move.
At the gate, Lucas lifted something toward the camera.
An old photograph.
Then he said.
"I need to see Daniel Mercer."
Marcus asked why.
Lucas looked over his shoulder into the darkness.
"Because he thinks Adrian Vale is coming for the children."
Daniel leaned closer to the screen.
Lucas continued.
"He's wrong."
A faint movement appeared behind the boy.
Someone stood among the trees.
Watching.
Lucas turned toward the shadow.
For the first time, fear crossed his face.
Then he looked back into the camera.
"Vale isn't trying to take them."
Daniel pressed the intercom button.
"Then what does he want?"
Lucas stared directly at him.
"He's trying to stop the person who is."
The eastern security lights suddenly went dark.
Every alarm in the Mercer estate began ringing at once.
Marcus reached for his weapon.
Mara grabbed Daniel's arm.
Upstairs, Lila screamed.
A second later the entire house lost power.
In the darkness, Daniel heard the front door unlock.
Not break.
Unlock.
Someone already had the code.
Then a voice came from the entrance hall.
A voice Daniel had not heard since childhood.
"Daniel?"
He stopped breathing.
Mara whispered.
"Who is that?"
Daniel knew.
The last time he heard that voice, he had been nine years old.
He turned slowly toward the dark hallway.
"Mom?"
Eleanor Mercer had supposedly been sleeping at her assisted living residence twenty miles away.
But the woman standing inside Daniel's house sounded exactly like her.
A flashlight switched on.
For half a second Daniel saw an elderly woman's face.
Then another figure appeared behind her.
A man.
Tall.
Gray-haired.
Samuel Mercer.
Daniel's missing uncle.
Samuel raised one finger to his lips.
Eleanor whispered something Daniel could not understand.
Then Samuel looked past Daniel toward the staircase where Lila and Sophie stood.
His expression filled with fear.
"Get the girls out of this house."
Daniel stared at him.
"Why?"
Samuel looked toward the dark windows.
"Because Vale finally told the truth."
"What truth?"
Samuel swallowed.
"Project Juniper wasn't created by Adrian Vale."
Daniel felt Mara's hand tighten around his arm.
"Then who created it?"
Samuel looked at Eleanor.
Daniel followed his gaze toward his mother.
Eleanor's face changed.
Not fear.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
Then she quietly said,
"I did."
Outside, somewhere beyond the blackened security gates, Lucas began pounding desperately against the metal.
And from the woods came the sound of approaching engines.
More than one.
Daniel looked at his mother.
At Samuel.
At Mara.
At his two daughters standing together at the top of the stairs.
For the first time he understood that the mystery had not begun with Mara's disappearance.
It had not begun with Project Juniper.
It had not even begun with his father.
It had begun decades earlier with the woman who had raised Daniel and Victor, the woman everyone had dismissed as an elderly widow who knew nothing about Hollow Creek.
Eleanor Mercer looked at her granddaughters.
Tears filled her eyes.
Then she said the words that would open a new chapter Daniel had never imagined.
"Before those men reach the house, there is something you need to know about Lila, Sophie and Lucas."
The engines grew louder.
Daniel stepped closer.
"What?"
Eleanor opened her mouth.
May you like
Before she could answer, the first window shattered.
And the truth remained unspoken.
