Chapter 13 - The Thirty-Third Name
Arthur denied having a daughter.
Immediately.
Violently.
“That is a lie.”
Danielle watched him pace.
“Evelyn said—”
“Evelyn has lied for forty years.”
Clara entered the room.
“She wasn’t lying.”
Arthur stopped.
Clara placed a photographed ledger page on the table.
Thirty-two names.
Most replaced with numbers.
Two readable.
Jonathan Vance.
And:
Grace Vance.
Arthur stared.
“No.”
Danielle’s middle name was Grace.
Coincidence.
Maybe.
Arthur whispered, “Who is Grace?”
Clara looked toward Danielle.
“I don’t know.”
Danielle hated that look.
“What?”
Clara swallowed.
“Your adoption records.”
Danielle stared.
“I’m not adopted.”
Arthur looked at her.
Clara said softly, “Danielle…”
“No.”
Danielle’s parents were Robert and Helen Grace.
Robert died when Danielle was seventeen.
Helen died four years later.
She had childhood photographs.
Birthdays.
School records.
A whole life.
Clara was her older sister.
They shared a home.
Memories.
Family.
Clara reached for her hand.
Danielle pulled away.
“Say it.”
“When I was investigating Nathan, I found your birth certificate flagged inside Marrow.”
“Why?”
“It was reissued.”
Danielle stopped breathing.
“Reissued?”
“When you were three months old.”
Arthur sat down.
Danielle looked between them.
“No.”
Clara continued carefully.
“Mom and Dad may have adopted you privately.”
“You’re my sister.”
“Yes.”
“Biologically?”
Clara cried.
“I don’t know.”
Danielle turned away.
The room blurred.
Everything in her life had already been manipulated.
Her company.
Her mentor.
Her fiancé.
Now childhood.
Arthur whispered, “How old was Grace Vance?”
Clara looked at the ledger.
“Infant.”
Arthur went pale.
Danielle looked at him.
“You had a baby daughter?”
“No.”
“You just said—”
“I said I didn’t.”
Arthur covered his mouth.
Then looked at the ledger.
“But Evelyn was pregnant once.”
Silence.
“When?”
“Two years after Jonathan was born.”
“What happened?”
“She lost the baby.”
“Girl?”
Arthur nodded.
“We never named her.”
Danielle felt dizzy.
“How old would she be?”
Arthur calculated.
Then stopped.
Clara whispered, “Forty-one.”
Danielle was twenty-nine.
Not Danielle.
Relief arrived.
Then disappeared.
Because the dates did not align.
Grace Vance could not be Danielle.
Unless the ledger was not listing birth dates.
Clara pointed.
“These numbers aren’t ages.”
“What are they?”
“Recovery dates.”
Arthur looked at her.
“Recovery from Janus.”
“Yes.”
Grace Vance appeared on the ledger seventeen years after Evelyn’s miscarriage.
Arthur stared.
“That’s impossible.”
Danielle said, “Maybe Grace wasn’t the baby.”
Arthur looked toward her.
Clara turned another page.
A photograph.
Teenage girl.
Approximately fourteen.
Blonde.
Standing beside Thomas Reid.
On the back:
GRACE / RECOVERED / 1998.
Arthur’s knees nearly failed.
He held the photograph.
Danielle saw why.
The girl resembled Evelyn.
Strongly.
Arthur whispered, “That’s her.”
“What?”
“My mother.”
Danielle frowned.
“The girl looks like your mother?”
“No.”
Arthur shook his head.
“She looks like Evelyn’s mother.”
Danielle stared.
That made no sense.
Unless Grace was related to Evelyn, not Arthur.
Before they could continue, Lena entered.
“We found Nathan.”
Everyone turned.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Marrow.”
Danielle grabbed her coat.
Lena stopped her.
“You need to hear the rest.”
Nathan had been found inside a basement surgical room.
Shot once.
Still alive.
Beside him were burned records.
Destroyed drives.
And the body of Reed Dalton.
Lena continued.
“Nathan said one thing before surgery.”
“What?”
“He said Jonathan attacked them.”
Arthur closed his eyes.
Danielle asked, “Did he say where Jonathan went?”
“No.”
“What did he take?”
Lena looked at Clara.
“The recovery ledger.”
Clara went pale.
“That’s impossible.”
“Why?”
Clara opened her handbag.
Pulled out a small leather book.
“I have it.”
Everyone stared.
The ledger taken from Marrow was a second copy.
Danielle whispered, “There are two.”
Clara shook her head.
“No.”
She opened hers.
“Mine has thirty-two names.”
Lena handed her a photograph from the crime scene.
The Marrow ledger showed thirty-three.
One extra name.
The last entry had not burned.
DANIELLE GRACE.
Danielle stared at it.
Her full name.
Beside it was a designation.
CANDIDATE D.
May you like
And beneath that:
STATUS: ACTIVE.
