Chapter 3 - The Locked Room
Emily did not go directly home.
She spent the next hour driving through crowded streets, checking her mirrors for the black sedan.
No one appeared to be following her.
At noon, Ethan called again.
“Where are you?”
“In the car.”
“Is Noah with you?”
“He’s at school.”
“You should pick him up.”
“Why?”
“My mother left the house.”
Emily tightened her grip on the steering wheel.
“Where did she go?”
“I don’t know. She said she had an appointment.”
“Do you believe her?”
“No.”
It was the first time he had answered without defending Margaret.
Emily pulled into a supermarket parking lot.
“What do you know about Anna?”
“Very little.”
“Tell me.”
Ethan exhaled.
“When I was fifteen, I found letters in my mother’s closet. They were addressed to someone named Anna Mercer.”
“What did they say?”
“I only read one line before Mom caught me.”
“What line?”
Ethan hesitated.
“Give him back before he learns what you are.”
Emily felt cold despite the sunlight filling the car.
“What happened after she caught you?”
“She burned the letters.”
“And you never asked again?”
“I did. She said Anna was a disturbed cousin who became obsessed with me after losing her own child.”
“That story makes no sense.”
“I was fifteen.”
“You’re thirty-six now.”
He did not answer.
Emily immediately regretted the cruelty in her voice.
“I’m sorry.”
“No. You’re right.”
For years, Ethan had treated his mother’s secrecy as an unpleasant personality trait. He avoided questions because questions caused arguments, tears, or sudden health crises.
Margaret had trained him to stop asking.
“I’m coming home early,” he said.
“Don’t tell her what we found.”
“I won’t.”
“And change every password.”
“I already did.”
Emily looked at the note from Claire.
There was an address written on it, an old industrial district near the river.
“I need to check something.”
“Emily, don’t do anything dangerous.”
“I won’t.”
It was a lie.
At eight that evening, she parked outside an abandoned garment factory.
The building’s upper windows were broken. Weeds grew through cracks in the parking lot.
Claire waited near a side entrance.
“You came alone?”
“Yes.”
“Where is Noah?”
“With Ethan.”
Claire unlocked the door and led her through a dim corridor.
“Who are you?” Emily asked.
“Anna Mercer was my sister.”
Emily stopped walking.
“You said she was Ethan’s mother.”
“She was.”
“Margaret claims Anna died.”
“Anna did die.”
“But you told me Margaret did the same thing to her.”
“I meant the surveillance. The isolation. Convincing people she was unstable.”
Claire opened a metal door.
Inside was a small room filled with boxes, photographs, and stacks of documents.
A large map covered one wall.
Red pins marked hospitals, houses, churches, and several cemeteries.
At the center was a photograph of Margaret.
“What is all this?”
“Thirty-six years of trying to prove what happened.”
Emily looked at the boxes.
“If Anna died, why does Margaret fear her?”
“Because before Anna died, she told someone the truth.”
“Who?”
“A doctor named Samuel Reed.”
The name meant nothing to Emily yet.
Claire opened a box and removed an old cassette tape.
“My sister met Robert Hale when she was twenty-two. He was married to Margaret.”
Ethan’s father had died when Ethan was nine. Margaret rarely spoke about him except to describe him as weak and irresponsible.
“Did Robert have an affair with Anna?”
“Yes. Anna became pregnant. Robert promised to leave Margaret, but he never did.”
“And Margaret took the baby?”
Claire nodded.
“Anna went into labor six weeks early at St. Catherine’s private maternity wing. Margaret worked there as an administrator. She controlled records, staff access, and patient transfers.”
“What happened?”
“The official record says Anna delivered a stillborn boy and died from internal bleeding.”
“But Ethan lived.”
“Yes.”
Claire placed a photograph on the table.
It showed a newborn wrapped in a hospital blanket.
A nurse held him beside a clock displaying 4:17 a.m.
“Dr. Reed took this photograph because he suspected someone was altering the records.”
“Why didn’t he report it?”
“He tried. The hospital director threatened him. Robert Hale paid him to leave the state.”
“Robert knew?”
“Robert arranged it.”
Emily’s stomach twisted.
“Why would Ethan’s father help steal him?”
“Because Margaret could not have children. Robert wanted his wife satisfied and his scandal erased.”
“And Anna?”
“Left to die.”
Emily stared at the newborn photograph.
“Why are you showing me this now?”
“Because Margaret has begun repeating her pattern.”
“With me.”
“With Noah.”
Emily shook her head.
“Noah is my biological son.”
“I know.”
“Then why would she take him?”
Claire walked to the wall map and removed a recent photograph.
It showed Margaret entering a legal office.
“She filed a confidential petition claiming you were mentally unstable and planning to abduct your child.”
Emily remembered the altered school account.
“She’s building evidence.”
“She has been building it for months.”
Claire handed her another document.
It was a photocopy of a life insurance application.
The insured person was Noah.
The policyholder was Margaret Hale.
Benefit amount: two million dollars.
Emily could barely speak.
“How did she get this?”
“She forged Ethan’s signature.”
“Why insure Noah?”
“I don’t know.”
Claire looked genuinely frightened.
“That is what worries me.”
A sound came from the corridor.
Metal scraping against concrete.
Claire switched off the lamp.
“Did anyone follow you?”
“No.”
The doorknob moved.
Claire grabbed Emily’s arm and pulled her behind a shelf.
The door opened.
A figure entered carrying a flashlight.
The beam swept across the boxes.
Emily pressed both hands over her mouth.
The figure walked to the table and picked up the newborn photograph.
Then a familiar voice whispered, “Where did she hide the tape?”
May you like
Emily’s blood turned cold.
It was Margaret.
