Chapter 15 - THE VOICE BEHIND THE WALL
Henry drank water while Marian examined his injuries.
Two cracked ribs.
A dislocated shoulder that had been forced back into place without anesthesia.
Cuts around both wrists.
He refused to go to a hospital.
“Malcolm controls too many physicians,” he said.
Eleanor held Jonathan’s sealed envelope.
“Where is Thomas?”
“I don’t know.”
“You said he was inside this house.”
“He entered through the old foundation tunnels.”
“The shelter?”
“Deeper than the shelter.”
Caroline sat near the window, still holding the newborn photograph.
“Why did he not come to us?”
“He does not trust Cross.”
Eleanor thought of the warning beneath the soap dish.
“Did Thomas write the message?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Cross’s suspension was not caused by his investigation.”
“What caused it?”
Henry looked toward the bedroom door.
“He falsified evidence in another case.”
Cross had never mentioned that.
“What kind of evidence?” Marian asked.
“A recording.”
Eleanor’s grip tightened around the envelope.
“He altered a recording?”
“He removed several minutes from an interrogation to protect a witness.”
“Which witness?”
“Anna.”
The room became still.
Caroline looked at Henry.
“Why would he protect her?”
“Because Anna is his mother.”
Eleanor shook her head.
“Anna said Richard was her son.”
“She has two sons.”
“Cross and Richard?”
“Yes.”
“They look nothing alike.”
“They were born ten years apart to different fathers.”
Eleanor remembered the photograph.
Thomas holding the infant identified as Richard.
“What does that make Thomas?”
“Anna’s brother and Richard’s guardian.”
“Not his father?”
“No.”
Richard had referred to Thomas as his father because Thomas had raised him.
Cross’s father remained unknown.
Eleanor looked at the sealed envelope.
“Why did Jonathan write this?”
“Open it.”
The wax seal broke easily.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
Eleanor,
If this reaches you, then the people I failed to stop have returned.
Do not search for the master index in the company archives.
It is hidden where Caroline first learned to read.
Trust the child who remembers the red door.
Do not trust anyone who claims Thomas acted alone.
Most importantly, the girl must never enter Whitmore House.
Eleanor read the final sentence again.
The girl must never enter Whitmore House.
Caroline stood beside her.
“Why would Father say that?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where did I first learn to read?”
“The nursery.”
Caroline frowned.
“We didn’t have a red door.”
Eleanor remembered a small playhouse in the garden.
Jonathan had painted its door red when Caroline was four.
She learned to recognize words from the storybooks stored inside.
“The garden playhouse.”
They went downstairs.
The house remained under federal protection, but the agents outside had no view of the rear garden.
Marian stayed with Henry.
Eleanor and Caroline crossed the wet lawn carrying flashlights.
The old playhouse stood beneath an oak tree.
Its red paint had faded to brown.
Caroline opened the door.
Dust covered the small table and shelves.
Childhood books remained stacked in one corner.
Eleanor remembered sitting there while Caroline sounded out simple words.
Home.
Mother.
Promise.
Safe.
They searched the walls and floor.
Nothing.
Caroline lifted an old alphabet board.
Behind it was a narrow compartment.
Inside rested a small black ledger.
Eleanor opened it.
The pages contained names, dates, blood types, genetic markers, adoption records, medical interventions, and coded locations.
The master index.
Caroline turned the pages quickly.
“Find my name.”
They located it near the end.
Caroline Whitmore Vale.
Beneath her name were five pregnancy records.
Not three.
Caroline stared at the page.
“I was pregnant three times.”
The index listed two additional procedures under different patient numbers.
Embryo transfers.
The first marked unsuccessful.
The second marked viable.
A birth date appeared eleven years earlier.
Beside it was a code.
Subject relocated.
Guardian designation: R.D.
Caroline’s hands shook.
“Who is R.D.?”
Eleanor searched the earlier pages.
Several protected children shared the same guardian designation.
R.D.
No full name.
No address.
Only a small red-door symbol.
Caroline continued reading.
At the bottom of her daughter’s record, someone had added a recent entry.
Return authorized upon death of E.W.
Eleanor felt cold.
“They were waiting for me to die.”
“Why?”
“So the trust would transfer without resistance.”
Caroline turned another page.
A photograph slipped out.
It showed a girl standing outside a school.
She appeared to be eleven years old.
Dark hair.
Gray eyes.
A crescent-shaped mark near her left ear.
Caroline pressed the photograph against her chest.
“My daughter.”
A date had been written on the back.
Yesterday.
“They know where she is,” Caroline whispered.
Eleanor examined the background.
A red door stood behind the girl.
Above it was the name of a school.
St. Catherine’s Academy.
Caroline immediately moved toward the playhouse exit.
“We have to go.”
“No.”
“That is my daughter.”
“Jonathan warned us that she must never enter this house.”
“We are not bringing her here.”
“We do not know whether the school is real.”
“It is enough to start.”
Eleanor caught her arm.
“It may be a trap.”
“I lost eleven years.”
“And rushing toward the first photograph may cost you everything else.”
Caroline pulled away.
“You are asking me to wait.”
“I am asking you to survive long enough to reach her.”
A twig snapped outside.
Both women turned.
A shadow passed behind the playhouse window.
Eleanor closed the ledger.
“Who is there?”
No answer.
Caroline moved behind her mother.
The red door slowly opened.
Thomas Mercer stood outside.
He was older than the bank photograph, with white hair, a scar across his jaw, and a cane in his right hand.
His eyes moved to the ledger.
“You found it.”
Eleanor faced him.
“You were in this house during Richard’s arrest.”
“Yes.”
“You gave Henry the letter.”
“Yes.”
“You know where Caroline’s daughter is.”
Thomas looked toward Caroline.
“I knew.”
“Knew?” she asked.
“She was moved yesterday.”
“By whom?”
“The guardian.”
“Who is R.D.?”
Thomas did not answer.
Caroline stepped closer.
“Tell me.”
A gunshot cracked through the garden.
The window shattered.
Thomas pulled Eleanor and Caroline to the floor.
A second bullet struck the wall.
“Stay down.”
He reached beneath his coat and drew a pistol.
Eleanor heard agents shouting near the house.
Flashlights swept across the lawn.
Thomas looked through the broken window.
“They found us faster than I expected.”
“Malcolm’s people?” Eleanor asked.
Thomas’s expression darkened.
“No.”
“Then who?”
He looked toward the upper windows of Whitmore House.
A small figure stood inside Caroline’s childhood bedroom.
A girl.
Dark hair.
Pale face.
The crescent-shaped mark visible near her left ear.
Caroline stopped breathing.
“My daughter.”
The girl raised one hand and pressed it against the glass.
Then an adult figure appeared behind her.
A hand covered the girl’s mouth.
The curtains closed.
Caroline screamed and ran toward the playhouse door.
Thomas caught her.
“Let me go!”
“You cannot enter the house.”
“She is inside!”
“That is exactly what they want you to believe.”
Eleanor stared at the closed curtains.
“But we all saw her.”
Thomas turned toward her.
“No, Eleanor.”
His voice carried terror.
“You saw the first child.”
Caroline became completely still.
“The first?”
Thomas looked down at the open master index.
He turned to the page containing Caroline’s records.
Then he pointed to the entry Eleanor had overlooked.
The second viable transfer.
The second birth date.
The second girl.
Caroline had not lost one daughter.
She had lost twins.
Before anyone could speak, every light inside Whitmore House turned on at once.
The front doors opened.
Dr. Malcolm Whitmore stepped onto the porch.
Beside him stood Richard.
No handcuffs.
No agents holding him.
Richard looked across the garden toward Eleanor.
Then he smiled.
Malcolm raised a phone to his ear.
The device in Eleanor’s pocket began to ring.
She answered without taking her eyes from them.
Malcolm’s voice came through clearly.
“You arrested the wrong son.”
May you like
Behind him, the girl in the upstairs window began pounding against the glass.
And somewhere beneath the house, another child screamed Eleanor’s name.
