Chapter 29 - The Message
“I’m going with you.”
Mark said it before I even finished reading the message.
I shook my head.
“No.”
“Hannah.”
“He said alone.”
“That doesn't mean you have to obey.”
“I need to know who he is.”
“You can know with someone standing beside you.”
Jonathan stepped between us.
“Mark is right.”
I looked at him.
“That's surprising.”
He ignored it.
“You don't go alone.”
Miriam nodded.
“The message could be a test.”
“Or a trap.”
“Exactly.”
I looked at Elias.
He had gone completely still.
“What?”
He stared at my phone.
“That's not his number.”
“What?”
“The number belongs to me.”
I looked at the screen.
He was right.
The call had come from Elias's own phone number.
But Elias's phone was on the table.
Not ringing.
Mark picked it up.
The screen was frozen.
“Someone cloned your phone.”
Elias went pale.
“That's impossible.”
Miriam shook her head.
“No.”
She looked toward the door.
“They're inside.”
A sound came from the hallway.
One step.
Then another.
Eleanor's voice came through the speaker overhead.
“Hannah.”
I looked up.
“You're wasting time.”
Mark raised his weapon.
“How did she get onto the system?”
Miriam answered:
“Because she built it.”
The speakers crackled.
Eleanor continued.
“You have eight minutes.”
“Until what?”
“Until the police enter.”
I looked at Jonathan.
“Then let's leave.”
He nodded.
But Martin stopped us.
“No.”
We turned.
Martin held another file.
“You can't go to the station.”
“Why?”
“Because I found this.”
He handed it to me.
A surveillance report.
Photographs of the station.
Four men positioned around it.
One photograph showed a man waiting on the platform.
Older.
Gray hair.
My stomach turned.
“Is that him?”
Martin nodded.
“Yes.”
“You've seen him?”
“No.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because his face is in Eleanor's files.”
I stared at the photograph.
The man's face was partially hidden.
But there was something about his posture.
Something familiar.
I looked at Elias.
He stepped closer.
The color left his face.
“That's him.”
“Who?”
“Your father.”
The room fell silent.
“Then why would he be waiting there?”
“Because he knows we're coming.”
Martin shook his head.
“No.”
“What?”
“He isn't waiting for you.”
“Then who?”
Martin pointed at the photograph.
“At the woman beside him.”
I looked.
There was a second figure.
A woman.
Dark hair.
Hat.
Only half her face visible.
I zoomed in.
My heart stopped.
I knew her.
I had seen that face before.
In the photograph at the Black House.
My mother's face.
I looked at Jonathan.
“That's my mother.”
“Yes.”
My voice shook.
“She’s alive.”
“Yes.”
Mark stared at the screen.
“Then the trap isn't for Hannah.”
“No.”
Martin's face was grim.
“It's for both of them.”
I looked at Eleanor's security map.
The station.
The road.
The police blockade.
A trap.
But there was something else.
A small red dot on the map.
Inside the Carter estate.
I zoomed in.
A camera.
One of the investigators' vehicles was parked directly outside the house.
I thought about the fake fraud case.
The manipulated images.
The cloned phone.
The staged evidence.
Then I understood.
They weren't trying to arrest me.
They wanted to force me to run.
They wanted me to lead them to my parents.
I looked at Martin.
“You knew this.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“An hour ago.”
“And you waited.”
“Because I needed to know whether you could see the pattern.”
Rachel stepped forward.
“You knew she'd figure it out.”
“I hoped.”
She looked at him.
“You keep making decisions for everyone.”
“I know.”
“And you call that protection.”
“I call it survival.”
She slapped him.
The sound echoed through the room.
Martin didn't react.
Rachel's hand trembled.
“You don't get to decide what happens to me anymore.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Her eyes filled.
“You don't.”
She turned toward me.
“Hannah.”
I looked at her.
“Whatever happens next, I don't want to lie to you again.”
“Then don't.”
Rachel took a breath.
“I found something.”
She handed me a small memory card.
“What's this?”
“The original recordings.”
“Of what?”
“My mother.”
I stared.
“Your mother?”
“Margaret.”
“What did she record?”
“Everything.”
I looked at Martin.
He had gone pale.
“What?”
He whispered:
“Rachel, don't.”
She turned on him.
“You don't get to tell me what to do.”
She looked at me.
“Margaret knew Eleanor was alive.”
My stomach dropped.
“What else?”
“She knew where your mother was.”
Silence.
“Where?”
Rachel pointed to the memory card.
“The recording says she kept her in a clinic.”
“What clinic?”
“Ridgeway.”
I frowned.
There was a hospital by that name.
Miriam stepped forward.
“Ridgeway closed twelve years ago.”
Rachel shook her head.
“Not the public one.”
She looked at me.
“A private facility.”
Elias grabbed the table.
“No.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“That's where they took your mother.”
Miriam turned.
“How do you know?”
“Because I paid for it.”
Everyone froze.
“You?”
Elias's eyes filled with shame.
“I thought I was paying for her safety.”
“Who did you pay?”
He whispered:
“Martin.”
I turned toward Martin.
His face was empty.
“You took my money.”
“I used it to keep the clinic operating.”
“You knew my mother was there.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because Eleanor was watching.”
“You could have told Thomas.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“Thomas told me to wait.”
I stared at him.
“Eleven years.”
“Yes.”
“You let me believe she was dead for eleven years.”
Martin's voice broke.
“If I had told you, Eleanor would have found her.”
“You don't know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
He looked at Rachel.
“My father died because he tried to tell someone.”
Rachel stared at him.
“Who?”
“My sister.”
Caroline stepped forward.
“You had a sister?”
Martin nodded.
“Her name was Anna.”
“When did she die?”
“Eleven years ago.”
I understood.
The missing sister.
The hidden family.
The reason Martin had become obsessed with controlling pressure.
The reason he was terrified of Eleanor.
But before anyone could speak, the entire house shook.
A window exploded.
Then another.
Gunfire erupted outside.
Jonathan shouted:
“Down!”
We dropped.
Police vehicles outside were burning.
Someone had attacked them.
Mark crawled toward me.
“What is happening?”
Miriam looked at the monitor.
Her face changed.
“They're here.”
“Who?”
“The people Eleanor was afraid of.”
A black SUV crashed through the front gate.
The doors opened.
Armed men poured out.
At the center of them stood an older man.
Gray-haired.
Weak.
Unmistakable.
The man from the photograph.
My father.
He looked directly at the house.
Then raised a hand.
Every gunman stopped.
He shouted:
“Eleanor!”
The speakers came alive.
Eleanor answered.
“Yes?”
The man looked toward the building.
“You promised me she would never be used.”
Eleanor smiled.
“She wasn't.”
He looked up.
“She is now.”
Then he turned toward the windows.
And called my name.
“Hannah.”
The entire room froze.
He said:
“Come out.”
I stepped forward.
Mark grabbed my arm.
“No.”
My father looked directly at me through the glass.
And then he said the one thing nobody in that room expected.
“Your mother is not my wife.”
I stopped.
He continued.
May you like
“She is your grandmother's prisoner.”
Eleanor's smile vanished.
