Chapter 13 - The House Stephen BoughtStephen's house had been sold again two months earlier.
Which meant he had moved everything.
But Rebecca remembered one thing.
The photograph had been inside a box of childhood memories.
And that box had never been moved.
It was still in the attic.
The new owner was a woman named Helen Park.
She agreed to let us search.
Inside the attic, Rebecca found the box.
The photograph was there.
She turned it over.
The back panel opened.
Inside was a memory card.
We watched the footage on a laptop.
Frank appeared.
He was sitting in his car.
He looked directly into the camera.
“Rebecca,” he said.
My daughter covered her mouth.
“If you're watching this, I am probably dead.”
Frank paused.
“There are people who will tell you I betrayed your mother.”
I started crying.
“They are lying.”
He continued.
“I made mistakes.”
“Big ones.”
“But I never stopped trying to protect your mother.”
He explained Bellwood.
Daniel's debt.
Stephen's manipulation.
The mineral rights.
Then he said the thing that changed everything.
“Daniel is guilty.”
My heart broke.
“But he is not the person who started this.”
Frank looked down.
“The person who started it is someone I once considered family.”
Rebecca whispered:
“Who?”
Frank looked at the camera.
“My brother.”
I froze.
Frank had an older brother.
Thomas.
He had died fifteen years earlier.
Impossible.
The video continued.
“Thomas didn't die.”
Rebecca stared.
“What?”
Frank explained that Thomas had faked his death to escape debts.
He had returned under another identity.
Stephen Ward.
The room went silent.
Stephen wasn't a random lawyer.
He was Frank's brother.
And the entire operation began decades earlier.
Bellwood had been Thomas's creation.
Frank had spent years trying to keep the truth buried.
But Daniel had gotten involved.
Thomas used that opportunity to pull the family into the scheme.
Rebecca stopped the video.
“Mom.”
I could barely speak.
“Your father knew Stephen was Thomas?”
“Yes.”
“He let me think his brother was dead.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To protect you.”
She restarted the video.
Frank continued.
Thomas knows about the gas rights.
He knows about Claire.
He knows about everything.
If he ever threatens Margaret, release the archive.
Then he looked directly at the camera.
But don't give it to the police first.
Give it to the newspaper.
Because there are people inside the system who owe Thomas favors.
Rebecca stopped the recording.
Nobody spoke.
Then David's phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed.
“What?”
He listened.
Then said:
“When?”
He ended the call.
“Stephen is gone.”
“Where?”
“No one knows.”
The investigator's phone rang immediately afterward.
He answered.
Then looked at us.
“Daniel is missing.”
My stomach dropped.
“From the hospital?”
“Yes.”
“Did he leave voluntarily?”
“No.”
I looked at Rebecca.
Her face had gone white.
“Someone took him.”
We searched the hospital cameras.
A man had entered disguised as a maintenance worker.
He had taken Daniel through a rear exit.
The investigator found the vehicle.
It belonged to Stephen.
Or Thomas.
Whatever name he was using.
Rebecca looked at me.
“We have to release the archive.”
David shook his head.
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
“Because there is still one piece missing.”
“What piece?”
He looked at the bank records.
“The one-million-dollar insurance payment.”
Laura had traced the policy.
It had never been deposited into Daniel's account.
It had gone into another trust.
A trust controlled by a third party.
We searched the beneficiary.
The name stunned me.
Claire Mercer.
Claire.
The daughter Frank had secretly protected.
I looked at Evelyn.
She was crying.
“Frank never forgot her,” she said.
Rebecca stared at the file.
“Then why didn't he give her the money?”
Evelyn whispered:
“Because he wasn't sure she was safe.”
A message suddenly appeared on Rebecca's phone.
Unknown number.
One sentence.
STOP SEARCHING.
Then another.
YOUR BROTHER IS ALIVE.
A third message arrived.
And this one made my blood run cold.
YOUR HUSBAND WASN'T THE LAST PERSON FRANK CALLOWAY SPOKE TO.
Rebecca looked at me.
“Mom.”
“What?”
May you like
The final message appeared.
HE SPOKE TO YOU.
