Chapter 12 - The Mercer WillMy father had designed the final betrayal decades before I was born.
Margaret had taken Lucy through a hidden tunnel.
Michael and I followed.
Rebecca stayed with the wounded detective.
The tunnel led beneath Saint Agnes and into an old railway passage.
Snow blew through a collapsed wall.
No footprints.
No cars.
Nothing.
I wanted to tear the world apart.
Michael caught my arm.
“We're too late.”
I shoved him away.
“Then help me.”
“I am.”
“Then stop lying.”
He stared at me.
“About what?”
“The will.”
He went quiet.
“You knew the will named someone.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Michael pulled a folded paper from his coat.
“My father told me before he died.”
He handed it to me.
I read the final clause.
The Mercer empire shall belong to the child who survives the Parker line.
I looked at him.
“What does that mean?”
“It means the heir isn't a person.”
“Then what is it?”
“It's proof.”
Michael explained.
Thomas Mercer had built his empire around stolen land and manipulated trusts.
But if the records were exposed, everything could collapse.
The Parker children had been born from women whose families owned property Thomas wanted.
He had altered births, forged guardianships, and transferred land through fraudulent estates.
Lucy wasn't valuable because she was my daughter.
She was valuable because her DNA could invalidate twenty-seven years of legal records.
She was living evidence.
I looked toward Saint Agnes.
“So Margaret wants her alive.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To force me to sign the company away.”
Michael nodded.
“Your father's final trust activates when you sign.”
“And if I don't?”
“Lucy disappears.”
I looked at him.
“Where is the original trust?”
“At the courthouse.”
“The one in Harrisburg?”
“Yes.”
We drove through the storm.
The courthouse archives were empty at midnight.
Too empty.
The doors opened for me.
Security cameras were turned off.
Every light was on.
But nobody was there.
A red envelope waited on the central desk.
Inside was a photograph of Lucy.
Alive.
Bound to a chair.
Behind her stood Margaret.
The message beneath it said:
BRING THE WILL. COME ALONE.
Michael reached for his weapon.
I stopped him.
“This is what she wants.”
“Then what do we do?”
I looked at the photograph.
“We give her exactly what she asked for.”
“But you said we can't trust—”
“I didn't say we would give her the real will.”
Michael stared at me.
“You changed.”
“No.”
May you like
I folded the photograph.
“I finally became my father's son.”
