Chapter 13 - Inside the PanThe police returned the skillet as evidence.
We examined every inch.
Nothing.
Then Lily noticed a scratch along the handle.
She pressed it.
The bottom plate popped loose.
Inside was a tiny metal compartment.
Hidden beneath it was a microfilm strip.
My heart raced.
Daniel found a reader at the police station.
The film contained dozens of pages.
Birth records.
Hospital transfers.
Adoption records.
Financial transactions.
Names of children.
And one handwritten page.
My grandmother's writing.
If you are reading this, they found a way to erase the truth.
I kept reading.
Thomas believes children can be moved like property. Margaret believes silence is protection. Vanessa believes what they are doing is necessary. They are all wrong.
Then another line.
Rachel is the only one I trust.
I stared.
“Me?”
Lily nodded.
“Your grandmother knew you would eventually discover it.”
The next page made my stomach twist.
It described Lily's accident.
Vanessa pushed Lily. Rachel was blamed. Thomas ordered the hospital records altered. Margaret agreed.
Then another page.
But Lily remembers the baby.
I stared.
“What baby?”
Lily closed her eyes.
“You.”
“Me?”
“No.”
She pointed to the page.
“The other baby.”
I turned it.
A photograph was attached.
My grandmother holding a newborn.
The caption:
Rachel's daughter.
The birth date was five years before Emma.
The same date my family had told me I had miscarried.
My breath stopped.
There had been another child.
Before Emma.
A daughter.
And she hadn't been taken after birth.
She had been taken before anyone knew she existed.
I looked at Lily.
“Who was she?”
Lily stared at me.
“We never found out.”
“Then how did Grandma know?”
“She was keeping records.”
“What happened to her?”
Lily whispered:
“She disappeared.”
The room went silent.
The police officer looked at the microfilm.
“There's another page.”
He unfolded it.
A final entry.
Subject 1 remains active.
Everyone stared.
“Who is Subject 1?”
Lily looked at me.
“That's the beginning.”
“Beginning of what?”
“The first child they ever moved.”
“Who?”
She pointed toward the hospital corridor.
At the end stood a woman.
Gray hair.
Old.
Wearing a nurse's uniform.
She looked directly at me.
Then she smiled.
“Subject 1,” Lily whispered.
The woman walked toward us.
“Rachel?”
“Yes?”
She stopped in front of me.
“I delivered your first child.”
I could barely speak.
“Who was my baby?”
The nurse's smile disappeared.
“She wasn't a baby.”
“What?”
“She was your sister.”
I froze.
“That's impossible.”
The nurse leaned closer.
“Your first child was never yours.”
May you like
Then she whispered:
“She belonged to Vanessa.”
