Chapter 2 - THE MAN WHO WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD
For several seconds, I forgot about the stitches above my eyebrow.
I forgot that my father had abandoned me in the emergency room.
I forgot that Vanessa had lied.
All I could hear was the sentence repeating inside my head.
Rachel Mercer was my daughter.
Thomas Mercer was my grandfather.
And my father had told me this man was dead.
I stared at him.
“You’re supposed to be dead.”
Thomas did not flinch.
“I know.”
Nurse Denise was still standing near the wall, her fingers wrapped around the edge of her clipboard.
She looked terrified.
Not surprised.
Terrified.
Thomas noticed it too.
“Denise,” he said quietly, “how long have you worked here?”
“Seventeen years.”
“And before this?”
“St. Catherine’s.”
Something changed in Thomas’s expression.
“Rachel was taken to St. Catherine’s.”
Denise swallowed.
“Yes.”
My heart started pounding.
“What does that mean?”
Neither of them answered me.
Thomas pulled the chair closer to my bed.
“My granddaughter needs the truth.”
Denise looked toward the hallway.
“Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because if Vanessa Bennett knows this girl called you, she’ll come.”
The room went silent.
I stared at her.
“You know Vanessa?”
Denise closed her eyes for half a second.
“I knew her before she was Vanessa Bennett.”
Thomas stood so quickly the chair scraped across the floor.
“What was her name?”
Denise hesitated.
“Vanessa Cole.”
Thomas’s face hardened.
That name meant something to him.
A lot.
“Grandpa?”
It was the first time I had called him that.
He looked at me immediately.
I almost wished I hadn’t said it because something broke across his face.
Eight years of missing birthdays seemed to pass through his eyes at once.
Then he came closer.
“Yes?”
“What is happening?”
Thomas looked at Denise.
She nodded reluctantly.
He shut the hospital room door.
“My daughter did not abandon you.”
My throat tightened.
“I know. I have her letter.”
“No,” he said. “You know part of it.”
He reached inside his jacket and removed a worn photograph.
Rachel stood beside him outside a courthouse.
She was younger than I remembered.
Beautiful.
She was holding me.
I could not have been older than five.
Standing beside Rachel was my father.
And behind them, slightly out of focus, was Vanessa.
My stomach dropped.
“She knew my mother?”
Thomas’s jaw tightened.
“Vanessa worked for Rachel.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
“Rachel was an attorney. Vanessa was her legal assistant.”
I looked at the photograph again.
Vanessa had been in our lives before my mother disappeared.
Dad had never told me.
Thomas continued.
“Your mother specialized in financial misconduct cases. Eight years ago, she discovered something she believed could send several people to prison.”
“What?”
“That is what I intend to find out.”
Denise made a quiet sound.
Thomas turned.
“You know.”
Denise’s eyes filled with fear.
“I know what happened the night Rachel came into St. Catherine’s.”
My fingers tightened around the blanket.
“She was there?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“The night everyone says she disappeared.”
I stopped breathing.
Denise stepped closer.
“Your mother was brought into the emergency department shortly after midnight.”
“Was she hurt?”
“Yes.”
“Who brought her?”
Denise looked at Thomas.
Then at me.
“Vanessa.”
I felt cold all over.
“No.”
“I remember because Rachel kept saying one thing.”
“What?”
Denise lowered her voice.
“Don’t let Vanessa take my daughter.”
The monitor beside my bed began beeping faster.
Thomas reached for my hand.
“Easy.”
But there was no easy anymore.
Everything my father had told me was falling apart.
Mom had not packed a suitcase and left.
Mom had not decided she wanted another life.
She had been in a hospital.
And Vanessa had been there.
“What happened to her?”
Denise shook her head.
“That’s the part I never understood.”
She explained that Rachel had suffered a head injury and a broken wrist. She had been conscious when she arrived.
Then two men appeared.
One claimed to be a lawyer.
The other carried paperwork authorizing Rachel’s transfer to another facility.
“I questioned it,” Denise said. “The paperwork looked wrong.”
“Why didn’t you stop them?” Thomas demanded.
“I tried.”
Her voice broke.
“I was twenty-seven years old. I had a toddler at home. A hospital administrator told me the transfer had been approved and that if I interfered, I would lose my license.”
Thomas paced toward the window.
“What facility?”
“That was the problem. The destination changed in the records.”
“To where?”
“First, Franklin Behavioral Center.”
Thomas froze.
Then Denise continued.
“Later, the electronic record said Rachel discharged herself.”
My chest hurt.
“She didn’t.”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
Denise looked directly at me.
“Because I watched them wheel your mother out.”
The door opened.
A security officer stepped inside.
“Judge Mercer?”
Thomas turned.
“There’s a man asking for the girl.”
My pulse jumped.
“My dad?”
The officer shook his head.
“No. Says he’s an attorney representing Vanessa Bennett.”
Thomas’s expression became ice.
“How did he know she was here?”
Nobody answered.
Then my phone buzzed.
A text message.
From Dad.
COME HOME NOW.
A second message appeared.
Forget whatever that old man told you.
My hands went numb.
Thomas leaned over the screen.
“How does your father know I’m here?”
“I don’t know.”
Then another message arrived.
This one was not from Dad.
Unknown number.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LEFT THE PAST BURIED.
Thomas took the phone from my hand.
Denise whispered, “Oh my God.”
Thomas looked toward the hospital door.
Then he said something that changed the way everyone in the room moved.
“Lock this floor down.”
The security officer hesitated.
“Sir?”
Thomas held up the phone.
“My fourteen-year-old granddaughter has just been threatened inside a hospital.”
May you like
Then he looked at me.
“And someone knows I’m alive.”
