PART 3 — THE NIGHT THEY CAME BACK
The kitchen window exploded inward.
Mrs. Voss screamed.
I dropped to the floor as glass sprayed across the table, the cassette recorder, and the documents scattered beneath our feet.
Something heavy struck the opposite wall.
For half a second, I thought someone had fired a gun.
Then I saw the object rolling beneath the kitchen chair.
A brick.
A piece of white paper had been wrapped around it with red string.
“Stay down,” I whispered.
Mrs. Voss was already crouched beside the cabinet, one hand pressed against her chest.
I crawled toward the wall beneath the broken window.
Outside, darkness swallowed the backyard.
The porch light illuminated the first few feet of frozen grass, but beyond that there was nothing except bare trees and falling snow.
I heard an engine.
“Someone’s leaving.”
I ran toward the front hallway.
“Merrick, don’t!”
I ignored her.
By the time I reached the porch, red taillights were disappearing around the corner.
A dark vehicle.
SUV, maybe.
I could not see the license plate.
I stood barefoot in broken snow for two seconds before realizing I had left my shoes in the kitchen after stepping through the glass.
Then the reality of what had happened finally caught up with me.
Someone had been watching us.
Someone knew about the tape.
Someone had been close enough to hear—or guess—that Mrs. Voss was finally talking.
I went back inside and locked the door.
Mrs. Voss had not moved.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Her voice was shaking.
I checked her hands.
No blood.
Then I looked beneath the chair and picked up the brick.
“Don’t touch it,” she said.
Too late.
I placed it carefully on the table.
The paper around it had torn open when the brick struck the wall.
Three words had been printed in thick black letters.
BURN THE TAPE.
Mrs. Voss covered her mouth.
I stared at the message.
“This wasn’t random.”
“No.”
“Who knew we were listening tonight?”
She said nothing.
I looked at her.
“Mrs. Voss.”
“Calder.”
“He left ten minutes ago.”
“Yes.”
“Sabine?”
“She knows I have old records.”
“Bram?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone else?”
Her silence lasted too long.
“Who else?”
Mrs. Voss looked toward the cassette recorder.
“My lawyer.”
That surprised me.
“You have a lawyer?”
“I have had one for eleven years.”
“Does your family know?”
“They know I have legal representation. They do not know everything I gave him.”
My eyes moved toward the broken window.
“What did you give him?”
“A copy of my will.”
I stared at her.
“And?”
“Instructions.”
“What instructions?”
Mrs. Voss looked at me.
“If anything happens to me, he is supposed to contact you.”
The cold I felt had nothing to do with the shattered window.
“You already put me in your will.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
“That was before I knew who you were.”
“I knew who you were.”
I rubbed both hands over my face.
“Mrs. Voss, you can’t keep dropping things like this on me.”
“I know.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
I pointed toward the brick.
“Someone just smashed your window because of that tape. Twenty minutes ago, I learned my father may not have abandoned us. An hour ago, I learned you’re my grandmother. Now you’re telling me you changed your will before I even knew we were related.”
She lowered her eyes.
“I was running out of time.”
“What does that mean?”
She looked toward the medicine bottles I had labeled months earlier.
“I have pancreatic cancer.”
Everything inside me stopped.
“What?”
“It has spread.”
I stared at her.
“How long have you known?”
“Since last spring.”
“And your children?”
“They know.”
Suddenly the pressure to sell the house made sense.
The folder.
The signatures.
The constant visits.
The urgency.
“They’re waiting for you to die.”
Mrs. Voss did not answer.
She did not need to.
I looked around the kitchen.
At the cracked cabinets.
The half-empty refrigerator.
The old curtains.
“Eleven million dollars,” I whispered.
“What?”
“Calder sold the company for nearly eleven million.”
Mrs. Voss gave a tired smile.
“You have been researching.”
“Why are you living like this?”
“The company belonged to Edgar.”
“You were his wife.”
“The business assets passed through trusts. Calder controlled most of them after Edgar died.”
“And the house?”
“Mine.”
“That’s why they want it.”
“Partly.”
“What else?”
Mrs. Voss looked toward the blue room.
“The land.”
I waited.
“There is something beneath this property that is worth considerably more than the house.”
I almost laughed from exhaustion.
“Of course there is.”
She gave me a strange look.
“What?”
“I’m sorry. It’s just every answer creates another secret.”
“That is what happens when secrets are allowed to age.”
I sat across from her.
“What’s under the property?”
“Not literally beneath it. Edgar purchased six adjacent parcels through shell companies in the 1980s. Most were eventually incorporated into a redevelopment zone.”
“How much are they worth?”
“I don’t know exactly anymore.”
“Guess.”
“Twenty-five million.”
I stared at her.
“Dollars?”
“Yes.”
“And your children need your signature?”
“My name is attached to the final parcel.”
“The house.”
She nodded.
“If I sell, the redevelopment can proceed.”
“That’s why Calder keeps bringing paperwork.”
“Yes.”
“Why haven’t you sold?”
Mrs. Voss looked toward the broken window.
“Because Lucan found evidence that Edgar obtained two of those parcels illegally.”
The story kept getting worse.
“How?”
“He pressured elderly owners. Forged signatures. Used company employees as witnesses for transactions that never happened.”
“And Lucan discovered it?”
“Yes.”
“Was that the account Calder mentioned on the tape?”
“Partly. There was also money being moved through the printing company.”
“How much?”
“Millions over many years.”
“And my father wanted to expose him.”
“Yes.”
I looked down at the cassette.
“So this wasn’t only some family argument.”
“No.”
“My father had evidence of financial crimes.”
“Yes.”
“And then he vanished.”
Mrs. Voss closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
The sound of sirens grew louder outside.
I had called 911 without even remembering doing it.
Two police officers arrived five minutes later.
One photographed the broken window.
The other placed the brick inside an evidence bag.
I showed them the note.
I did not show them the cassette.
Not yet.
That decision bothered me even while I was making it.
But after hearing Edgar’s voice and Calder’s words, I no longer knew whom the Voss family had influenced twenty-one years earlier.
One officer asked whether Mrs. Voss had enemies.
She said no.
I looked at her.
She looked at me.
Neither of us mentioned her children.
When the officers finally left, I shut the temporary plastic they had taped across the window.
“You lied to the police,” I said.
“So did you.”
“I didn’t answer.”
“That is the polite version of lying.”
I almost smiled.
Almost.
Then I picked up the cassette.
“We need copies.”
Mrs. Voss nodded.
“I have equipment upstairs.”
“No.”
“No?”
“We’re not leaving the original here.”
I slipped the cassette into the inside pocket of my coat.
“You’re coming with me.”
“Where?”
“My apartment.”
She blinked.
“Merrick, I cannot—”
“Someone just threw a brick through your window.”
“I’ve lived here for sixty-two years.”
“And tonight might be an excellent night to live somewhere else.”
“This is my home.”
“That didn’t stop whoever was standing outside.”
She looked toward the hallway.
I softened my voice.
“Please.”
That word changed her.
Twenty minutes later, Mrs. Voss was wearing a gray wool coat and carrying a small overnight bag.
Before leaving, she stood in the center of the kitchen.
“What?”
“I’m remembering it.”
“The kitchen?”
“The house.”
“Why?”
She looked at me.
“In case I don’t come back.”
I hated those words.
“You’re coming back.”
She smiled.
“Your father used to say things like that.”
“Things like what?”
“He believed certainty could bully the universe into cooperating.”
I opened the door.
“Did it?”
“No.”
She walked past me.
“But I always loved him for trying.”
My apartment had never seemed smaller than when I brought an eighty-one-year-old woman into it.
The laundromat below us was still running, and every few minutes the floor vibrated during the spin cycle.
Mrs. Voss stood in the doorway, taking in the mattress against the wall, the folding table, the hot plate, and the duffel bag containing nearly everything I owned.
She said nothing.
That somehow made it worse.
“Don’t.”
She looked at me.
“Don’t what?”
“Feel guilty.”
“I was not going to say anything.”
“You’re thinking plenty.”
“I am.”
I put water on the hot plate.
“Tea?”
“Yes.”
I gave her the only chair.
I sat on the mattress.
For a few minutes, neither of us spoke.
Then she looked at the duffel bag.
“You still keep everything packed.”
My stomach tightened.
“How would you know that?”
“Your mother did the same thing.”
I looked at her.
“When she lived with Lucan, she kept a suitcase under their bed for almost a year.”
“Why?”
“She said she had learned never to unpack completely in a place that belonged to somebody else.”
The words hit too close.
I stared at my duffel bag.
“Did my father know?”
“He eventually convinced her to unpack.”
“How?”
Mrs. Voss smiled.
“He bought a dresser.”
“That’s it?”
“No.”
She looked down at her hands.
“He removed the bedroom closet door.”
I frowned.
“Why?”
“So she could see there was nothing waiting to push her belongings out.”
I laughed quietly.
“That sounds ridiculous.”
“It was.”
Her smile faded.
“But she unpacked.”
I had never known that story.
Something about it hurt differently from the others.
Not violently.
Tenderly.
My parents had been real people.
They had joked.
Argued.
Bought furniture.
Cooked meals.
Made plans.
Before that night, they had existed in my mind only as a dead mother and an absent father.
Now they were becoming human.
That made losing them feel new.
After tea, I connected my old laptop to a cheap audio interface I used for school presentations.
We played the cassette again while recording the sound digitally.
The first twenty minutes contained business discussions.
Payments.
Property transfers.
Company accounts.
Names I did not recognize.
Then Lucan’s voice appeared.
Again.
“You touch Mara or my son and I swear I’ll destroy every one of you.”
My chest tightened.
Mrs. Voss looked away.
We continued.
The crash.
The shouting.
“Mara, take Merrick and run!”
Then silence.
Except it was not silence.
Not completely.
The first time, we had assumed the tape ended.
This time, with headphones on and the volume raised, I heard something beneath the static.
A faint sound.
I rewound.
Played it again.
Mrs. Voss leaned toward the laptop.
“What is that?”
“A door.”
Then footsteps.
Another voice.
Very quiet.
A woman.
I increased the volume.
The words became clearer.
“Edgar, what have you done?”
Mrs. Voss’s face changed.
“That’s me.”
I looked at her.
“You were there?”
“I came downstairs after hearing the crash.”
“Keep listening.”
On the tape, Edgar answered.
“Go back upstairs, Odette.”
Then Mrs. Voss’s younger voice.
“Where is Lucan?”
“He left.”
“He was just here.”
“He left.”
Then Calder.
“Mother, please.”
There was panic in his voice.
Mrs. Voss whispered something.
I turned the volume higher.
“What?”
“I said there was blood.”
My skin prickled.
The tape confirmed it.
“There’s blood on your sleeve, Calder.”
Then a long pause.
Edgar’s voice became cold.
“Odette, go upstairs.”
“What happened?”
“Go upstairs.”
“What happened to my son?”
A chair scraped.
Then Edgar spoke slowly.
“If you ever want to see your other children again, you will go upstairs and forget what you saw.”
The tape ended.
I removed the headphones.
Mrs. Voss stared at the wall.
“You remembered that?”
“Yes.”
“All these years?”
“Yes.”
“And you never told police?”
“No.”
Anger rose again.
But this time, when I looked at her, I saw more than cowardice.
I saw an eighty-one-year-old woman who had been terrified for decades.
That did not excuse what she had done.
But it changed the shape of it.
“Did Edgar hurt you?”
She did not answer.
I repeated the question.
“Did he hurt you?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes?”
“He never broke bones.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No.”
She rubbed her wrist unconsciously.
I noticed.
The bruise.
“Who gave you that?”
She stopped moving.
“Mrs. Voss.”
“Sabine.”
My jaw tightened.
“Today?”
“Yesterday.”
“What happened?”
“She wanted the key to the blue room.”
“How did she know you opened it?”
“I believe Calder told her.”
“She grabbed you?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You already had enough.”
“I’m calling the police.”
“No.”
“Your daughter assaulted you.”
“I know.”
“She could come back.”
“I know.”
“Then why protect her?”
Mrs. Voss looked at me.
“Because I have spent my life protecting the wrong people. Breaking that habit is harder than deciding to break it.”
I had no answer.
At 3:18 in the morning, Mrs. Voss fell asleep sitting in the chair.
I covered her with my only extra blanket.
Then I opened my laptop again.
I searched old property records.
Company filings.
Newspaper archives.
Anything connected to Edgar, Calder, Lucan, or the parcels Mrs. Voss mentioned.
Most searches went nowhere.
Then I found a scanned court docket from nineteen years earlier.
VOSS PRINT & PACKAGING v. DANIEL ROURKE.
The name meant nothing.
I clicked.
The case involved wrongful termination.
Rourke had worked as an accountant for Edgar’s company.
The lawsuit had been dismissed after a settlement.
But one line caught my attention.
Plaintiff alleged he was terminated after raising concerns regarding irregular real estate transfers and undocumented corporate disbursements.
I searched Daniel Rourke.
Nothing current.
Then I found an obituary.
He had died eight years ago.
One surviving daughter.
Natalie Rourke.
I searched her name.
She was an attorney.
Philadelphia.
I stared at the screen.
At 3:41 a.m., I found her professional email address.
I started typing.
My name is Merrick Hale. I believe my father, Lucan Voss, disappeared after discovering financial irregularities involving Voss Print & Packaging. I found a court record involving your father, Daniel Rourke. If you know anything—
I stopped.
Too much.
Too dangerous.
Instead, I saved the message as a draft.
Then I heard Mrs. Voss speak behind me.
“Daniel knew.”
I turned.
She was awake.
“You know him?”
“He tried to help Lucan.”
I moved closer.
“How?”
“He was the company accountant. Lucan went to him after finding the account records.”
“What happened?”
“Edgar fired Daniel.”
“The lawsuit.”
“Yes.”
“Why did Daniel settle?”
Mrs. Voss gave me a look that made me already know I would hate the answer.
“Because someone threatened his daughter.”
Natalie.
I looked back at the email draft.
“Do you know where she is?”
“No.”
“She’s an attorney now.”
Mrs. Voss stared at me.
“What?”
“I found her.”
Her face became alarmed.
“Do not contact her.”
“Why?”
“Because if Natalie knows anything, she has spent twenty years surviving by not saying it.”
“So did you.”
“Yes.”
“And look where that got us.”
She looked toward the cassette.
I sent the email.
Mrs. Voss closed her eyes.
Neither of us spoke for several minutes.
At 4:07 a.m., my laptop chimed.
A response.
That was too fast.
I opened it.
Mr. Hale,
Do not write to this address again.
I stared at the message.
Mrs. Voss read over my shoulder.
Then another email arrived.
This one contained only a phone number.
Underneath it were six words.
CALL FROM A PHONE THAT ISN’T YOURS.
Mrs. Voss looked at me.
“She knows.”
Twenty minutes later, I used the pay phone outside a twenty-four-hour gas station two blocks away.
I had not even known the phone worked.
Mrs. Voss waited inside near the coffee machine while I dialed.
The number rang once.
A woman answered.
“Merrick?”
My grip tightened around the receiver.
“How do you know my name?”
“You emailed me.”
“You answered quickly.”
“I have an alert on the word Voss.”
That told me plenty.
“My father was Lucan Voss.”
Silence.
Then:
“I know.”
My heart jumped.
“You knew him?”
“My father did.”
“I found your father’s lawsuit.”
“Then you should stop digging.”
“Why?”
“Because every person who dug into Edgar Voss eventually lost something.”
“My father lost his life.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Do you?”
She said nothing.
“Ms. Rourke.”
“Do not use my name.”
“Fine. Do you know what happened to Lucan?”
“No.”
“But your father knew something.”
“Yes.”
“What?”
Another long silence.
Then she asked:
“Is Odette alive?”
I glanced through the gas station window.
Mrs. Voss stood near the register clutching her coat.
“Yes.”
“Is she with you?”
“Yes.”
“Get her away from the house.”
“We already did.”
“Good.”
“Why?”
“Because someone accessed my father’s old storage unit three days ago.”
“What storage unit?”
“The one containing everything he kept from Voss Print.”
My pulse quickened.
“What was taken?”
“Almost nothing.”
“What does that mean?”
“They ignored cash records. Property files. Tax documents.”
“What did they take?”
“One envelope.”
“Whose?”
“Lucan’s.”
My chest tightened.
“What was inside?”
“I don’t know.”
“Your father never told you?”
“No.”
“But he wrote something on the outside.”
“What?”
She inhaled.
“Only open if Lucan is found.”
I gripped the receiver.
“The envelope is gone?”
“Yes.”
“Who accessed the unit?”
“I’m trying to find out.”
“Why tell me any of this?”
“Because your email arrived three days after someone suddenly went looking for Lucan again.”
That chilled me.
“I only learned who he was tonight.”
“Then someone else knew before you did.”
I thought about the Facebook post.
The Voss children.
The locked room.
The property.
“Meet me.”
“No.”
“Please.”
“No.”
“My father disappeared.”
“I know.”
“My mother died believing he abandoned us.”
Her voice softened slightly.
“I know that too.”
That stopped me.
“How do you know about my mother?”
“My father kept notes.”
“What did they say?”
“Mara contacted him.”
“When?”
“After Lucan disappeared.”
“What did she want?”
“To know whether Lucan had left evidence with him.”
“Did he?”
“I don’t know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because my father protected me by telling me almost nothing.”
“That didn’t protect you. You’re still afraid twenty years later.”
Silence.
Then she gave me an address.
“Eleven tomorrow morning.”
I memorized it.
“Where?”
“A church basement in Germantown.”
“Why there?”
“Because it has six exits and no cameras in the meeting room.”
That was not reassuring.
Then she added:
“Bring Odette.”
“I will.”
“And Merrick?”
“Yes?”
“If Calder Voss calls you before then, do not answer.”
“Why?”
“Because my father believed Calder was the only person who knew where Lucan went after December seventeenth.”
The line disconnected.
I stood beside the pay phone listening to the dial tone.
When I returned to the apartment, Mrs. Voss knew from my face that something had changed.
“What did she say?”
“Her father thought Calder knew where Lucan went.”
Mrs. Voss sat slowly.
“He always denied it.”
“He may have lied.”
“Yes.”
“There’s more.”
I told her about the storage unit.
The stolen envelope.
The message written on it.
Only open if Lucan is found.
Mrs. Voss looked terrified.
“What?”
She shook her head.
“What?”
“Merrick, I need you to tell me exactly when that unit was opened.”
“Three days ago.”
She stood.
“Then we have to go back to the house.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Absolutely not.”
“There is something in the blue room.”
“You said we already had everything.”
“I forgot one thing.”
“What?”
She grabbed her coat.
“A key.”
I blocked the door.
“What does it open?”
“I don’t know.”
I stared at her.
“You’re not making a strong argument.”
“Lucan gave it to me the night he disappeared.”
Everything went quiet.
“You had a key from him this entire time?”
“Yes.”
“To what?”
“He never told me.”
“And you forgot?”
“I did not forget the key.”
Her eyes filled with fear.
“I forgot what was attached to it.”
“What was attached to it?”
“A metal tag.”
“What did it say?”
“R-214.”
I stared at her.
“Does that mean anything?”
“It didn’t then.”
“And now?”
“Daniel Rourke’s storage unit.”
I felt the floor shift beneath me.
“You think Lucan had access to it.”
“I think Daniel gave him somewhere to hide something.”
We returned to Mrs. Voss’s house shortly after sunrise.
I hated every second of it.
The street looked ordinary.
Too ordinary.
Snow covered the sidewalk.
A delivery truck idled two houses down.
No black SUV.
No suspicious car.
The broken window remained covered in police plastic.
We entered through the back.
The blue room was exactly as we had left it.
Mrs. Voss went to Lucan’s desk.
She pulled out the bottom drawer completely.
Behind it was a narrow space.
Her hand disappeared inside.
Then she removed a small brass key.
A metal tag hung from the ring.
R-214.
I stared at it.
“You had this for twenty-one years.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you give it to police?”
“I didn’t know what it opened.”
“You could have told them.”
“Yes.”
She sounded exhausted.
There was no point repeating the accusation.
I took the key.
On the back of the metal tag were tiny scratched letters.
M.E.M.
I held it toward the light.
“What does that mean?”
Mrs. Voss looked.
Then her eyes widened.
“Mara Elise Merrick.”
My mother’s initials.
I stopped breathing.
“This wasn’t for Lucan.”
“No.”
“It was for her.”
Mrs. Voss sat on the edge of the bed.
“Lucan must have intended to give it to Mara.”
“Why did you have it?”
“He pushed it into my hand during the argument.”
“What did he say?”
She closed her eyes, searching twenty-one years backward.
Then she whispered:
“He said, ‘If I don’t come back, she needs this.’”
A chill passed through me.
“You never gave it to my mother.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I was afraid.”
I turned away from her.
There were moments when I could understand her.
And moments when I wanted to scream.
This was one of the second kind.
“My mother spent years wondering what happened to him.”
“I know.”
“She came here with me.”
“I know.”
“She begged you.”
“I know.”
“And you had the key.”
Her voice cracked.
“I know.”
I faced her.
“She died without knowing.”
Mrs. Voss nodded.
“I know.”
I could not forgive her.
Not then.
Maybe not ever.
But before I could say anything, a floorboard creaked downstairs.
We both froze.
I had locked the back door.
Another sound.
Not the old house settling.
A drawer opening.
Mrs. Voss whispered:
“Someone is inside.”
I pulled out my phone.
No signal.
Of course.
The blue room sat at the back of the house where reception was terrible.
I motioned for Mrs. Voss to stay behind me.
Footsteps reached the hallway below.
Slow.
Unhurried.
Whoever had entered was not worried about being caught.
The first stair creaked.
Then the second.
Mrs. Voss gripped my sleeve.
I looked around for anything I could use.
The wooden desk chair.
A lamp.
Nothing useful.
The footsteps continued upward.
Then stopped outside the bedroom door.
I held my breath.
The handle turned.
Calder stepped inside.
He looked terrible.
His coat was unbuttoned.
Snow had melted into his hair.
There was dried blood beneath his nose.
I raised the desk chair anyway.
“Stay back.”
Calder lifted both hands.
“I’m not here to hurt you.”
“That sentence has never convinced anyone.”
“Merrick, listen to me.”
“How did you get inside?”
“I still have a key.”
Mrs. Voss spoke behind me.
“You said you returned yours.”
“I lied.”
“No surprise there,” I said.
Calder looked toward the brass key in my hand.
His expression changed.
“Where did you get that?”
“Why?”
“Merrick.”
“What does R-214 mean?”
He went pale.
“You need to put that somewhere safe.”
“Why?”
“Because Bram is looking for it.”
“Bram?”
“Yes.”
“I thought you were the one I should be afraid of.”
“You should be afraid of all of us.”
That answer surprised me.
“Including you?”
“Especially me.”
Mrs. Voss stepped forward.
“What happened to your face?”
Calder wiped beneath his nose.
“Bram.”
Her mouth opened.
“Your brother hit you?”
“He thinks I gave Merrick the tape.”
“You tried to take it.”
“I was trying to stop you from playing it.”
“Why?”
Calder looked at me.
“Because the tape doesn’t prove what you think.”
“It proves my grandfather threatened my father.”
“Yes.”
“It proves you had blood on your sleeve.”
“Yes.”
“It proves my father was afraid for my mother and me.”
“Yes.”
“What part am I misunderstanding?”
“The part where you assume Lucan was the one bleeding.”
I stopped.
Mrs. Voss whispered:
“What?”
Calder looked at his mother.
“The blood wasn’t his.”
“Whose was it?”
“Mine.”
I lowered the chair slightly.
“What happened?”
“Lucan hit me.”
“Why?”
“Because I tried to stop him from leaving.”
“Why would you stop him?”
“Because Father told me to.”
“That doesn’t make you innocent.”
“I never said I was innocent.”
He sat in the desk chair without asking.
For the first time, Calder Voss looked older than his sixty-something years.
“I followed Lucan behind the garage. We fought. He punched me. I fell against the stone wall and split my forehead.”
Mrs. Voss stared at him.
“You told us you only argued.”
“I lied.”
“What happened next?”
“Lucan ran.”
“Where?”
“To the alley.”
“And?”
“I followed.”
My body tightened.
Calder looked at me.
“He got into Daniel Rourke’s car.”
Everything connected.
“The accountant.”
“Yes.”
“Daniel was waiting for him?”
“Yes.”
“Where did they go?”
“I don’t know.”
“Natalie said her father believed you knew.”
Calder’s eyes snapped toward me.
“You spoke to Natalie?”
“Yes.”
“You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Everyone keeps telling me what I shouldn’t do.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Then explain.”
Calder stood.
“Lucan did not disappear that night because we killed him.”
I stared at him.
“He disappeared because Daniel helped him escape.”
Mrs. Voss looked confused.
“Escape where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why wouldn’t he take Mara and Merrick?”
“He planned to.”
That hurt worse.
“What happened?”
Calder hesitated.
Then:
“Someone reached Mara first.”
My blood went cold.
“Who?”
Calder looked toward his mother.
“Edgar.”
Mrs. Voss staggered backward.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
“He told Mara that Lucan had taken money from the company and run.”
“She didn’t believe that.”
“No.”
“So?”
“He showed her something.”
“What?”
“I never knew.”
Calder rubbed his face.
“But afterward, Mara stopped trying to find Lucan publicly.”
“That’s not true. She filed a missing-person report.”
“She withdrew it six weeks later.”
I had not found that in the article.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
I thought of my childhood.
My mother refusing to discuss my father.
Her vague answer.
He left.
Maybe that had not been her belief.
Maybe it had been something she had been forced to say.
“Did Lucan know where we were?”
Calder stared at the floor.
“I don’t know.”
“You keep using that answer.”
“Because unlike Father, I’m finished inventing convenient truths.”
I showed him the brass key.
“What is R-214?”
Calder looked at it.
“Daniel’s private evidence locker.”
“Locker?”
“He rented storage rooms under company names. R-214 was one.”
“Natalie said the storage unit was accessed three days ago.”
“That one?”
“I don’t know.”
Calder swore under his breath.
“What?”
“If Bram has Lucan’s envelope, he may know.”
“Know what?”
Calder stared at the key.
“Where Lucan went.”
Mrs. Voss grabbed the bedpost.
“You said you didn’t know.”
“I didn’t.”
“You think Bram does?”
“Maybe.”
“Why?”
Calder looked at us.
“Because Bram has been paying someone for nineteen years.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know the name.”
“Paying them for what?”
“Every month, fifteen hundred dollars leaves one of the old company accounts.”
“And you never asked?”
“I did.”
“What did Bram say?”
“That it was an insurance obligation.”
“Did you believe him?”
“For years.”
“And now?”
“Three months ago, I traced one payment.”
“Where?”
Calder swallowed.
“To a bank in Vermont.”
Mrs. Voss stopped breathing for a second.
“Vermont?”
I looked at her.
“What?”
She was staring at Lucan’s photograph.
“Lucan wanted to move to Vermont.”
“When?”
“Before Merrick was born.”
My heart hammered.
Calder looked at me.
“I drove there last month.”
“What did you find?”
“A post office box.”
“And?”
“The payments were being withdrawn by someone using initials.”
“What initials?”
Calder reached into his coat.
I raised the chair again.
“Slowly.”
He removed his wallet.
From it, he pulled a folded receipt.
He placed it on the desk.
I picked it up.
Three initials had been written beside a transaction number.
L.E.V.
Lucan Edgar Voss.
My knees almost gave out.
Mrs. Voss whispered:
“No.”
Calder looked at me.
“I think your father may still be alive.”
Everything inside the room disappeared.
The walls.
The bed.
The photographs.
All I saw were those three letters.
L.E.V.
“You think?”
“I don’t know who withdrew the money.”
“You just said—”
“I said I think.”
“Where in Vermont?”
“A town outside Montpelier.”
“What town?”
Before Calder could answer, his phone rang.
He looked at the screen.
His face changed.
“Who is it?”
He did not answer.
“Calder.”
He turned the phone toward us.
Bram.
“Answer it.”
“No.”
“Answer it.”
Calder accepted the call and put it on speaker.
“Bram.”
His brother’s voice came through immediately.
“You found them.”
Calder stared at us.
“How do you know where I am?”
Bram laughed.
“You really never understood Father’s favorite lesson.”
“What lesson?”
“Always know where your money is going.”
Calder’s expression darkened.
“You tracked my phone.”
“I track lots of things.”
I stepped closer.
“Bram.”
Silence.
Then:
“So the cleaner has a voice.”
“My name is Merrick.”
“I know exactly who you are.”
That sent a chill through me.
“How long have you known?”
“Longer than you.”
“Did you throw the brick?”
“No.”
I did not believe him.
“Did you access Daniel Rourke’s storage unit?”
Another pause.
“Yes.”
Calder shut his eyes.
“What was in Lucan’s envelope?”
Bram laughed softly.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“What was in it?”
“A photograph.”
My heart dropped.
“Of what?”
“Not what.”
His voice became almost amused.
“Who.”
Mrs. Voss stepped toward the phone.
“Bram, stop this.”
“Hello, Mother.”
“What photograph?”
“The one Lucan sent Daniel eighteen years ago.”
I could barely breathe.
“Eighteen?”
“Yes, Merrick.”
“That’s three years after he disappeared.”
“Excellent arithmetic.”
My hand clenched.
“He was alive.”
“At least then.”
“Where was the photograph taken?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“You mean you won’t.”
“Same result.”
“Why has someone been paying money into Vermont?”
Silence.
Calder stared at me.
Bram finally answered.
“That’s the interesting part.”
“What?”
“The payments aren’t going to Lucan.”
“Then who?”
“They’re going to the person who made sure he stayed gone.”
The line went dead.
For several seconds, none of us moved.
Then Calder grabbed his coat.
“Where are you going?”
“To find Bram.”
“No.”
“Merrick—”
“We go to Natalie first.”
Calder stopped.
“You really contacted her.”
“We’re meeting her at eleven.”
“That’s a bad idea.”
“Everything appears to be a bad idea in this family.”
Mrs. Voss almost smiled.
Calder did not.
“You don’t know Natalie.”
“No.”
“I do.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
Calder looked away.
“How?”
He said nothing.
Mrs. Voss stepped forward.
“Calder.”
His jaw tightened.
“Natalie and I were married.”
I thought I had misheard him.
“What?”
“For eleven months.”
“When?”
“Eighteen years ago.”
The same year Lucan sent the photograph.
Mrs. Voss looked stunned.
“You never told us.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because Father would have destroyed her.”
“Like he destroyed everyone else?”
Calder nodded.
My mind raced.
“You married the daughter of the accountant your father threatened.”
“Yes.”
“Did she know about Lucan?”
“She knew her father was helping him.”
“Did she know he was alive?”
“Not at first.”
“At first?”
Calder closed his eyes.
Then he said:
“The photograph Bram found was sent to Daniel.”
“Yes.”
“I was there when Daniel received it.”
My pulse hammered.
“You saw the photograph?”
“Yes.”
“Where was Lucan?”
Calder looked directly at me.
“He was standing beside your mother.”
The room went dead silent.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“My mother?”
“Yes.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Why?”
“Because my mother told everyone he left.”
“People say many things when they are being watched.”
I stared at him.
“When was the photograph taken?”
“Eighteen years ago.”
I counted automatically.
“I would have been three.”
“Yes.”
“Was I in it?”
Calder looked at me.
“No.”
My stomach dropped.
“Why not?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where was the photograph taken?”
Calder hesitated.
“Vermont.”
Mrs. Voss gasped.
I felt as if the air had vanished.
My mother had been with Lucan.
Three years after he disappeared.
Three years after she told everyone he had abandoned us.
And I had not been with them.
“Where was I?”
No one answered.
I stepped toward Calder.
“Where was I?”
“I don’t know.”
“You saw them together.”
“Yes.”
“Was there anything written on the photograph?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
Calder looked sick.
“Three words.”
“What words?”
He swallowed.
“Merrick is safer.”
I stared at him.
Then I remembered being nine years old.
My mother dying.
My aunt taking me.
No father appearing.
No grandmother.
No Voss family.
Nothing.
“What did that mean?”
“I never knew.”
“Did they leave me intentionally?”
“I don’t know.”
My eyes burned.
For the first time since this began, I did not want another answer.
Because I suddenly understood that the truth might be worse than abandonment.
The truth might be that my parents had both been alive.
Together.
And had deliberately left me behind.
Then Mrs. Voss spoke.
“There was something else.”
I looked at her.
“What?”
She was staring at the photograph of Lucan on the wall.
“The year Merrick turned three.”
Her voice shook.
“A package arrived for me.”
Calder looked at her.
“What package?”
“I never opened it.”
I stared at her in disbelief.
“Why not?”
“It had no return address. Only Lucan’s handwriting.”
“Where is it?”
Mrs. Voss slowly turned toward the closet.
“I put it away.”
She opened the door.
Behind several old coats sat a small cardboard box.
Untouched.
Yellowed with age.
She lifted it with both hands.
My name had been written across the top.
MERRICK.
Nothing else.
No address.
No instructions.
Just my name.
Mrs. Voss placed the box on the bed.
My hands trembled as I peeled away the brittle tape.
Inside was a child’s red sweater.
A wooden toy train.
A birthday card with a large number 3 on the front.
And beneath them, a VHS tape.
A white label had been stuck across it.
FOR MERRICK WHEN HE IS OLD ENOUGH TO UNDERSTAND.
I picked it up.
Calder stepped closer.
“That’s Lucan’s handwriting.”
Mrs. Voss began crying.
I stared at the tape.
For eighteen years, it had been sitting fifteen feet from the hallway I mopped every Thursday.
A message from my father.
Possibly my mother.
Waiting for me.
And nobody had opened it.
I looked at Mrs. Voss.
“Do you have a VCR?”
She nodded.
“In the basement.”
We carried the tape downstairs.
The old television sat beneath a sheet.
Calder connected the VCR while I stood beside Mrs. Voss.
The machine struggled when the tape entered.
Then the screen filled with static.
A date appeared.
March 14.
Eighteen years earlier.
The image shook.
Then a man stepped into frame.
Lucan.
Older than the photographs.
Thin.
Bearded.
Alive.
My father sat in front of a plain white wall.
He looked directly at the camera.
“If you are watching this, Merrick, then either I finally found a safe way back to you…”
He stopped.
Swallowed.
“…or I failed.”
My knees weakened.
Mrs. Voss gripped my hand.
Lucan continued.
“You are three years old today.”
His voice broke.
“I bought you a train because your mother says you line up anything with wheels and refuse to let anyone touch them.”
I looked at the wooden train in my hand.
My mother had told him things about me.
He knew me.
At least from a distance.
Then someone entered the frame.
My breath stopped.
My mother.
Alive.
She sat beside him.
For the first time in twelve years, I saw her moving.
Blinking.
Smiling.
She looked into the camera.
“Happy birthday, baby.”
I covered my mouth.
Mrs. Voss began sobbing.
My mother continued.
“I know you won’t understand why we aren’t there.”
She looked toward Lucan.
He took her hand.
“But one day, you need to know that leaving you was the hardest thing we ever did.”
My chest cracked open.
“Then why?” I whispered at the screen.
As if she could hear me, my mother answered.
“Because someone threatened to kill you.”
Calder stepped backward.
The video continued.
“We tried taking you with us,” Lucan said. “But they found us twice.”
My mother nodded.
“So we made the only choice we thought would keep you alive.”
“You stayed with Aunt Celia,” Lucan said. “And we disappeared.”
I stared at the television.
Aunt Celia.
My mother’s sister.
The woman who had raised me until I was fifteen.
She knew.
She had to know.
My mother looked into the camera again.
“If Celia kept her promise, you will never see this until Edgar Voss is dead and the danger is over.”
Mrs. Voss whispered:
“Celia?”
I could barely speak.
“She never gave me anything.”
Lucan continued.
“There is one person we trust with the records.”
Daniel.
“Daniel Rourke has everything.”
Then my mother said something that made Calder sit down.
“But if Daniel is dead, find Natalie.”
We all stared at the screen.
Natalie.
The woman we were meeting in less than three hours.
My mother leaned closer to the camera.
“She knows where we went.”
Calder whispered:
“No.”
Lucan squeezed my mother’s hand.
“And Merrick, if Natalie tells you we are dead, believe her.”
My stomach twisted.
“But if she tells you we survived…”
Lucan looked directly into the camera.
“…then do not come looking for us.”
I stopped breathing.
My mother began crying.
Lucan continued.
“Because if you found this tape, it means the people we were hiding from have probably found you too.”
Static flashed across the television.
The image returned for three final seconds.
My mother looked away from the camera.
Someone outside the room shouted:
“They found the car.”
Lucan stood abruptly.
The recording ended.
The television turned blue.
No one moved.
Then my phone rang upstairs.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
I ran.
Unknown number.
I answered.
“Merrick?”
Natalie.
“Yes.”
Her voice was breathless.
“Do not come to the church.”
“Why?”
“They know.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
A loud crash came through her phone.
Then she whispered:
“I found what my father hid.”
“What?”
“Proof Lucan was alive after your mother died.”
My entire body went cold.
“That’s impossible.”
“No.”
“My mother died when I was nine.”
“I know.”
“How long was Lucan alive?”
Natalie breathed rapidly.
“Merrick, listen carefully.”
“Tell me.”
“Your father did not die twenty-one years ago.”
“I know.”
“He didn’t die eighteen years ago either.”
“Natalie.”
“He was alive eleven years ago.”
I gripped the phone.
“Where?”
“I have a photograph.”
“What photograph?”
“Your father standing outside a hospital.”
“When?”
“Eleven years ago.”
“Why was he there?”
Natalie started crying.
“Because he was visiting someone.”
“Who?”
There was a sound behind her.
A door opening.
Natalie whispered:
“Oh God.”
“Natalie?”
Then she said five words that changed everything again.
“He was visiting your mother.”
The call ended…………
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 4…
