Rebecca Sloan came out of Mercer at 11:02 p.m.
I know because Thomas called the second police had her.
He sounded breathless.
“She’s alive.”
Claire looked at the clock.
“And?”
“In custody.”
“Arrested?”
“Temporarily detained.”
Rebecca Sterling said, “For what?”
“Obstruction. Refusing commands. Tampering with a sealed interior door.”
“Anything else?”
Thomas paused.
“She had a gun.”
Daniel stood.
“What?”
“Registered to Peter.”
Rebecca Sloan’s supposedly dead husband.
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Loaded?”
“Yes.”
“Fired?”
“No.”
Claire exhaled.
I asked, “What was in the metal box?”
Thomas lowered his voice.
“Not the blue book.”
“Then what?”
“Film.”
“Photographs?”
“Microfilm.”
Daniel’s expression changed.
“Original archive copies.”
Thomas said, “That’s what Rebecca claims.”
“Where’s the blue book?”
“She says Peter took it out years ago.”
“Then Mom’s copy?”
“Different book.”
Anne was still connected.
She spoke immediately.
“Michael called it the blue book.”
Daniel rubbed his forehead.
“There were multiple editions.”
I stared at him.
“You knew that?”
“No. I guessed.”
Rebecca Sterling said, “Stop guessing.”
Thomas continued.
“Police found another room below the hidden room.”
Claire looked at me.
“How?”
“Trap access behind movable shelving.”
Daniel whispered, “There was never a second basement.”
Thomas answered, “There is now.”
“What’s inside?”
“That’s why I called.”
No one moved.
Thomas spoke more slowly.
“Beds.”
Claire went still.
“How many?”
“Six.”
“Old?”
“Yes.”
“Children’s?”
Thomas did not answer immediately.
Then:
“Yes.”
Marlene covered her mouth.
Rebecca Sterling closed her eyes.
I thought about Luca.
Small enough that one arm could hold him.
Small enough that every adult decision around him could become his entire world.
“What else?”
“Growth charts on one wall.”
Claire whispered, “Oh God.”
“Names?”
“Codes.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Medical equipment?”
“Old restraints. Sedation logs. Feeding schedules.”
Daniel sat down.
Marlene stared at him.
“You knew none of this?”
“No.”
“Raymond did?”
“I don’t know.”
She laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
Thomas said, “There are dates.”
“What range?”
“1981 through 1993.”
I did the arithmetic.
Adam had been born inside that range.
So had I.
Claire too.
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Any identifying records?”
“One chart lists transfer families.”
My stomach tightened.
“Read it.”
Thomas hesitated.
“Police are photographing everything.”
“Read it.”
He did.
“Carter to Renner.”
Adam.
“Vale to Sloan.”
Rebecca Sterling looked at the phone.
Thomas stopped.
“Who?”
He said nothing.
“Thomas?”
“My family.”
“What child?”
“I don’t know yet.”
He continued.
“Bennett to—”
Daniel stood.
“Stop.”
Claire looked at him.
“No. Read it.”
Thomas swallowed.
“Bennett to Carter.”
The room went quiet.
I stared at Daniel.
“What does that mean?”
He shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Rebecca Sterling said, “It means a child born into the Bennett family may have been placed with the Carters.”
Claire’s face changed.
Everyone looked at me.
I laughed once.
“No.”
Daniel whispered, “Evan.”
“No.”
Claire reached for my hand.
I pulled away before I realized I had.
Not from her.
From everything.
I walked toward the window again.
“Who?”
Thomas said, “No name yet.”
“Then don’t look at me.”
Nobody answered.
I turned.
“I was born to Anne.”
Anne spoke from the phone.
“Yes.”
“Dad was not my biological father.”
Her silence confirmed what she had already admitted.
I looked at Daniel.
“And now Mercer says Bennett to Carter.”
Daniel shook his head harder.
“No.”
“What?”
“Timing.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “What timing?”
Daniel looked sick.
“My mother had a child before me.”
Claire stopped breathing.
“What?”
“A daughter.”
Marlene stared.
“You never told me.”
“I barely knew.”
Rebecca Sterling said, “Name?”
“Margaret.”
“When was she born?”
“1968.”
“That doesn’t match Evan.”
“No.”
“Any later children?”
Daniel shook his head.
“My mother had complications after me.”
Claire asked, “Your father?”
Daniel stared at her.
“Raymond had affairs.”
The sentence came flat.
Marlene looked away.
Rebecca Sterling said, “Children?”
“I don’t know.”
“You never investigated?”
“No.”
“Convenient.”
Daniel ignored her.
Thomas came back on the line.
“They found a name.”
My body tightened.
“Which entry?”
“Bennett to Carter.”
No one spoke.
Thomas said, “Male infant.”
Claire held Luca closer.
“Name?”
“The birth record says Samuel Bennett.”
Daniel froze.
“That’s impossible.”
“Why?”
“Samuel was my brother.”
Claire stared at her father.
“You had a brother too?”
Daniel nodded slowly.
“He died at birth.”
Rebecca Sterling shut her eyes for half a second.
The pattern had become obscene.
Dead babies.
Living brothers.
Reassigned names.
Families told one version while Mercer kept another.
I asked, “What does Carter mean?”
Thomas said, “Destination family.”
Anne whispered something.
I looked at her phone.
“What?”
She did not answer.
“Mom?”
Her voice trembled.
“Michael had an older cousin named Samuel.”
I stared.
“What happened to him?”
“He died as a baby.”
Rebecca Sterling spoke first.
“No.”
Anne began crying.
“I never thought—”
I moved closer to the phone.
“Mom, was Samuel Carter raised by Dad’s family?”
“Yes.”
“How old would he be?”
She calculated.
“About sixty-eight.”
Daniel sat down slowly.
His face had gone gray.
“My brother would be sixty-eight.”
Claire whispered, “Same child.”
Nobody challenged it.
Thomas said, “The transfer chart lists Bennett infant moved to Carter custody at six days old.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“My mother held a funeral.”
Claire looked at him.
“For an empty coffin?”
“I don’t know.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Did you ever see a body?”
“I was three.”
Marlene sat beside him.
Not touching him.
Just beside him.
I asked Thomas, “Any other named transfers?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Twelve on this wall.”
“Read them.”
Rebecca Sterling intervened.
“Not over an unsecured call.”
She was right.
I hated that she was right.
Thomas said, “One matters immediately.”
“Which?”
“Sloan to Vale.”
He sounded different.
I waited.
“Female infant.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Name?”
“Original: Elaine Sloan.”
Thomas stopped.
“And destination?”
“Vale.”
Daniel looked up.
“Who became Elaine Vale?”
Thomas said, “My mother.”
No one spoke.
The family tree had stopped being a tree.
It was a crime scene with branches.
Thomas continued.
“My mother was told she had no Sloan connection.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Did Peter know?”
“I don’t know.”
Daniel whispered, “Peter knew everything.”
Thomas snapped, “Apparently not enough to stop it.”
Claire said quietly, “None of them stopped it.”
That silenced both men.
Thomas exhaled.
“You’re right.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Any record tied to Peter directly?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“His birth certificate is here.”
Daniel stared.
“Why?”
“Because he was transferred too.”
“From where?”
Thomas took longer this time.
Then:
“Renner.”
I looked at Daniel.
Peter Sloan had been born Renner.
Adam had been born Carter and raised Renner.
Thomas’s mother had been born Sloan and raised Vale.
Samuel Bennett had apparently become Samuel Carter.
The families had been exchanging children for decades.
Not metaphorically.
Actually.
Claire whispered, “Why?”
Nobody answered.
Then Anne did.
“Debt.”
We all looked toward her phone.
“What?”
She breathed slowly.
“Michael once said his father believed families were easier to control if everyone owed everyone something.”
Rebecca Sterling leaned toward the speaker.
“Children as collateral.”
Anne began crying again.
“Yes.”
My stomach turned.
Claire’s expression became cold.
Not emotional.
Cold.
“They traded babies.”
Daniel shook his head.
“I don’t think parents understood it that way.”
Claire looked at him.
“Then how should I understand a six-day-old baby being moved from one family to another because adults made agreements?”
He had no answer.
Thomas spoke.
“Police found something else.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “What?”
“A photograph album.”
“Dates?”
“Mixed.”
“Any recent?”
“Yes.”
“How recent?”
“2009.”
That was after Michael had supposedly stopped everything.
After Peter’s wife had supposedly died.
After Adam had vanished.
“Who is in them?”
Thomas flipped through something off-screen.
“Children.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“Transferred children?”
“Some grown.”
“Names?”
“Codes and current identities.”
Rebecca Sterling’s voice sharpened.
“Do not read those aloud.”
Thomas stopped.
“Understood.”
I asked, “Is there anything about Adam?”
Thomas went quiet.
Then:
“Yes.”
My chest tightened.
“What?”
“A photograph.”
“Date?”
“2009.”
Four years after Mercer.
“Where?”
“Looks like Montreal.”
“Is he alive?”
“In the photograph, yes.”
I gripped the table.
“Anyone with him?”
Thomas looked.
“A woman.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Age?”
“Maybe forties.”
“Description?”
Rebecca Sterling interrupted again.
“Do not speculate identity from an old photograph.”
I almost snapped at her.
Instead I waited.
Thomas said, “There’s writing on the back.”
“Read it.”
He did.
“FIRST CHILD LOCATED. L.M. CONFIRMED.”
Nobody spoke.
I remembered Adam’s letter.
I found the first child. She is alive.
“L.M.”
Daniel whispered, “Initials.”
“Obviously.”
“Who?”
Nobody knew.
Then Marlene stood.
Her chair scraped loudly.
Claire looked at her.
“Mom?”
Marlene’s face had gone white.
“No.”
“What?”
She shook her head.
Daniel stared.
“Marlene.”
She backed away.
“Not her.”
Claire sat straighter.
“Who?”
Marlene looked at her daughter.
“I knew someone with those initials.”
Rebecca Sterling said, “Who?”
Marlene’s hands trembled.
“Linda Mercer.”
The name stopped everything.
Mercer.
Not a company.
A person.
I said, “Who was Linda Mercer?”
Marlene sank back into the chair.
“My aunt.”
Daniel stared at his wife.
“You told me Linda died before we met.”
“That’s what my mother told me.”
“How old?”
“Six.”
“When?”
“1962.”
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Was there a body?”
Marlene looked at her.
“No.”
Claire whispered, “Oh my God.”
Marlene continued.
“My mother said Linda was sick. Then one morning she was gone. There was a funeral. Closed casket.”
Daniel stood.
“Your family was Mercer?”
“No. My grandmother’s maiden name was Mercer.”
Rebecca Sterling’s eyes narrowed.
“Then Mercer Warehouse may have been named for the family.”
Daniel stared.
“I thought Raymond named it after the street.”
“There is no Mercer Street,” Rebecca said.
He looked embarrassed.
Marlene whispered, “My grandmother’s name was Louise Mercer.”
Claire asked, “And Linda?”
“Her daughter.”
“The first child.”
Marlene began crying.
“Maybe.”
Thomas spoke quietly through the phone.
“There’s another notation.”
“What?”
“L.M. transferred 1962.”
Marlene covered her face.
Claire looked at me.
A child declared dead in one family.
Moved into another.
Found decades later by Adam Renner.
Rebecca Sterling asked, “Destination?”
Thomas read.
“Vale.”
Everyone went still.
Thomas whispered, “No.”
“What?”
“I know L.M.”
My skin tightened.
“Who?”
Thomas did not answer immediately.
Then:
“My aunt.”
Daniel stood.
“What’s her name?”
Thomas breathed out.
“Laura Vale.”
Marlene stopped crying.
She simply stared.
“My mother’s sister was Linda Mercer.”
Thomas answered.
“And I grew up knowing her as Laura Vale.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 11: Laura Vale Agreed to Speak Only After Hearing Marlene’s Voice, and What She Remembered About Mercer Made Claire Ask Whether Any of Our Parents Had Ever Known Who Their Children Really Were
The Night Before My Heart Surgery, My Husband Sent a Message That Changed What I Was Fighting to Survive For
Part 10 of 36
