Chapter 9 - THE GIRL BEFORE ME
Her name was Rebecca Lane.
She would have been thirty-one.
Grandma’s first grandchild.
Dad stared at Caroline.
“That’s impossible.”
“No.”
Caroline’s voice shook.
“Before you married Sarah, I had a daughter.”
Dad looked stunned.
“You had a baby?”
“I was nineteen.”
Grandma hid the pregnancy from the family.
Caroline was unmarried.
The Vale name mattered more than honesty.
Rebecca was raised by relatives under another surname.
But when she developed a mild spinal curvature at seven, Grandma became involved.
Too involved.
Caroline remembered braces.
Restrictions.
Doctors.
Then Rebecca supposedly became “too medically complicated” for ordinary school.
Grandma controlled everything.
“At fifteen, Rebecca ran away.”
I held my breath.
“Where?”
“Nobody knows.”
“Did police search?”
“Mom told everyone Rebecca was unstable and had gone with friends.”
Caroline’s eyes filled.
“She made me believe Rebecca hated me.”
Sarah discovered Rebecca’s file years later.
The same phrases appeared in my fake chart.
Fragile.
Defiant.
Medically resistant.
Incapacity.
Grandma had been developing the same system for decades.
Then Caroline gave Dad a small brass key.
“I took this from Mom’s desk.”
“What does it open?”
“The basement room at the estate.”
I stopped breathing.
Grandma’s basement was always locked.
She said it contained wine and old records.
Police obtained a warrant.
The room contained no wine.
There were old braces.
Locked cabinets.
Boxes of medical files.
Not just mine.
Not just Dad’s.
Not just Caroline’s.
And in the far cabinet, investigators found Rebecca’s file.
The last document was seventeen years old.
A discharge form.
DESTINATION:
St. Catherine Residential Academy, Vermont.
Caroline stared.
“She didn’t run away.”
No.
Grandma had sent her away.
But St. Catherine had closed twelve years earlier.
Investigators contacted former administrators.
By evening, they had an answer.
Rebecca Lane had never disappeared.
She had aged out of the program at eighteen.
Then changed her name.
Dad asked:
“To what?”
The investigator looked toward Dr. Harrison.
“Rebecca Harrison.”
Everyone stopped.
May you like
Dr. Harrison went white.
Rebecca was his wife.
