Chapter 7 - THE WOMAN VICTOR BURIED TWICE
Catherine Castle died of cancer when Victor was twenty.
There was a funeral.
A coffin.
A gravestone.
Victor remembered all of it.
Now my father’s video suggested something impossible.
Catherine may have survived her own death.
Victor stared at the screen.
“This is wrong.”
Elena looked shaken too.
“I watched her die.”
“Did you see the body after?”
She hesitated.
Victor turned toward her.
“Elena.”
“I was nineteen.”
“Did you see her?”
“No.”
Silence.
Victor stood.
For the first time since the hotel, anger overwhelmed his control.
“He lied to us.”
“Who?”
“Our father.”
Victor began pacing.
“He told us Mother died at the private clinic.”
My stomach tightened.
“What clinic?”
Elena answered:
“Mercer Medical.”
Graham Mercer again.
We searched Dad’s ledger.
There it was.
Payments to Mercer Medical under a code name.
Catherine Castle.
But the payments continued for six years after her supposed death.
I stared.
“She was alive.”
Victor looked like someone had punched him.
Then another record appeared.
A passport scan.
Different name.
Catherine Hale.
Travel history showed Europe, Canada, and finally Chicago.
The most recent entry was two weeks earlier.
Victor sank into a chair.
“My mother is alive.”
No one knew what to say.
Then my phone buzzed.
An email.
Unknown sender.
Subject:
YOUR FATHER WAS RIGHT.
Inside was a photograph taken that morning.
An elegant woman in her sixties stepped out of a black sedan.
Victor leaned closer.
His face went white.
“Mother.”
Below the photograph was a message.
COME TO THE BROOKS FOUNDATION GALA OFFICE AT NOON. ALONE.
I laughed bitterly.
“Absolutely not.”
Victor looked toward me.
“Agreed.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“You’re learning.”
But the message contained something else.
A video file.
My supervisor Karen sat tied to a chair.
Someone stood behind her.
Only a woman's hand was visible.
Then Catherine Castle’s voice spoke.
“Hazel, your father left something that belongs to me.”
My stomach tightened.
“You have until noon.”
Karen began crying.
Then Catherine added:
“And Victor must not come.”
Victor’s jaw clenched.
I looked toward him.
“She knows we're together.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
His expression darkened.
“Someone here is reporting to her.”
The room went silent.
Elena.
Dr. Patel.
The attorney.
Me.
Victor looked toward the hallway.
Then slowly pulled out his phone.
He opened the call log.
One outgoing number appeared at 3:12 A.M.
A call he hadn't made.
From his phone.
To an unknown Chicago number.
The call lasted twenty-three seconds.
Then Dr. Patel entered the room.
He looked at our faces.
“What?”
Victor raised his gun.
Dr. Patel froze.
And Elena whispered:
“Oh, God.”
May you like
Because the number Victor’s phone had called belonged to Mercer Medical.
Someone inside the safe house had already betrayed us.
