Chapter 4 - THE FIRST SON
Evelyn's face remained perfectly composed on the screen.
David stood in front of Sophie and Jane as if his body could shield them from a woman speaking through glass and wires.
"Where is Harry?"
David demanded.
Evelyn smiled faintly.
"Still giving orders before asking the right question."
"Where is he?"
"Close."
"What do you want?"
Evelyn lifted one hand.
The emerald ring caught the light.
"The same thing Arthur stole from me."
David's voice hardened.
"Money?"
"A life."
The screen changed.
Old home video footage appeared.
A younger Arthur Mercer stood beside the greenhouse holding a baby wrapped in a blue blanket.
The timestamp read March 18, 1988.
One day after David's birth.
Claire Mercer appeared in the edge of the frame, pale and exhausted.
Then Evelyn walked toward them.
She looked much younger than David remembered, because in that video she was not yet Arthur's wife.
She was a house employee.
A private nurse.
David's stomach turned.
The image froze on Evelyn's face.
"Arthur met me before he married me."
Evelyn said.
"Long before Harry was born."
Jane looked at David.
David understood before Evelyn said it.
He did not want to understand.
"No."
Evelyn's smile vanished.
"You were my first son."
Sophie clutched Jane's dress.
David felt as though the marble floor had shifted under him.
Claire Mercer had been his mother in every memory that mattered.
She had taught him to swim.
She had read to him when he had pneumonia.
She had sat in the front row at every school concert.
"You're lying."
"Arthur told me you died during childbirth."
Evelyn replied.
"He told Claire the baby came through a private adoption."
David's mind fought the words.
"Why would my father do that?"
"Because I was twenty-one, poor, and inconvenient."
Evelyn's voice sharpened for the first time.
"Because Claire could not have children."
Jane whispered.
"And Harry?"
Evelyn looked almost amused.
"Harry was born six years later, after Arthur finally came back to me."
David stared at the screen.
The dates matched too well.
Arthur married Evelyn when David was six.
At the time, David had thought she was simply his father's new wife after Claire's death.
He had never known she might be his biological mother.
"If this is true, why fake your death?"
David asked.
Evelyn's eyes cooled.
"Arthur did that too."
The screen switched to a scanned legal document.
A psychiatric commitment order.
Evelyn Mercer.
Private treatment facility.
Switzerland.
Indefinite restriction.
Signed by Arthur Mercer.
David stepped closer.
"He had you committed?"
"He had me erased."
"Why?"
Evelyn leaned toward the camera.
"Because I found the accounts."
The shell companies.
The stolen money.
The ledger.
David had assumed Harry was the thief.
Evelyn claimed Arthur was.
She said Arthur moved money out of Mercer Holdings for years and hid it through dormant family accounts.
When Evelyn confronted him, he threatened to take Harry away.
When she threatened to expose him, Arthur used doctors, lawyers, and money to have her declared unstable.
Then he told the world she was dead.
Harry grew up believing his mother had died.
Until he found her seven years ago.
That was when Harry began working for David.
Not out of loyalty.
Out of strategy.
"You used him."
David said.
Evelyn's expression turned cold.
"I rescued him from your father's lie."
"You helped him imprison Jane."
"Jane refused to cooperate."
"You threatened my daughter."
Evelyn did not answer.
That silence told David more than denial would have.
He stepped closer to the camera.
"You don't get to call yourself my mother."
For the first time, Evelyn looked wounded.
Then the emotion vanished.
"Bring the brass key to the greenhouse."
"No."
"Then you will never know what happened to Arthur."
"I don't care."
"You will."
Evelyn's voice softened.
"Because Arthur did not die from a heart attack."
The screen went black.
A moment later, the mansion lights returned.
The jammer dropped.
David's phone exploded with missed calls and messages.
Cole radioed from the security room.
"System is back. Police are eight minutes out."
David replied.
"Find Mason."
"Mason is in the security room with me."
David froze.
"What?"
"He came in through the east passage two minutes ago."
David looked at the balcony where he had watched Mason get struck down.
Jane's face went pale.
"Then who was outside the window?"
A knock sounded at the nursery door.
Three slow taps.
David lifted a fireplace poker from beside the hearth.
"Who is it?"
"David."
It was Harry's voice.
Jane backed away.
Sophie grabbed her hand.
David opened the door only after Cole confirmed over the radio that Harry had not been seen on any camera.
Harry stood in the hallway.
His dark suit was torn.
There was dirt across one cheek.
His left hand was bleeding through a wrapped handkerchief.
He looked exhausted and furious.
Jane recoiled.
"Stay away from me."
Harry lifted both hands.
"I didn't lock you down there."
Jane stared at him.
"You stood over me while they chained the door."
"Because she was watching."
"You threatened Sophie."
Harry flinched.
"I wrote the note."
David moved forward.
Harry immediately said.
"I wrote it to keep Sophie from opening the trapdoor while armed men were in the house."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"No."
Harry reached into his jacket slowly.
David raised the poker.
Harry pulled out a small blue notebook.
Sophie's eyes widened.
"That's Grandpa's book."
Harry held it toward David.
"I took it before Evelyn could."
David did not lower the poker.
"Why?"
Harry's face changed.
"Because everything she told you is half true."
He opened the notebook to the final page.
A dried brown stain covered one corner.
Arthur's handwriting ran shakily across the paper.
David read the first line.
IF I AM DEAD, EVELYN DID NOT DO IT.
Then he read the second.
HARRY DID NOT DO IT EITHER.
David looked up.
"Then who did?"
Harry swallowed.
"The same person who just pretended to be Mason on your balcony."
A gunshot cracked downstairs.
Cole's voice vanished from the radio.
May you like
Harry whispered.
"She found us."
