At 11:19 P.M., Caroline made the decision Marcus had been afraid she would make.
"We're going to the estate."
"No."
Marcus didn't hesitate.
Caroline turned the burner phone toward him. The frozen image still showed Rebecca and Douglas bound to their chairs, with Chief Holloway standing behind them.
"He's going to kill them."
"Maybe."
"Maybe?"
"That's exactly what Holloway wants you to believe."
"And if he's telling the truth?"
Marcus stared at her.
"Then arriving exactly where he ordered you to go is still the worst thing we can do."
Caroline's voice dropped.
"Rebecca may be my mother."
"And Douglas may be your father."
"May be?"
The word stopped her.
Marcus had made the mistake without realizing it.
Caroline slowly lowered the phone.
"You said Rebecca was my biological mother."
"I said the evidence indicates—"
"No. You said, 'Rebecca Hale was your biological mother.'"
Marcus looked away.
Caroline understood.
"There is something else."
Evelyn leaned forward from the back seat.
"Marcus, tell her."
"We don't have time."
"Then make time."
Caroline's hand tightened around the phone.
"One of them is your parent."
She repeated the message from the wall.
"One."
Marcus remained silent.
"Not both."
Still nothing.
Caroline felt fury rising beneath her fear.
"Is Douglas Mercer my father?"
Marcus finally answered.
"I don't know."
Caroline laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
"My name might not be mine. My mother isn't my mother. My father might not be my father. The dead woman isn't dead, the body in my bedroom belonged to someone else, and apparently the only person who knew any of this decided to reveal it one trauma at a time."
"I was trying to protect you."
"Stop saying that."
Marcus flinched.
Caroline leaned closer.
"Everyone who has destroyed my life has claimed they were protecting me."
That silenced him.
Evelyn looked through the windshield.
"Eleven twenty-two."
Thirty-eight minutes until midnight.
Marcus started driving again.
But he didn't turn toward the Mercer estate.
Caroline noticed immediately.
"Where are we going?"
"The blue room."
---
The house should not have existed.
Caroline recognized the iron gates before Marcus even stopped the car.
She stared through the windshield.
Beyond them, hidden beneath decades of overgrown ivy and eucalyptus trees, stood a two-story Mediterranean mansion.
Her childhood home.
"No."
Marcus parked without turning off the engine.
Caroline opened the door.
"Wait."
She ignored him.
The gate was chained but not locked.
Caroline pushed through.
Memories attacked her with every step.
Her tenth birthday beneath the lemon tree.
Eleanor teaching her to ride a bicycle along the stone path.
Juliette falling into the fountain and blaming Caroline.
Douglas leaving for another business trip.
Christmas mornings.
Arguments behind closed doors.
Her mother's perfume.
The house had been abandoned, but not demolished.
Douglas had lied.
Again.
Caroline reached the front door.
It opened beneath her hand.
Marcus appeared behind her with his gun drawn.
"Stay close."
Caroline stepped inside.
Dust covered everything.
Furniture remained beneath white sheets.
An old grandfather clock had stopped at 4:16.
Evelyn entered behind them.
"This place is creepy."
Caroline barely heard her.
She was looking toward the staircase.
"I haven't been here since I was sixteen."
"The year Eleanor died," Marcus said.
Caroline nodded.
"Douglas moved us out three weeks later."
"He said the house was sold?"
"He said he couldn't stand living here without her."
Marcus's expression suggested he believed none of that anymore.
"Where's the blue room?"
Caroline looked upstairs.
"It was my mother's private sitting room."
They climbed.
At the end of the hallway stood a faded blue door.
Caroline touched the handle.
Locked.
Marcus examined it.
"Old lock."
He forced it open with a metal tool.
The smell hit Caroline first.
Dust.
Old paper.
And something faintly floral.
She stopped.
"Gardenias."
"What?" Evelyn asked.
"My mother's perfume."
Impossible after eleven years.
Yet Caroline could smell it.
The room remained almost exactly as Eleanor had left it.
Blue wallpaper.
White bookshelves.
A writing desk facing the garden.
An old piano.
Caroline walked toward the desk.
A photograph stood beside the lamp.
Three women smiled at the camera.
Eleanor.
Rebecca.
And another woman.
Caroline didn't recognize her.
Marcus came closer.
"I've never seen this."
Caroline picked up the photograph.
The women looked approximately twenty.
On the back was a handwritten sentence:
**The three of us against the world.**
Below it were initials.
E.M.
R.H.
L.V.
"Who is L.V.?"
Marcus shook his head.
Caroline opened the desk.
Empty.
Second drawer.
Empty.
Third—
Locked.
She searched beneath the desk.
Her fingers touched metal.
A small key had been taped underneath.
Caroline inserted it.
Click.
Inside was a stack of letters tied with a blue ribbon.
Marcus reached toward them.
Caroline stopped him.
"They're hers."
He withdrew his hand.
Caroline untied the ribbon.
The first letter was addressed to Rebecca.
She read silently.
Then again.
Her breathing changed.
"What?" Evelyn asked.
Caroline handed her the letter.
It wasn't romantic.
Not exactly.
But it was intimate.
Eleanor wrote about Douglas.
About fearing him.
About regretting a decision.
About "the arrangement."
One sentence had been underlined.
**If Douglas ever discovers what we did, he will take Caroline away from both of us.**
Caroline's hands began shaking.
"Both of us."
Marcus took the letter.
"Keep reading."
The next letters revealed fragments.
Eleanor had wanted a child.
Douglas had wanted an heir.
Rebecca had agreed to help.
But something had gone wrong.
There were references to doctors.
Money.
A private clinic.
And someone identified only as **L**.
Then Caroline found the final letter.
It had never been mailed.
**Rebecca,**
**I know the truth now.**
Caroline stopped.
Marcus watched her.
"Read it."
She continued.
**Douglas lied to all of us. Caroline was never part of the agreement. He changed the records before either of us understood what he had done.**
Caroline's pulse pounded.
**I confronted him tonight. He says telling Caroline would destroy her. I think he means it would destroy him.**
Then:
**If something happens to me, find Lillian. She has the original file.**
Caroline looked at the photograph.
"L.V."
Marcus nodded.
"Lillian."
Evelyn suddenly moved toward the bookshelf.
"There's something behind this."
A section of wallpaper had separated.
Marcus pulled the shelf aside.
A small wall safe appeared.
Four digits.
Caroline immediately entered Eleanor's birthday.
Wrong.
Rebecca's birthday was unknown.
Then she remembered the stopped grandfather clock downstairs.
4:16.
She entered 0416.
Click.
The safe opened.
Inside was a cassette recorder.
A medical folder.
And an envelope marked:
**FOR CAROLINE ONLY.**
Caroline forgot how to breathe.
She opened it.
Inside was a single handwritten page.
Her mother's handwriting.
**My darling Caroline,**
**If you are reading this, then I failed to tell you the truth myself.**
Tears blurred Caroline's vision.
She continued.
**Whatever anyone tells you, you were wanted. You were loved. Rebecca loved you. I loved you. What Douglas did cannot change that.**
Caroline covered her mouth.
Evelyn put a hand on her shoulder.
The letter continued.
**But Douglas Mercer is not your biological father.**
Caroline closed her eyes.
There it was.
The certainty she had demanded.
She almost wished she could return it.
Marcus whispered, "Keep going."
Caroline read the final paragraph.
**Your father does not know you exist. Rebecca and I believed keeping you from him would protect you. I no longer know whether we were right. His name is recorded on the cassette.**
Caroline looked toward the recorder.
Marcus inserted the tape.
Pressed PLAY.
Static filled the room.
Then Eleanor's voice.
Eleven years dead.
"Caroline, if you're hearing this, I need you to forgive me."
Caroline began crying.
She hadn't heard that voice since she was sixteen.
"There are things parents do because they believe love excuses deception. It doesn't."
A pause.
"I was unable to carry a child. Rebecca offered to become a surrogate. Douglas agreed. At least, that is what he told us."
Marcus looked at Caroline.
Eleanor continued.
"Months later, Rebecca discovered the embryo used in the procedure was not the one we had authorized."
Evelyn whispered, "Oh my God."
Caroline stared at the recorder.
"Douglas had secretly substituted genetic material."
Static.
Then Eleanor said:
"But it wasn't his."
Caroline's stomach dropped.
"Why?" Evelyn whispered.
The recording continued.
"Douglas wanted a specific bloodline connected to the Mercer family. I didn't understand until years later."
A sound interrupted the recording.
Someone knocking.
Eleanor's recorded voice became frightened.
"He's here."
The cassette clicked.
Then resumed.
"If Douglas tells you your father was a stranger, don't believe him."
Caroline leaned toward the machine.
"Your biological father was someone I knew."
Static swallowed several words.
Marcus adjusted the recorder.
"...and if he learns you're alive..."
More static.
"...everything Douglas built could belong to you."
The recording stopped.
Caroline stared at the machine.
"That's it?"
Marcus flipped the cassette.
Nothing.
Evelyn examined the medical folder.
"Caroline."
Inside were fertility records.
DNA markers.
Embryo identification numbers.
And one name heavily blacked out.
Marcus held the document beneath the lamp.
"There may be a way to recover it."
Caroline's burner phone suddenly vibrated.
11:48 P.M.
A message from Holloway.
**TWELVE MINUTES.**
Attached was another live image.
Rebecca remained tied to the chair.
Douglas was beside her.
But now Juliette stood behind them.
Caroline stared.
Juliette wasn't tied.
She was holding a gun.
"She really is part of this."
Marcus looked at the image.
"Maybe."
"What do you mean, maybe?"
"Look at her hand."
Caroline enlarged the picture.
Juliette held the pistol awkwardly.
Her index finger wasn't on the trigger.
Her eyes weren't looking at the camera.
They were looking to the left.
At someone outside the frame.
Fear.
Genuine fear.
Marcus said quietly:
"She may not be there willingly."
Another message arrived.
**BRING THE FILE FROM THE BLUE ROOM.**
Caroline's skin prickled.
"How does Holloway know we're here?"
Nobody answered.
Then they heard a floorboard creak in the hallway.
Marcus raised his weapon.
Evelyn grabbed Caroline.
The blue-room door slowly moved.
Marcus aimed.
"Come out."
Silence.
"Now."
A woman stepped into the doorway.
She appeared to be in her late sixties.
Thin.
Gray-haired.
A scar ran from her ear to her jaw.
Caroline had never seen her before.
But the woman looked at Caroline and immediately began crying.
"My God."
Marcus kept his gun raised.
"Who are you?"
The woman ignored him.
She walked toward Caroline.
"You look like him."
Caroline stepped backward.
"Who?"
The woman smiled sadly.
"Your father."
Marcus moved between them.
"Name."
The woman looked at him.
"Lillian Vale."
Caroline's eyes widened.
"L.V."
Lillian nodded.
"Eleanor told me you might eventually come."
Caroline held up the medical file.
"Who is my father?"
Lillian's expression changed.
Fear replaced relief.
"You shouldn't have opened that."
"Tell me."
"Caroline—"
"TELL ME HIS NAME."
Lillian looked toward the window.
Then at Marcus.
Then back at Caroline.
"Douglas spent twenty-seven years making sure you never found out."
"Why?"
"Because your biological father had something Douglas wanted."
"What?"
Lillian swallowed.
"The Mercer empire."
Caroline stared at her.
"That doesn't make sense."
"It will."
Lillian took the photograph of Eleanor, Rebecca, and herself.
"There were never three of us."
"What?"
"There were four."
She turned the photograph over.
With her fingernail, she peeled away a thin layer that had been glued over the right edge.
Another person appeared.
A young man.
Caroline's heart stopped.
She knew that face.
Everyone in California knew it.
A billionaire industrialist.
A man whose disappearance twenty-eight years earlier had become one of the most famous unsolved cases in the state.
Adrian Vale.
Founder of Vale Industries.
Declared dead after his private aircraft vanished over the Pacific.
Lillian looked at Caroline.
"My brother."
Caroline stared at Adrian's face.
Then at Lillian.
"You're saying Adrian Vale was my father?"
"No."
Caroline frowned.
"But you just—"
"I said Douglas wanted you to believe Adrian was dead."
Silence.
Lillian's eyes filled with terror.
"My brother never boarded that plane."
Caroline felt the room grow colder.
"Where is he?"
Lillian looked directly at her.
"For twenty-eight years, Douglas Mercer has kept your father alive."
Caroline could barely speak.
"Where?"
Lillian's answer was almost a whisper.
"Under the Mercer estate."