Chapter 3 - THE BROTHER WHO DIED
Caspian took the photograph from Sloan as though it could burn him.
“My brother's name was Julian.”
Sloan waited.
Caspian rarely spoke about childhood.
She knew his father had died when he was young.
She knew his mother had died several years later.
Everything else had been a locked room.
“He was eight months old,” Caspian said. “There was a fire at my father's warehouse. My mother had taken Julian there because she was meeting my father.”
“And Julian died?”
“So I was told.”
“You weren't there?”
“I was twelve.”
Caspian studied the old photograph.
“My uncle Malcolm picked me up from school. He told me my mother survived, but Julian hadn't.”
“Did you see the body?”
“No.”
That single word changed the room.
Sloan folded her arms around herself.
“Could Malcolm have lied?”
Caspian looked at her.
“My uncle raised me after my mother died. He taught me everything.”
“That isn't an answer.”
“No.”
His voice turned cold.
“It isn't.”
Sloan should have felt vindicated.
Instead she felt afraid.
Because Malcolm Reed wasn't merely Caspian's uncle.
He was the man who had built the organization Caspian inherited.
And Sloan had met him.
Once.
At a charity dinner.
Malcolm had kissed her hand and told Caspian she was “too decent for this family.”
At the time, Sloan thought it was a joke.
Now she wasn't sure.
Caspian called one of his security men, Elias, inside.
“Find everything from the warehouse fire. Hospital records. Fire reports. Newspaper archives. Quietly.”
Elias nodded.
“And the rosary?”
Caspian handed him the surveillance photograph.
Elias studied it.
His face changed almost imperceptibly.
Sloan noticed.
“So you recognize it too.”
Elias looked at Caspian.
“Your mother had two.”
Caspian froze.
“What?”
“She gave one to Malcolm.”
Silence.
Caspian's expression hardened.
“You're certain?”
“I saw him wearing it years ago.”
Sloan looked between them.
“Then maybe the man in that car is Malcolm.”
“No,” Caspian said.
“Why not?”
“Because Malcolm is in Boston.”
“That doesn't prevent him driving to Providence.”
“He can't drive.”
Sloan frowned.
Caspian explained.
“Stroke last year. His left side never fully recovered.”
Another answer.
Two more questions.
Sloan felt suddenly exhausted.
“I want to go home.”
“I'll drive you.”
“No.”
“Sloan.”
“I've spent six months building a life where I make my own decisions. You don't get to arrive and erase that in an afternoon.”
Something painful crossed his face.
“All right.”
He stepped aside.
Sloan left alone.
She made it halfway to her apartment before noticing the gray sedan.
Parked across the street.
Her breath stopped.
This time she could see the driver.
A man perhaps thirty.
Dark hair.
Lean face.
He was watching her.
Sloan reached for her phone.
The sedan pulled away.
She called Caspian.
He answered before the first full ring.
“Where are you?”
“Outside my apartment.”
“What happened?”
“The car.”
His voice changed instantly.
“Go inside.”
“I'm already—”
“Don't.”
Sloan stopped.
“Why?”
“Because if he knows where you live, your apartment is the obvious place to corner you.”
She hated that he was right.
“There's a coffee shop on the corner.”
“Go there. I'm six minutes away.”
He arrived in four.
Caspian entered the coffee shop without his coat, breathing hard, Elias behind him.
Sloan had never seen him hurry.
“You okay?”
“Yes.”
“Describe him.”
She did.
Elias and Caspian exchanged a look.
“What?”
Neither answered.
“Caspian.”
Elias finally took out his phone and opened a photograph.
It showed a younger man standing beside Malcolm Reed at a hospital fundraiser.
Sloan stared.
“That was him.”
Caspian's face went blank.
“Who is he?”
Elias answered.
“Daniel Mercer.”
Sloan frowned.
The name meant nothing to her.
Caspian sat opposite her.
“Daniel is Malcolm's physical therapist.”
“Why is your uncle's physical therapist following me?”
“I don't know.”
Elias's phone buzzed.
He read the message.
“Caspian.”
“What?”
“The warehouse fire report.”
Elias turned the screen toward them.
The original report listed one fatality.
Not an infant.
A forty-three-year-old security guard.
No child was listed among the dead.
Caspian stared at the screen.
“My mother was told Julian died there.”
“By Malcolm?” Sloan asked.
His silence answered.
Then another message arrived.
Hospital admissions from that night.
Caspian read them himself.
His mother, Evelyn Reed, had been treated for smoke inhalation.
Beside her name was another patient.
Eight-month-old Julian Reed.
Condition: stable.
Discharged two days later.
Caspian stood so abruptly his chair scraped backward.
“He lived.”
Sloan's heart pounded.
“At least through the fire.”
Caspian looked toward the window.
For the first time since she had known him, Sloan saw something close to hatred in his face.
“Malcolm stole my brother.”
Elias shook his head.
“Maybe not.”
He had opened another archived record.
An adoption intake from Rhode Island.
The infant's name had been changed.
But the birth date matched Julian's exactly.
And the listed emergency contact was someone Sloan recognized.
She leaned closer.
Dr. Arthur Morrison.
Her obstetrician.
Sloan slowly lifted her eyes toward Caspian.
“Dr. Morrison knew your brother.”
Before Caspian could answer, Sloan's phone buzzed.
Not a mysterious number.
The clinic's scheduling app.
Her next appointment had been moved.
Beneath it was a note entered by Dr. Morrison himself.
May you like
Sloan, don't bring Caspian back here. Malcolm will know.
---
