Chapter 3 - THE FIANCÉE WHO STOLE SOMEONE ELSE'S NAME
“Vanessa Whitmore?”
Damien stared at Rachel as though he hadn't heard correctly.
His fiancée had spent the previous eighteen months convincing him they were building a future together.
Now Rachel was suggesting Vanessa might be his father's daughter.
His half sister.
“Tell me why you think that,” Damien said.
Rachel turned the silver bracelet over.
“Evelyn told me she wanted her daughter to have something nobody could take away. She scratched those three marks into the bracelet herself.”
“Then who engraved the message?”
“I don't know. But Vanessa has a scar behind her left ear.”
Damien frowned.
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Evelyn's daughter was born with a small birthmark in that exact place.”
Damien remembered Vanessa gathering her hair over her left shoulder when they first met.
He remembered her refusing to be photographed from certain angles.
He also remembered a thin pale mark behind her ear.
He had never asked about it.
“That's not proof.”
“No,” Rachel admitted. “But it's enough to ask questions.”
Damien reached for his phone.
Before he could dial, Anthony returned.
“We found the printing company. Hartford police are sending officers. I'm going with them.”
“Don't enter until they arrive,” Damien ordered. “Michael could hurt the boy.”
Anthony nodded.
Then he looked at Rachel.
“There's something else.”
He set a photograph on Damien's desk.
It showed Vanessa stepping out of a dark sedan behind a downtown Hartford office building.
Beside her stood Daniel Mercer.
The attorney who had supposedly contacted Damien to help expose Vincent's trust.
“When was this taken?” Damien asked.
“Yesterday afternoon.”
Damien's expression changed.
Mercer had claimed he hadn't spoken to Vanessa in years.
Apparently, he'd lied.
“Find out what they discussed,” Damien said.
Anthony hesitated.
“Boss, there's a second picture.”
He placed it beside the first.
Michael Russo had arrived at the same building twenty minutes later.
The three of them had entered together.
Rachel stared at the photographs.
“They're working together.”
“Maybe,” Damien answered.
“But if they are, why would Mercer tell me where to find the birth certificate?”
Nobody had an answer.
Damien studied Vanessa's face.
She looked tense.
Michael seemed angry.
Mercer looked like a man trying to keep two people from fighting.
It didn't resemble a friendly meeting.
Damien made a decision.
“Bring Mercer here.”
Rachel reached for her cane.
“I'm coming with you.”
“You need an X-ray.”
“My son needs his mother.”
“And he will have her.”
Damien softened his tone.
“But Michael wants you frightened enough to make mistakes. I'm not giving him that advantage.”
Rachel looked away.
For a moment, Damien expected her to refuse.
Instead, she asked, “Will you call me the second they find him?”
“Yes.”
“Even if it's bad news?”
Damien held her gaze.
“Especially then.”
Twenty-five minutes later, Vanessa entered the mansion escorted by two security officers.
She stopped when she saw the bracelet on Damien's desk.
The color left her face.
“Where did you find that?”
Damien leaned against the desk.
“Inside your suitcase.”
Vanessa looked at Rachel.
“You had no right.”
Rachel stood carefully.
“Neither did you.”
Vanessa's eyes flashed.
“You searched through my personal belongings.”
“You pushed me against a bench because I saw something you were hiding.”
Vanessa looked toward Damien.
“She's twisting everything.”
Damien didn't raise his voice.
“Did you give Michael a copy of Rachel's driver's license?”
Vanessa went silent.
“Did you help him take Caleb?”
“No.”
“Did you know he intended to?”
Vanessa swallowed.
“I knew he wanted to speak with the boy.”
Damien stared at her.
“You knew.”
“I didn't know he'd abduct him!”
Rachel took an angry step forward.
“Then why did you threaten to take away my paycheck if I didn't carry your suitcase?”
Vanessa looked down.
“Because I was trying to get it out of the house.”
“Why?”
Vanessa's lower lip trembled.
“Because Michael told me he'd kill me if you found what was inside.”
Damien watched her carefully.
This was the first time he'd seen Vanessa look genuinely frightened.
He still didn't know whether it was fear of Michael or fear of being caught.
“You could have told me.”
Vanessa laughed bitterly.
“You think everyone in Connecticut feels safe telling Damien Russo that a member of his family threatened them?”
The words landed harder than he expected.
She continued.
“Your cousin has been controlling the family trust for twenty years. He knows where every dollar went. He knows who your father paid to keep silent.”
“Who is Evelyn Bennett?”
Vanessa closed her eyes.
When she opened them, they were wet.
“My mother.”
Rachel gripped the back of the chair.
Damien felt the room tilt.
Vanessa reached behind her ear and lifted her hair.
There was a small pale scar.
“Evelyn told me it came from an accident when I was little,” Vanessa whispered. “She said I fell against a heater.”
Rachel stepped closer.
“What happened to Evelyn?”
Vanessa shook her head.
“I don't know. Michael told me she abandoned me.”
Rachel's expression crumpled.
“She wouldn't have done that.”
“You didn't know her the way I did.”
“She was my sister.”
Vanessa stared at her.
For the first time, the two women looked at each other without anger.
“My aunt Rachel?” Vanessa whispered.
Rachel slowly nodded.
Vanessa pressed her hand over her mouth.
But Damien wasn't ready to believe everything.
“Why use the Whitmore name?”
“Because Michael arranged a new identity for me when I was eleven. He said the Russo family would hurt me if I kept my real name.”
“And you never questioned him?”
“I did. Every time I did, he threatened to stop paying for my schooling.”
Damien remembered Vanessa explaining that her parents had died when she was young and a distant relative had raised her.
It had sounded sad but ordinary.
Now he wondered how much of her story had been carefully prepared.
“Did you know Vincent Russo was your father when we met?”
Vanessa looked at him.
“No.”
“Did you know when we became engaged?”
Her silence lasted too long.
“Vanessa.”
“Michael told me three months ago.”
Damien stepped back.
Three months.
For three months, she'd known the man she planned to marry was her half brother.
“And you said nothing?”
“He told me Vincent wasn't really my father. He said the certificate had been altered.”
“Did you believe him?”
“I wanted to.”
Damien looked away in disgust.
Vanessa began crying.
“I loved you.”
“Then you should have told me the truth.”
“I was afraid you'd destroy everything.”
Rachel interrupted quietly.
“What about Caleb?”
Vanessa wiped her eyes.
“I never wanted Michael to take him.”
“But you knew Michael was interested in him.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Vanessa hesitated.
Then she whispered, “Because Michael said Caleb was the only person who could identify Evelyn.”
Rachel went very still.
“Identify her?”
Vanessa nodded.
“He said Caleb had met a woman using another name. A woman who knew about the trust.”
Damien leaned forward.
“Who was she?”
Vanessa shook her head.
“Michael wouldn't tell me.”
At that moment, Anthony returned with news from the printing company.
Officers had entered the building.
The green door marked 14 was there.
So was Caleb's backpack.
But Caleb was gone.
Rachel made a small, broken sound.
Anthony placed the backpack on the desk.
Inside was Caleb's notebook, his spare hearing-aid batteries, and a folded drawing.
Rachel opened it with shaking fingers.
The drawing showed a woman with long brown hair standing beside Caleb.
Above them, in careful handwriting, were the words:
THE LADY WHO KNOWS MY FIRST NAME.
Rachel turned the page over.
May you like
On the back, Caleb had written one sentence.
Mom, I think she knows what happened to Aunt Evelyn.
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