Chapter 5 - The Woman Who Carried Him Away
Victor drove back to the mansion without speaking.
Isabella sat beside him, staring at the photograph of Martha and Evelyn.
For the first time in her life, she seemed afraid to ask her father a question.
Finally, she whispered, “Are you going to fire her?”
Victor kept his eyes on the road.
“No.”
“Even after what she did?”
“We don't know everything she did.”
“But she signed you out.”
Victor's hands tightened around the steering wheel.
“I know.”
He remembered Martha carrying Isabella through the house when she was sick.
Martha teaching her to tie her shoes.
Martha sitting outside Margaret's bedroom during her final illness, refusing to leave until the doctors arrived.
The idea that the same woman had helped steal him from his mother made Victor feel physically sick.
Yet something refused to fit.
If Martha had willingly helped Lorenzo, why had she spent decades secretly visiting Evelyn?
Why had she brought his childhood coat to a grieving mother?
And why had she hidden the truth even after Lorenzo died?
When they reached the mansion, Victor found Martha in the kitchen.
She was washing a teacup with her uninjured hand.
The bandage around her other palm had darkened.
Victor placed the hospital photograph on the counter.
Martha looked at it.
Then slowly set down the cup.
“You found Thomas.”
“Yes.”
“Is he well?”
“He's alive. He has a job. He helps children.”
Martha closed her eyes.
“Thank God.”
Victor moved closer.
“Did you sign me out of St. Catherine's?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know Lorenzo intended to take me?”
Martha looked directly at him.
“Yes.”
Isabella inhaled sharply.
Victor stepped back.
For several seconds, he couldn't speak.
Then he asked, “Why?”
Martha sat down.
“Because your mother was bleeding.”
Victor stared.
“What?”
“After you were born, Evelyn developed a severe hemorrhage. The doctors were trying to save her.”
Martha's voice trembled.
“Lorenzo came to the hospital with two men. He said he had arranged for the baby to be taken to another facility.”
“Why would anyone believe him?”
“Because the hospital administrator signed the transfer papers.”
Victor felt his anger rising.
“Did you believe him?”
“No.”
“Then why did you carry me out?”
Martha looked at her bandaged hand.
“Because one of his men was holding Thomas.”
The room fell silent.
“He brought Evelyn's older boy into the service hallway,” she continued. “He told me that if I refused to sign, Thomas would disappear before his mother woke up.”
Victor swallowed.
“They threatened a child.”
“Yes.”
“And you believed them.”
“I'd seen what Lorenzo was capable of.”
Victor looked away.
Martha's voice grew softer.
“I carried you to a waiting car. You were wrapped in a blue blanket. You were crying.”
She pressed her fingers to her mouth.
“I've heard that sound in my dreams for forty-eight years.”
Victor corrected her quietly.
“Almost forty-eight.”
Martha nodded.
“I watched them drive away with you. Then I went back upstairs and sat beside Evelyn until she woke.”
“What did you tell her?”
“The truth.”
Victor turned toward her.
“All of it?”
“I told her Lorenzo had taken you. I told her I'd helped because he threatened Thomas.”
“What did she say?”
Martha's eyes filled.
“She asked me to save whichever child I still could.”
Victor lowered himself into a chair.
For years he had believed courage meant refusing to show fear.
Now he was looking at a woman who had been terrified and still spent decades trying to repair one terrible decision.
“Did you help her look for me?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you come to work for the Marinos?”
“Because Evelyn asked me to.”
Victor stared.
“She wanted someone inside the house?”
“She wanted to know you were alive. Healthy. Loved.”
Martha wiped her cheek.
“She couldn't reach you. But I could tell her whether you smiled, whether you were eating, whether Margaret treated you kindly.”
Victor thought of Margaret.
The woman who raised him.
“Did she know I'd been stolen?”
Martha hesitated.
“She knew Lorenzo had arranged the adoption.”
“Adoption?”
“That's what he called it.”
“Did she know Evelyn hadn't consented?”
Martha's silence answered.
Victor looked at the floor.
Margaret's love had been real.
But so had her silence.
It was a painful truth he would have to live with.
Isabella moved toward Martha.
“Why didn't you tell Daddy after Grandpa died?”
Martha's expression changed.
“Because Lorenzo left instructions.”
Victor looked up sharply.
“What instructions?”
“He prepared a sealed packet. Benjamin brought it to me after the funeral.”
“Benjamin?”
“Yes.”
“What was inside?”
Martha's voice became thin.
“A photograph of Thomas outside St. Agnes. And a note saying that if I spoke, the people Lorenzo had paid would finish what he'd started.”
Victor rose.
“Do you still have it?”
“I burned the note.”
“And the photograph?”
Martha looked toward the hallway.
“In my room.”
Victor and Isabella followed her upstairs.
Martha's bedroom was small.
A narrow bed.
A wooden dresser.
A faded quilt.
Beside the bed hung the silver rosary Victor had seen in Thomas's photograph.
Martha opened her dresser drawer.
She removed a cloth pouch.
Inside were an old wristwatch, several photographs, and a folded piece of paper.
She handed Victor the photograph.
Thomas stood outside a brick building.
The date on the back was 2019.
Three years after Lorenzo's death.
Victor stared at it.
“Lorenzo died in 2020,” he said.
Martha nodded.
“He was still watching Thomas.”
Victor examined the photograph more closely.
A dark sedan appeared behind Thomas.
Its license plate was partly visible.
Victor recognized the vehicle.
Benjamin had driven a car just like it.
Isabella leaned forward.
“Daddy, look at the reflection.”
In the glass door behind Thomas, the photographer's face was faintly visible.
Victor moved closer to the lamp.
The image was imperfect.
But the outline was unmistakable.
Benjamin Cole.
Victor's jaw tightened.
Martha took a breath.
“There's something else.”
She lifted the old wristwatch from the pouch.
Its leather strap was cracked.
The hands had stopped at 2:17.
“Evelyn gave me this the last time I visited her.”
Victor turned it over.
An inscription covered the back.
FOR DANIEL, WHEN HE FINDS HIS WAY HOME.
His chest tightened.
“Why didn't you give it to me?”
“She said I should wait until you knew the truth.”
Martha reached for the watch.
As Victor moved it beneath the lamp, the loose back cover shifted.
A tiny folded strip of paper slipped into his hand.
He opened it.
The message contained seven words.
Ask Benjamin what happened to Margaret's doctor.
Victor read it twice.
Then looked at Martha.
“Who was Margaret's doctor?”
Martha's face went white.
“Dr. Samuel Pierce.”
Victor knew that name.
Dr. Pierce had treated Margaret during her final illness.
He had also supervised the private medical clinic Lorenzo funded for years.
Victor reached for his phone.
He called Benjamin.
No answer.
He tried again.
Nothing.
Then Isabella noticed something on the small bedroom television.
The mansion's security display had appeared automatically.
One camera showed Benjamin leaving the garage.
In his hand was the wooden cassette case.
Victor stared as Benjamin approached the black sedan.
But the security chief wasn't alone.
A silver-haired man was waiting beside the passenger door.
Martha clutched Victor's arm.
“Oh, dear God.”
Victor looked at her.
“Who is that?”
She could barely get the words out.
“That's Samuel Pierce.”
Isabella stared at the screen.
“Grandpa's doctor?”
Martha shook her head.
“No, sweetheart.”
May you like
Her voice broke.
“That's the man who delivered your father.”
