Chapter 5 - THE MAN WHO CARRIED THE BABY OUT OF THE FIRE
“He was alive,” Owen admitted. “And I helped him disappear.”
Rebecca stared at the photograph.
For twenty-five years, she'd carried memories of her father's funeral.
The closed coffin.
The white flowers.
Her mother's shaking hands.
Now she was looking at evidence that David Morgan had driven away from their burning house.
“You let us bury him?” she asked.
Owen's face tightened.
“I was twenty-six. I worked for Vincent. I thought I was protecting your family.”
Rebecca shook her head.
“You watched my mother cry over an empty grave.”
“I know.”
“No. You don't.”
She turned away.
Nicholas placed the photograph on the counter.
“Tell us everything.”
Owen explained that Vincent had sent him to the Morgan house after receiving a warning about an attack.
When Owen arrived, smoke was already pouring through the upstairs windows.
David was fighting to reach his daughters.
Owen had helped him break a bedroom window and carry Rebecca outside.
Then David ran back for the baby.
Rebecca looked at Owen.
“You were the man who saved me?”
He nodded.
She remembered powerful arms lifting her through smoke.
A man's voice telling her to close her eyes.
She had spent years imagining a nameless firefighter.
It had been Owen.
For a moment, she didn't know whether to thank him or hate him.
“Why was Whitaker there?” Nicholas asked.
“He arrived just after we got the girls out. He told David the fire was a warning.”
“A warning about what?”
“The clinic records.”
Owen lowered his voice.
“David had copies of documents showing Whitaker was taking money from mothers and prospective adoptive parents. He wanted to turn everything over to the police.”
Nicholas frowned.
“Why didn't he?”
“Because Whitaker threatened the girls.”
Owen described the terrible bargain.
David could disappear, surrender his records, and allow Whitaker to arrange Lily's placement.
Or he could come forward and risk losing both daughters.
“Vincent paid for his relocation,” Owen said. “He believed David could return once Whitaker was stopped.”
Rebecca stared at him.
“Did my father agree?”
“He drove away that night.”
“That wasn't my question.”
Owen looked down.
“He begged Vincent to let him take you and your mother.”
“And?”
“Whitaker said Lily would disappear permanently if he tried.”
Claire, who had remained beside June, covered her mouth.
The silence afterward was painful.
Nicholas looked at Owen.
“You could have told me after Father died.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you?”
“Because by then I had helped maintain the lie for nineteen years.”
Nicholas stepped back.
Owen continued quietly.
“Every year it became harder to admit what I'd done.”
Rebecca understood that kind of shame.
She had kept silent while Catherine insulted her because she needed the job.
She had swallowed her anger to protect Hannah.
But silence had consequences.
And Owen's silence had lasted almost her entire life.
“Where's my father now?” she asked.
“I don't know.”
Rebecca turned toward him.
“You expect me to believe that?”
“The last location I had was outside Albany. That was years ago.”
Nicholas examined the receipt Owen had signed.
“You're going to give investigators everything you remember.”
Owen nodded.
“Whatever they need.”
Nicholas looked at Rebecca.
“You shouldn't have to decide whether to trust him today.”
She gave a tired laugh.
“I don't trust anyone today.”
Claire approached her.
“Not even me?”
Rebecca looked at her younger sister.
The question was gentle, almost embarrassed.
Rebecca took her hand.
“You haven't lied to me.”
Claire squeezed back.
Nicholas arranged for an independent attorney to meet them at June's bookstore.
He wanted the documents preserved properly before Whitaker could claim they had been altered.
Then he called the medical clinic caring for Hannah.
The nurse said Hannah was stable.
She had experienced some wheezing that afternoon, but her medication was working.
Rebecca reached for the phone.
“Sweetheart?”
“Mommy?”
Hannah sounded tired.
“Are you okay?”
“I'm okay. Mrs. Dawson brought me to the doctor because my chest got tight.”
Rebecca shut her eyes.
“I'm coming home.”
“Did you find the lady in the picture?”
Rebecca glanced at Claire.
“I did.”
“Is she nice?”
Rebecca smiled.
“Very.”
“Can she come for pancakes?”
Claire heard the question.
For the first time that day, she laughed.
“Tell her I like pancakes.”
Rebecca repeated the message.
Hannah sounded pleased.
Then she asked, “Mommy, can you bring my purple slippers?”
The ordinary request nearly broke Rebecca.
After everything she'd learned, her little girl still wanted nothing more than comfortable slippers and her mother nearby.
“I'll bring them, baby.”
Nicholas waited until she finished.
“We're going back.”
Claire looked toward June.
“Mom, I want to go with them.”
June hesitated.
“Are you sure?”
“I need to know what happened.”
June took her daughter's face between her hands.
“Then I'll come, too.”
Within an hour, they were traveling back toward the Caruso estate.
Owen drove a separate vehicle.
Nicholas had temporarily removed his security authority until investigators could review his involvement.
He didn't enjoy the decision.
Owen had been loyal to him for years.
But loyalty couldn't mean ignoring the truth.
At the mansion, Catherine was waiting in the front hall.
She looked surprised to see Claire.
Then she began crying.
Claire stared at her.
“You're Catherine?”
“Yes.”
“You sent the birthday presents?”
Catherine nodded.
“The books, too.”
Claire's expression hardened.
“You knew my mother was looking for me.”
Catherine wiped her cheeks.
“I believed bringing you together would put you in danger.”
“You didn't get to make that choice.”
“No,” Catherine whispered. “I didn't.”
Claire walked past her.
Nicholas stopped beside his sister.
“If you have anything else hidden, now is the time.”
Catherine looked exhausted.
“I'll give you access to every account I managed.”
“That's a start.”
“Nick, Whitaker doesn't just want money.”
Nicholas waited.
“He wants the original agreement because it connects his signatures to the clinic placements. If that document survives, he could lose everything.”
“Then we find it.”
Catherine looked toward the old family portraits.
“Margaret may have known where it was.”
Nicholas felt another sting of betrayal.
His mother.
The woman who had taught him honesty.
Another keeper of secrets.
Before Catherine could explain, Rebecca hurried into the hallway.
The clinic had just called.
Hannah's breathing had worsened.
She had been transferred to the children's hospital for observation.
Rebecca's face had gone white.
Nicholas immediately arranged a car.
He accompanied her, carrying the purple slippers she'd requested.
At the hospital, they found Hannah sitting upright in bed, breathing through a small oxygen mask.
Mrs. Dawson sat beside her.
“She's doing better,” the older woman assured them.
Rebecca kissed her daughter's forehead.
“I'm here, sweetheart.”
Hannah lifted one hand.
“I made you something.”
A drawing lay beside her pillow.
It showed a yellow house, a large tree, and two people holding hands.
Rebecca recognized herself and Hannah.
Underneath, Hannah had written:
HOME IS WHERE MOMMY IS.
Rebecca pressed the paper against her heart.
When she turned toward the doorway, she stopped.
A silver-haired man stood in the hall.
Gray suit.
Scar above his eyebrow.
Gold ring with a black stone.
He held another sheet of paper Hannah had drawn on.
A picture of the same yellow house.
Thomas Whitaker smiled.
May you like
Then he looked directly at Rebecca.
“Your daughter draws a lovely home. It would be a shame if she lost it.”
