Chapter 5 - THE MAN ROMAN TRUSTED
Tessa did not scream.
Again.
Roman would remember that later.
The first time danger found her, two guards had dragged her across his ballroom and she had refused to give Eleanor the satisfaction of panic.
Now Caleb’s gun rested inches from her ribs.
Her face went pale.
But her voice remained steady.
“Roman.”
Caleb looked at him.
“Don’t.”
Roman’s expression barely changed.
He had known Caleb Mercer for fourteen years.
Caleb had taken bullets for him.
Guarded Lena.
Carried Sophie upstairs.
Roman had trusted him with every address that mattered.
Including Hawthorne.
“You have three seconds,” Roman said.
“To do what?”
“Give me a reason not to kill you.”
Caleb’s jaw tightened.
“I’m trying to keep you from making the same mistake Anthony did.”
Tessa stared at him.
“You pointed a gun at me.”
“Because you’re standing between me and the door.”
She glanced sideways.
She was.
Caleb moved the weapon away from her.
Not enough.
But enough to matter.
Roman noticed.
“Put it down.”
“No.”
“Then explain.”
Caleb looked at the cassette player.
“My father spent twenty-six years cleaning up what Anthony left behind.”
Roman felt a new piece slide into place.
“Mercer.”
Caleb nodded.
“My real name is Caleb Mercer.”
Roman knew that name.
Samuel Mercer had been Anthony’s closest lieutenant before disappearing shortly after Anthony’s supposed death.
Roman had been told Samuel stole money and fled.
Another story written by adults who decided children were safer ignorant.
“Samuel was your father.”
“Yes.”
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
Roman watched his face.
“How?”
Caleb’s eyes moved toward the old photograph of Gabriel.
“Trying to get Marianne out.”
Roman felt the air change.
“You knew my mother.”
“I knew where she was.”
“Was?”
Caleb swallowed.
“She died twelve years ago.”
Roman looked down.
He had not known Marianne existed until hours earlier.
Still, grief found a place.
It always did.
“Did Eleanor know?”
“Yes.”
Another wound.
Roman almost smiled at how many a person could collect in one night.
Caleb lowered the gun completely.
“My father left me instructions. If Anthony ever resurfaced, I was supposed to stay close to you.”
“So you joined my security team.”
“Yes.”
“For fourteen years.”
“Yes.”
“Did you know Anthony was alive?”
“Not until three years ago.”
Roman stepped closer.
“When Lena vanished.”
“Yes.”
“Did you know where she was?”
Caleb said nothing.
Tessa whispered, “Oh, no.”
Roman’s voice dropped.
“Did you know?”
“Not at first.”
“When?”
“Eleven months after.”
Roman struck him.
Once.
Hard.
Caleb fell against the lockers.
He did not reach for his weapon.
Roman stood over him.
“Twenty-five months.”
Blood appeared at Caleb’s lip.
“Yes.”
“You watched me search.”
“Yes.”
“You stood beside me at Lena’s empty grave.”
“Yes.”
Roman wanted to hit him again.
He didn’t.
Sophie’s frightened face returned to him.
No yelling at Sophie.
No becoming something his children had to survive.
“Why?”
Caleb wiped his mouth.
“Because Anthony told me Nicholas would die if you came near Hawthorne.”
Roman froze.
“He had already moved the boy by then. He sent photographs every month.”
“Proof of life.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell Eleanor?”
“I did.”
Roman stared.
Now Eleanor’s behavior looked different again.
Caleb continued.
“She panicked. She tightened security. She sedated Lena more often because Lena kept trying to escape.”
Tessa’s disgust showed.
“So Eleanor was protecting Nicholas by imprisoning his mother.”
“I didn’t say it was right.”
“No,” Tessa replied. “You just helped.”
Caleb looked ashamed.
That mattered more than an excuse would have.
Roman picked up the New Jersey photograph.
“Where is this park?”
Caleb gave the address.
They drove there before sunrise.
The playground was empty.
Frost silvered the swings.
Roman stood where Anthony and Nicholas had stood eight months earlier.
A church rose beyond the trees.
Tessa looked at the photograph.
“Same steeple.”
Roman noticed a detail he had missed.
Nicholas was holding something.
A little wooden train.
The same train in the locker.
But in the photograph, a blue ribbon was tied around it.
The ribbon was gone now.
Tessa turned the toy over.
“There’s writing.”
Tiny pencil letters covered the underside.
ST. MATTHEW 12.
The church.
Inside, they found a wall of photographs from a preschool program.
Roman walked along them.
Children painting.
Children planting flowers.
Children dressed like shepherds for Christmas.
Then he found Nicholas.
Round cheeks.
Dark hair.
Roman’s gray eyes.
A paper crown tilted sideways on his head.
Beneath the photograph:
NICK M.
Roman touched the glass.
“My son.”
Tessa stood beside him.
“He looks like Sophie.”
Roman smiled for the first time.
Barely.
“He looks annoyed.”
“He probably is.”
A priest recognized the photograph Roman carried.
“Yes. Mr. Anthony brought the boy.”
Roman’s smile disappeared.
“When?”
“Several times last spring.”
“Where did they live?”
“I never knew.”
“What name did Anthony use?”
The priest frowned.
“Not Anthony.”
Roman waited.
“He called himself Gabriel.”
Roman looked at Caleb.
Anthony had used his dead son’s name.
Why?
The priest disappeared into an office and returned carrying a child’s small navy coat.
“He left this after the Easter service. I kept thinking they’d come back.”
Roman took it.
Inside the pocket was a folded drawing.
Nicholas had drawn three stick figures.
A tall man.
A woman.
A little boy.
Above the tall man, in a caregiver’s handwriting, was one word.
GRANDPA.
Roman stared at Anthony’s figure.
Tessa said softly, “Nicholas knew him.”
Roman hated that.
He hated being jealous of a dead man who apparently was not dead.
He hated that Anthony had heard Nicholas laugh.
Had held his hand.
Had watched him grow.
Things Roman had been denied.
Then something slipped from the coat lining.
A black plastic room key.
No hotel name.
Just a gold number.
Caleb turned it over.
“There’s a logo.”
Roman recognized it.
A mountain lodge his organization once used for private meetings.
Closed for renovation two years earlier.
Owned through a D’Angelo holding company.
Eleanor would know it.
Roman’s phone stayed in his pocket.
No calls.
No warning.
He simply drove.
Two hours later, they reached the lodge.
Snow covered the parking lot.
One set of recent tire tracks cut through it.
Roman entered first.
Room 214 was unlocked.
The bed had been slept in.
A child’s cup sat beside the sink.
A tiny pair of boots rested near the radiator.
Roman crossed the room.
“Nicholas?”
No answer.
Then Tessa saw the wall.
Dozens of photographs.
Not of Nicholas.
Of Roman.
Recent photographs.
At Hawthorne.
At the cemetery.
At the Pennsylvania station.
At the New Jersey church.
Someone had been following them since last night.
Caleb reached toward his weapon.
Roman stopped him.
On the bed lay Anthony’s gold cuff link.
Beside it was a note written in fresh ink.
Roman read it.
YOU FINALLY STOPPED TRUSTING THE WRONG PEOPLE.
Below that:
BRING ELEANOR TO THE OLD VALE HOUSE.
COME ALONE IF YOU WANT TO MEET YOUR SON.
Roman turned the paper over.
May you like
A second line was written on the back.
AND ASK ELEANOR WHY MARIANNE REALLY DIED.
