Clara replayed the recording twice.
The woman's voice remained the same.
Frightened.
Measured.
Certain.
She said there had been three children.
Then the tape ended in a burst of static.
Clara sat motionless.
Evan switched off the cassette player.
“What do you remember about your birth?”
The question sounded absurd.
Clara looked at him.
“My birth?”
“Anything your father ever told you.”
“He said I was born at St. Agnes.”
“When?”
“December 19, 1989.”
Evan's face tightened.
“That's six weeks after the document.”
Clara nodded.
“What about the other children?”
“I don't know.”
She looked at the photograph again.
Lydia Mercer held a baby wrapped in a pale blanket.
The baby's face was turned away.
Clara took the picture closer to the lamp.
There was something written along the lower edge.
Three letters.
E.M.
She turned it over.
Nothing else.
Evan picked up the legal document.
“There has to be another record.”
“Where?”
“The hospital.”
Clara shook her head.
“St. Agnes closed years ago.”
“The records may have been transferred.”
“To where?”
“I don't know.”
“You're beginning to say that a lot.”
He gave her a tired look.
“I've spent six months finding out how little I actually knew.”
Clara softened for half a second.
Then the anger returned.
“Six months?”
Evan looked away.
“What happened six months ago?”
“When we separated, I started looking into the accounts.”
“Which accounts?”
“Your father's.”
She stared.
“My father's dead.”
“I know.”
“Why were you looking at his accounts?”
“Because money disappeared.”
Clara's stomach tightened.
“How much?”
“Enough to explain why someone wants this house.”
He opened his phone and showed her a spreadsheet.
Several payments had been made from an old family trust.
Most were small.
Some were not.
Every transfer had occurred around the same date each year.
November 3.
Clara counted them.
Twenty-seven years.
Twenty-seven payments.
“Who received them?”
“Different companies.”
“Names?”
“Shell corporations.”
She looked at him.
“And you knew this before tonight?”
“I suspected.”
“You had months.”
“I was trying to confirm it.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because I didn't know who I could trust.”
The words hung between them.
Clara understood what he meant.
She didn't like it.
She closed her eyes.
Then something struck her.
“My father kept a second desk.”
Evan frowned.
“In the garage.”
They went outside.
The rain had slowed to a mist.
The garage door groaned as Clara lifted it.
Her father's workbench remained beneath a layer of dust. Tools hung in neat rows. A calendar from 2008 still showed a photograph of a fishing boat.
The second desk stood against the back wall.
Clara pulled open the top drawer.
Empty.
The second drawer contained nails, receipts, and old batteries.
The bottom drawer was locked.
Evan examined it.
“Do you have the key?”
“No.”
Clara remembered the brass key from the basement.
She tried it.
The lock opened.
Inside were folders.
Bank statements.
Photocopies.
A birth certificate.
Clara pulled it out.
Her name appeared.
Clara Anne Vale.
But the date was wrong.
December 21, 1989.
She stared.
“I was born on the nineteenth.”
Evan took the paper.
“This says twenty-first.”
“My father told everyone the nineteenth.”
“Why?”
“I don't know.”
Beneath the certificate was another.
A child named Elise Mercer.
December 19, 1989.
Same hospital.
Same attending physician.
Clara's hands began to shake.
“There were two.”
Evan found a third.
Jonah Mercer.
December 20.
Same hospital.
Same doctor.
Three children.
Three consecutive dates.
Clara looked at the names.
“Mercer.”
“Lydia's surname.”
“But why would my certificate say Vale?”
Evan didn't answer.
A folded letter fell from the folder.
Clara opened it.
Her father's handwriting.
“If Clara ever learns the truth, give her the choice I was denied.”
Clara read on.
“Tell her that protecting a child sometimes means allowing another family to believe a lie.”
She lowered the page.
“What does that mean?”
Evan read it.
“I don't know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I know.”
Clara looked at him.
“Maybe you should stop.”
He nodded.
She returned to the folder.
There was a newspaper clipping.
A small article from December 1989.
“LOCAL WOMAN DISAPPEARS AFTER HOSPITAL DISPUTE.”
Lydia Mercer.
Clara read the article.
Lydia had supposedly left the hospital without her newborn child.
No body was found.
No criminal charges were filed.
The baby was listed as missing.
Clara's breathing became shallow.
“My father told everyone my mother gave birth to me.”
“Maybe she didn't.”
Clara looked at him.
“What are you saying?”
“I'm saying the records don't match.”
“My mother died when I was eleven.”
“I know.”
“And you think she wasn't my mother?”
“No.”
He paused.
“I think we need to find Lydia.”
Clara stared at the article.
“She would be seventy now.”
“If she's alive.”
They searched the internet.
Nothing.
The name was common enough to bury her.
Then Evan remembered something.
“My father kept an address book.”
“Where?”
“After he died, my sister took it.”
“Call her.”
“I can't.”
“Why?”
“She won't speak to me.”
Clara looked at him.
“For once, use the phone anyway.”
He did.
No answer.
He left a message.
Minutes later, the phone rang.
Evan answered.
“Hello?”
His expression changed.
Clara watched him listen.
Then he said, “Where did you get that name?”
Silence.
“What name?”
He glanced at Clara.
“Lydia.”
The caller said something.
Evan's hand tightened around the phone.
“Don't hang up.”
The line went dead.
He immediately called back.
No answer.
Clara picked up the old address book from the desk.
“Maybe your sister wasn't the one who took it.”
She opened it.
Most pages were blank.
Near the back, one address had been circled.
A small town two hours north.
Clara recognized the surname.
Mercer.
Evan stared.
“That's her.”
“You're sure?”
“My father wrote that address the year before he died.”
Clara grabbed her coat.
Evan caught her arm.
“It's midnight.”
“I know.”
“We shouldn't drive there tonight.”
“Why not?”
“Because whoever is watching this house knows what we're finding.”
Clara stopped.
“What makes you think we're being watched?”
Evan pointed toward the garage door.
A muddy footprint crossed the concrete.
It wasn't theirs.
Clara looked toward the driveway.
A dark vehicle sat beyond the trees.
Its headlights were off.
Before either of them could move, the vehicle rolled backward and disappeared onto the road.
Clara's phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
One message.
“Stop looking for Lydia Mercer.”
She showed Evan.
A second message appeared.
“Your father wasn't protecting you from the truth. He was protecting the truth from you.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 4: The Woman We Found Living Beyond Town Knew My Father’s Secret, But Her First Question Made Me Doubt Everything
My Ex-Husband Appeared at My Door After Midnight, Carrying One Envelope and a Reason I Couldn’t Afford to Ignore
Part 3 of 20
