Chapter 6 - The Brother Nobody Was Supposed To Find
Clara spent the next day chasing a brother who might never have existed.
St. Matthew’s Hospital had closed in 2008.
Its records had been divided among a Catholic health network, a Maryland
archive, and private storage.
Rebecca warned that twenty-five-year-old medical records might be
incomplete.
Clara did not care.
For the first time since the gala, she had a question more painful than
Julian.
Did she have a twin?
Ethan said his father had a driver named Samuel Reed who might know.
Samuel was eighty-six and living in a Bethesda nursing facility.
He recognized Ethan immediately.
Then he saw Clara.
His smile disappeared.
“Anna’s girl.”
Clara’s pulse jumped.
“Were you at St. Matthew’s when I was born?”
Samuel looked toward the window.
Then he asked Ethan to close the door.
“Your father arrived after midnight. Margaret was already there. Anna
was screaming at everybody.”
“Why?”
“Because one baby was gone.”
The words struck Clara physically.
Samuel remembered Charles arguing with a doctor in a loading corridor.
He remembered Anna trying to leave her bed.
He remembered Margaret carrying Clara.
“What about the boy?”
“I never saw him.”
“Was he dead?”
“That’s what Charles told me.”
Margaret had told Clara something different.
Someone was still withholding something.
Back in Washington, Rebecca called with news about the forged deed.
The notary stamp belonged to a Virginia notary named Peter Lang.
Peter denied notarizing Clara’s signature.
His stamp had been reported stolen four months earlier.
Julian’s firm had used Peter before.
Then another fact complicated everything.
The deed had been submitted from an IP address inside Vance Foundation
headquarters.
Ethan stared at Rebecca.
“That’s impossible.”
“It’s logged.”
Clara turned toward him.
“Who has access?”
“Hundreds of employees.”
“And Julian?”
“Temporary consultant credentials.”
Ethan’s answer was immediate.
Clara noticed.
“You already knew he had access.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I approved it.”
Silence.
Mercer Strategic had been hired for preliminary redevelopment analysis
six months earlier.
Julian had not crashed the Vance gala by accident.
He was there because Ethan’s company invited him.
Clara stood.
“You left that out.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“Because the second I saw you on those steps, I realized Julian’s
contract and your mother’s file might be connected. I wanted facts
before I accused him.”
Clara grabbed her coat.
Ethan did not stop her.
At the door, he said, “You’re right to be angry.”
She turned.
“That doesn’t fix it.”
“No.”
That evening, Clara returned to Maya’s condo and found a padded envelope
leaning against the door.
No postage.
No courier label.
Inside was a flash drive.
The footage showed a hotel bar six weeks earlier.
Julian sat at a corner table.
Across from him was Margaret Vance.
The audio was poor, but one sentence was clear.
Julian leaned forward.
“If Clara learns about the boy, the Bennett land becomes impossible to
control.”
Margaret answered.
“Then make sure she never learns.”
Clara stared at the screen.
The woman who had cried when she saw her at the gala had known all
May you like
along.
And suddenly Margaret’s grief looked very different.
