Chapter 4
The Man Upstairs
That evening, somebody entered my house.
I knew because the nursery window was open.
I was in the kitchen when I heard a floorboard creak upstairs.
I backed toward the front door and called emergency services. A shadow moved across the hallway.
Then a man spoke from the nursery.
“Liam left me something too.”
I climbed the stairs with the phone in one hand and the knife in the other.
The man standing near the crib was older than Liam. I recognized him from the photograph immediately.
Elliot Bennett.
The brother who was supposed to be dead.
He held out a photograph.
It showed Liam holding a newborn baby.
“That’s why he spent the last three years trying to protect you,” Elliot said. “From the truth about our family.”
I looked at the photograph.
The baby had a small crescent-shaped birthmark beneath her left ear.
My daughter had the same mark.
I was still pregnant, but I had seen it in the ultrasound image. Liam had pointed it out once and kissed my stomach.
“Where is the child’s mother?” I asked.
Elliot made a broken sound in his throat.
“She died.”
“You’re saying Liam had a child before me?”
“No.”
“Then why does she look like my daughter?”
Elliot looked toward my stomach.
“Because Liam didn’t tell you what happened at the hospital.”
Three Days Later
I gave birth three days later.
The labor was long, but none of it seemed real. One question stayed inside my head through every contraction.
What had Liam known about my baby that I didn’t?
When the nurse placed her on my chest, I cried so hard I could barely breathe.
I did not doubt she was mine.
I had carried her. I had felt her kick. I had spent months imagining Liam holding her in the nursery.
But I knew something was wrong.
Dr. Barrett came into my room after midnight.
“Tell me,” I said.
He closed his eyes.
“Nine years ago, Liam’s mother, Margaret, learned she was terminally ill. Elliot was involved in an investigation connected to the family trust.”
“What does that have to do with my daughter?”
“Margaret believed someone was going to kill Elliot.”
“So she made him disappear?”
“Yes. She fabricated his death. Liam helped her.”
The Bennett trust had been stealing money for years. Elliot found evidence of fraudulent accounts, shell companies, political bribes, and stolen inheritances.
Liam became the person inside the family who gathered proof.
“Why did he hide all of this from me?”
“Because someone was still looking for Elliot.”
May you like
Dr. Barrett hesitated.
“Daniel Mercer is not his real name.”
