Chapter 9 - The Red File
Daniel was released just after noon.
Security footage from a neighboring house showed another man entering through our basement window near the time Patricia was attacked.
The man wore a hood, but the gold lion ring was visible when he climbed the fence.
Vincent Hart might have been declared dead, but someone wearing his ring had entered my home.
Daniel returned in the same clothes he had worn the night before.
Emma watched him from the living room.
He stopped several feet away.
“I am sorry.”
She looked at him.
“You watched Grandpa throw me out.”
“I was afraid.”
“So was I.”
Daniel had no answer.
I led him into the dining room and placed my father’s recorder on the table.
“Where is the red file?”
His eyes changed.
“Who told you about it?”
“My father.”
Daniel sat down slowly.
“Thomas gave it to me before he died.”
“Why would he trust you?”
“He did not. He said if you ever asked about Rebecca, I had to give it to you. Until then, I was supposed to keep it hidden.”
“You knew my mother might be alive?”
“I knew there was a woman named Rebecca. I did not know she was your mother.”
“Where is the file?”
Daniel looked toward the basement.
“In a deposit box under Emma’s name.”
Gerald had spent years looking inside my house for something Daniel had hidden in a bank.
Emma entered the room.
“Why did you sign the guardianship papers?”
Daniel’s eyes filled with tears.
“Because my father said Rachel was going to be arrested for stealing medication. He said if I did not sign, the state could place you with strangers.”
“You believed him instead of asking Mom.”
“Yes.”
She turned away.
Daniel reached into his coat and removed a key.
“The bank closes at five.”
Officer Ortiz arranged an escort.
At three thirty, we entered a private vault at a downtown bank.
The box registered to Emma contained a red file, a flash drive, and a sealed letter.
I opened the letter first.
Rachel,
Daniel does not know the whole truth. I chose him because Gerald would never believe his weakest son could keep a secret.
Rebecca survived. She agreed to disappear until Gerald could be prosecuted.
If she has returned, then someone forced her.
Do not trust any official named in the red file.
I opened the file.
Judges. Detectives. Contractors. City inspectors. Hospital administrators.
My supervisor’s name appeared near the bottom.
That explained the false medication complaint.
Officer Ortiz leaned closer.
Her own captain’s name appeared on the next page.
She stepped back.
“We need to leave.”
The vault door closed behind us.
The overhead lights went out.
Emergency lights came on.
A voice sounded through the bank intercom.
“Place the red file inside the deposit box.”
I recognized Gerald immediately.
Daniel moved in front of Emma.
“Dad, this is over.”
“No,” Gerald replied. “This ends when Rachel gives me what belongs to my family.”
I held the file against my chest.
“Where is Rebecca?”
A monitor on the wall flickered to life.
Rebecca sat inside a dark room.
Beside her stood Vincent Hart.
Alive.
Older, scarred, and wearing the gold lion ring.
He smiled into the camera.
May you like
“You have five minutes,” he said. “Then your mother dies for the second time.”
Continue to the next part: Rachel must choose between the evidence that can destroy the Hart family and the mother she has never had the chance to know.
