Chapter 17 - Chloe Mercer
Chloe had grown up inside the same wreckage I had.
I just hadn't known her name.
Thomas Mercer was the accountant who handled my father's company during its collapse.
According to the old records, he had disappeared shortly after the bankruptcy.
People assumed he stole money.
My father never believed it.
Now the truth was becoming clearer.
Thomas Mercer had helped Dad document what Beatrice did.
Then he vanished.
Chloe was nine years old.
I confronted her from the hospital.
Reed sat beside me.
Chloe looked exhausted.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I didn't know if you were really working with the FBI."
"You slept with my husband to find out?"
"No."
Her face tightened.
"I slept with Julian because I hated the Vances."
"That is not better."
"I know."
"Did Beatrice know who you were?"
"Not at first."
"Then why did she hire you?"
"She thought I was ambitious and stupid."
Chloe almost smiled.
"I encouraged that."
"You helped her fake a pregnancy."
"Yes."
"You helped humiliate me."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because I wanted access to her records."
I stared.
"So you were using Julian."
"Yes."
"Using Beatrice."
"Yes."
"And using me."
Her eyes lowered.
"Yes."
I felt no admiration.
Only exhaustion.
"Where is your father?"
Chloe's face changed.
"I don't know."
"What happened to him?"
"After Hayes Precision collapsed, he told my mother he had evidence."
"Then?"
"He disappeared."
"Police?"
"They found his car."
"No body?"
"No."
Reed leaned forward.
"Why didn't you tell federal investigators earlier?"
"Because Beatrice contacted me when I turned eighteen."
My blood chilled.
"What did she say?"
"That my father was alive."
Silence.
"Did she prove it?"
"She sent a photograph."
Chloe reached into a folder and pulled out a copy.
Thomas Mercer looked older.
Gray.
Thin.
He was standing beside a newspaper dated four years after his supposed disappearance.
"She used him to control you."
Chloe nodded.
"Every few months, another photo."
"And you believed she knew where he was."
"I still believe it."
I looked at Reed.
She was already examining the image.
Chloe continued.
"When Beatrice realized I was close to Julian, she offered me money."
"I took it because I thought I could get inside."
"Did you?"
"Eventually."
"The bank box."
"Yes."
"The ledger."
"Yes."
"The drink?"
Her face collapsed.
"I knew she planned something."
Anger surged.
"You knew?"
"I thought it was a mild sedative."
"You thought drugging a pregnant woman was mild?"
"I was going to switch the glass."
"Did you?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Julian arrived early."
I wanted to hate her completely.
It would have been easier.
But people like Beatrice survived by turning damaged people against each other.
That did not erase Chloe's choices.
It explained how Beatrice found them useful.
"Your father."
I said.
"What did he know?"
"Everything about the original accounts."
"Including the two hundred and eighty million?"
"Maybe."
Reed looked at the photo again.
Then she zoomed in.
Behind Thomas Mercer was a building sign.
Only four letters were visible.
H.
A.
V.
E.
Reed's eyes sharpened.
"Havenbrook."
"What's that?"
She searched.
A private assisted-living facility in Connecticut.
Twenty miles from the Vance winter house.
Chloe stopped breathing.
"No."
Reed called a team.
Agents reached the facility before midnight.
Thomas Mercer was there.
Alive.
Registered under another name.
For seventeen years, Beatrice had paid for his room through a shell company.
He had suffered a traumatic brain injury years earlier.
But he could speak.
He could remember.
And when Agent Reed showed him Beatrice Vance's photograph, the old man began trembling.
Then he asked one question.
"Is Daniel's daughter safe?"
Reed called me immediately.
I cried when I heard his voice.
Thomas listened quietly.
Then he said, "Clara, your father gave me something before they took me."
"What?"
"Proof."
"We have the ledger."
"No."
His breathing became rough.
"The ledger proves the bribery."
"What did he give you?"
"Proof of who ordered the threat against you."
My throat tightened.
"Beatrice."
Thomas was silent.
Then he whispered.
May you like
"No."
And for the first time in this entire nightmare, I wondered whether we had blamed the wrong Vance for the worst thing of all.
