Chapter 10 - The Girl in Red
Her name was Julia Bennett.
Twenty-four years old.
A junior accountant for a company connected to the Prescott Foundation.
Mercy General records claimed Julia died after an accidental overdose.
The medical examiner's documentation raised immediate questions.
The signing physician had also authorized Samantha Reed's psychiatric detention.
The judge overseeing the emergency order had been Robert Holloway.
Captain Dale Monroe had delivered Julia to the hospital.
Every road led back to the same circle.
Calvin searched Julia's name on the card.
One hidden video appeared.
Julia sat across from Samantha in a parked car.
"I found duplicate ledgers."
She held up a flash drive.
"They're moving money through the shelters."
Samantha looked terrified.
"Does Margaret know you copied them?"
"I don't think so."
"Then leave Charlotte tonight."
Julia laughed nervously.
"What about you?"
Samantha looked toward the camera.
"I already waited too long."
The file ended.
Rachel looked at Agent Brooks.
"If Julia was officially declared dead, why would Samantha tell us to find her?"
Brooks answered.
"Maybe because she isn't dead."
The investigation expanded.
Records showed Julia's body had been released to a private funeral home within six hours.
The funeral home was owned by a Prescott subsidiary.
The family claimed cremation.
There was no independent identification by Julia's relatives.
Her parents had been told the body was too badly compromised to view.
Rachel whispered.
"They erased a living person."
Emily closed her eyes.
Agent Brooks cautioned us not to assume that yet.
But twenty-four hours later, investigators found proof.
A toll camera in Virginia had photographed a woman resembling Julia three months after her supposed death.
Then another image surfaced in Tennessee.
Julia had been alive.
The Prescotts had not killed her.
They had convinced the world she was dead.
Why remained unclear.
Charles awakened sufficiently at Blackwood to speak with investigators.
He asked for Samantha.
When told she was missing, he began crying.
According to Brooks, Charles admitted building the earliest version of the Blue Room decades ago.
He called it "reputation protection."
Information was gathered on adversaries.
Political enemies.
Business competitors.
Journalists.
At first, Charles claimed, it was defensive.
Then Margaret transformed it.
She began buying officials.
Destroying witnesses.
Using hospitals and courts to declare inconvenient people unstable.
Ethan and Brandon learned from her.
Charles finally tried to dismantle it.
Margaret discovered his plan.
Then he woke inside Blackwood.
But Charles gave investigators something valuable.
A location.
Not Samantha's.
Julia's.
A small house outside Asheville purchased through one of his private trusts.
Agents entered the property the following morning.
Julia Bennett was inside.
Alive.
Terrified.
And holding a box containing original financial ledgers.
When Brooks gave us the news, Emily began crying with relief.
Then Julia told investigators something that changed the case.
Samantha had visited her only four days earlier.
Samantha knew the Prescotts were hunting her.
Julia begged her to stay.
Samantha refused.
"Why?" I asked.
Brooks looked at me.
"Because Samantha said Emily was still trapped."
My daughter stopped moving.
Brooks continued.
"She said she couldn't disappear while another woman was being held inside that house."
Emily covered her face.
Samantha had returned to Charlotte because of her.
And now Samantha was missing.
Then Rachel's phone rang.
She listened.
Her expression hardened.
May you like
Judge Robert Holloway had just signed an emergency order declaring Emily temporarily incompetent.
And the petitioner was Ethan Prescott.
