Chapter 4 - The Blood Test
Emily couldn’t make herself touch the report.
Daniel did.
His eyes moved slowly across the page.
Margaret stood behind him.
“What is it?”
Daniel looked at her.
“A paternity test.”
Margaret stopped moving.
Emily felt as though the walls had shifted around her.
“That’s impossible.”
Daniel turned the report toward her.
The test had been performed twenty-eight years earlier.
The probability listed at the bottom was unmistakable.
99.98 percent.
Robert Mercer was Emily’s biological father.
Daniel lowered himself into his father’s chair.
For the first time that night, the controlled businessman looked completely lost.
Emily stared at the report.
“My father’s name was Michael Reed.”
Margaret spoke quietly.
“Anna married Michael after leaving this house.”
Emily looked at her.
“You knew?”
“I knew she married him.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Margaret’s silence was answer enough.
Daniel stood.
“You knew my father had a relationship with Anna?”
Margaret shook her head.
“Not then.”
“When?”
Margaret looked toward the photograph.
“After Anna was fired.”
Emily felt anger replacing shock.
“You accused her of stealing, threw her out, and then found out she was carrying your husband’s child?”
“No.”
Margaret’s voice cracked.
“I found out about the relationship.”
She pointed toward the report.
“I never saw that.”
Daniel examined the document again.
Something was wrong.
The report had been dated eleven months after Anna was dismissed.
That meant Robert Mercer had continued looking for her.
Emily opened the next page.
It was a letter addressed to Charles Vale.
Robert’s handwriting covered both sides.
The tone was furious.
You told Margaret the investigation was complete.
It was not.
Anna did not steal the necklace.
I know what you moved through the foundation accounts, and I know why you needed Anna gone.
Daniel stopped reading.
Margaret gripped the edge of the desk.
“What foundation accounts?”
Daniel flipped to the financial records.
Millions of dollars had been transferred through shell companies.
The oldest transaction was nearly thirty years old.
The newest was dated only eight months ago.
Someone had continued the scheme long after Robert died.
Emily whispered, “Charles.”
Daniel shook his head.
“Maybe.”
He pointed toward a signature.
Several recent transfers had been authorized by someone else.
Vanessa Vale.
The same woman who had tried to frame Emily hours earlier.
Suddenly Emily understood.
Vanessa hadn’t planted the necklace because she disliked a housekeeper.
She had discovered Emily’s identity.
She knew Emily was Robert Mercer’s daughter.
And if Emily started asking questions, she could uncover a fraud that had survived for almost three decades.
Daniel reached for his phone.
Before he could call anyone, the lights in the study went out.
The entire mansion dropped into darkness.
Then somewhere in the hallway, glass shattered.
Emily heard running footsteps.
Daniel switched on his phone flashlight.
The hidden compartment was open.
May you like
The paternity report was still on the desk.
But Robert Mercer’s original letter to Charles Vale was gone.
