Chapter 6 - Twenty-Seven Minutes Missing
Sarah did not show Declan the message immediately.
That decision lasted eleven minutes.
Then guilt won.
She found him outside near the security vehicles.
Snow collected across his shoulders while he spoke with Nolan.
“Declan.”
He knew from her face.
“What happened?”
She handed him the phone.
He read the message.
For the first time since the poisoning began, genuine fear appeared in his eyes.
Sarah saw it.
“Who was she?”
Declan looked toward Nolan.
“Leave us.”
Nolan moved away.
Sarah waited.
Declan’s voice became unusually low.
“When I was twenty-four, I was engaged.”
Sarah had known he had relationships before her.
She had never known about an engagement.
“Her name was Anna Mercer.”
“What happened?”
“She became pregnant.”
Sarah’s blood went cold.
“Did she die?”
Declan looked toward the mountains.
“She disappeared.”
Sarah stepped back.
“What?”
“We were driving from New York to Boston. Our convoy was attacked outside Hartford.”
He spoke mechanically, as though the story had been locked behind steel for ten years.
“I was shot. My driver died. Anna was taken.”
“Was her body found?”
“No.”
“Did anyone demand ransom?”
“No.”
“Who attacked you?”
“We never proved it.”
Sarah stared at him.
“And you never thought this might matter when I became pregnant?”
“I did not know you were pregnant.”
“You knew after the hospital.”
“Yes.”
“And you still said nothing.”
Declan looked at her.
“I spent four years searching for Anna. Every lead ended with another body. Eventually, I accepted that she and the baby were dead.”
Sarah’s anger became fear.
“The message says the last woman who carried a Hayes child.”
“They know details that were never public.”
“Could Anna be alive?”
Declan did not answer.
That was enough.
The stolen flash drive from Martin’s laptop was finally opened that afternoon.
The HEIR PROTOCOL folder contained financial records dating back twenty years.
Payments to doctors.
Private investigators.
Security contractors.
And one company called Northstar Maternal Services.
Sarah searched the name.
No public record existed.
But the payments corresponded to specific dates.
One payment occurred the day before Anna Mercer disappeared.
Another occurred the week Sarah’s poisoning symptoms began.
Declan stood absolutely still.
“They’re connected.”
Nolan traced Northstar’s bank routing information.
The account had been opened by a trust.
The trust was controlled by an attorney named Gabriel Shaw.
Sarah recognized the name.
“Evelyn’s lawyer.”
Declan looked at her.
“No.”
“What?”
“Gabriel Shaw was my mother’s attorney.”
The office descended into silence.
Shaw was eighty-one.
Retired.
Living in Marblehead.
Declan drove there personally.
Sarah insisted on going.
The old attorney lived in a weathered house overlooking the ocean.
When Declan knocked, no one answered.
The door was unlocked.
Inside, classical music played softly.
Gabriel Shaw sat in a chair facing the sea.
For one terrifying moment, Sarah thought he was dead.
Then he spoke.
“You look exactly like Patrick when you are angry.”
Declan stopped.
Shaw turned.
His eyes moved to Sarah’s stomach.
“And history is repeating itself.”
Sarah’s skin prickled.
“What is Northstar?” Declan asked.
Shaw sighed.
“A mistake.”
“Not enough.”
“It was created to protect pregnancies inside your family.”
“By poisoning them?”
“No.”
Shaw looked horrified.
“Northstar never poisoned anyone.”
Declan placed Martin’s records on the table.
“Then explain.”
Shaw studied them.
His face changed.
“Someone revived the accounts.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Sarah stepped forward.
“What happened to Anna Mercer?”
Shaw looked at Declan.
“You were told she was kidnapped.”
“Yes.”
“She wasn’t.”
Declan’s face became deadly.
“Choose your next words carefully.”
“Anna left voluntarily.”
“No.”
“She discovered your father’s old records. She learned what being attached to the Hayes family meant.”
“She would have told me.”
“She tried.”
Shaw looked down.
“But Evelyn intercepted the message.”
Declan went still.
“Evelyn?”
“She believed losing Anna was better than watching you abandon the organization for her.”
Sarah felt sick.
“What happened to the baby?”
Shaw closed his eyes.
“The baby was born.”
Declan’s entire body changed.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Boy or girl?”
“A girl.”
Declan staggered back one step.
Sarah had never seen him physically shaken.
“Where is she?”
“I do not know.”
Declan grabbed Shaw by the shirt.
“You helped steal my daughter.”
“I helped Anna disappear.”
“WHERE IS SHE?”
Sarah grabbed Declan’s arm.
“Declan!”
He released the old man.
Shaw coughed.
“Anna contacted me once after the birth. She said she was safe. She begged me never to search.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Declan turned away, barely containing himself.
Sarah noticed an old security recorder on Shaw’s desk.
Its timestamp blinked.
She looked around.
“Mr. Shaw, do your cameras record continuously?”
“Yes.”
“Can we see yesterday?”
He frowned.
“Why?”
Sarah pointed toward the driveway.
A familiar black SUV sat across the road.
The same kind Rebecca had photographed.
Nolan checked the footage.
The vehicle had appeared every evening for a week.
But one clip mattered.
Yesterday at 4:09 p.m., someone approached Shaw’s house.
A woman wearing a hood.
She entered.
Twenty-seven minutes later, she left.
Shaw stared at the screen.
“That never happened.”
“What?”
“I had no visitor yesterday.”
Sarah looked at the timestamp.
“Your recording was altered.”
Nolan compared system logs.
Twenty-seven minutes of video had been replaced.
Whoever visited Shaw had access to sophisticated surveillance technology.
Then the front window exploded.
Everyone dropped.
A gas canister rolled across the floor.
White vapor filled the room.
Declan covered Sarah’s mouth with his coat and dragged her toward the kitchen.
Nolan smashed a rear window.
They escaped seconds before flames consumed the front room.
Outside, Sarah coughed violently.
Declan held her upright.
Across the road, the black SUV disappeared.
Then Gabriel Shaw stumbled from the burning house.
He collapsed in the snow.
Declan ran toward him.
Shaw grabbed Declan’s sleeve.
“There is one thing.”
“What?”
“Your daughter.”
Declan leaned closer.
Shaw whispered an address.
Then he stopped breathing.
Declan looked at Sarah.
She had heard it too.
The address was in Maine.
And the name Shaw whispered before dying was impossible.
“Anna Hayes.”
May you like
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Not Mercer.
Hayes.
