Chapter 10 - EVELYN’S LAST SECRET
Evelyn Bennett’s death had been ruled an aneurysm.
No autopsy had been requested.
Walter had never questioned it.
Until now.
Marcus discovered that Daniel had purchased a powerful anticoagulant days before Evelyn collapsed.
Rebecca remembered something.
“Mom was afraid of Uncle Daniel.”
Walter stared at her.
“She never told me.”
“She told me.”
“When?”
“A few weeks before she died.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“She said if anything happened to her, I should never go anywhere alone with him.”
Walter looked devastated.
“And then the school let him take you.”
“Rachel signed me out.”
“But Daniel was waiting.”
Rebecca nodded.
Marcus reconstructed the crime.
Daniel had obsessed over Evelyn.
When she rejected him permanently, he poisoned her medication.
Then he kidnapped Rebecca to punish Walter.
Rachel helped because Daniel told her Walter abused Rebecca.
By the time Rachel understood the truth, she was trapped.
“She spent years trying to undo what she did,” Rebecca said.
Sarah cried quietly.
“She raised me.”
“She saved you.”
Rebecca took Sarah’s hand.
“She gave me the only thing I cared about.”
“You.”
Walter looked toward the locket.
Everything had returned because Rachel made sure Sarah kept it.
“She wanted it found someday,” he whispered.
Rebecca nodded.
“She told me that if she ever got away, she would put the truth where you would recognize it.”
The locket.
E.B.
A breadcrumb across three decades.
Daniel eventually confessed to kidnapping Rebecca.
But not Evelyn’s murder.
He denied the other children.
The trial became national news.
Walter hated cameras.
Sarah hated reporters.
Rebecca hated strangers turning her trauma into entertainment.
They stayed together anyway.
During the trial, Daniel stared at Walter from the defense table.
He smiled.
Walter refused to react.
Then Daniel’s attorney produced a surprise witness.
Harold Price.
The corrupt detective.
Price claimed Walter had known Rebecca was alive for years.
The courtroom erupted.
Sarah stared at Walter.
Rebecca looked horrified.
Walter stood.
“That’s a lie!”
The judge ordered silence.
Price testified that Walter had paid him to keep Rebecca hidden.
The prosecution was stunned.
Then Price produced bank records.
Payments from an account bearing Walter Bennett’s name.
Walter whispered, “I never made those.”
Daniel smiled.
Marcus examined the documents.
Something was wrong.
The signatures looked real.
Because they were.
Walter’s signature had been copied from old business documents.
Marcus discovered the account was opened using Walter’s identity.
By Daniel.
The lie collapsed.
But Daniel wasn’t finished.
His lawyer played a recording.
Walter’s voice filled the courtroom.
“Rebecca is better off gone.”
Rebecca stared at her father.
Walter looked shattered.
“I never said that.”
Then the recording continued.
Different words.
Different pauses.
Marcus understood.
Spliced audio.
Daniel had spent decades collecting Walter’s voice.
The judge excluded the recording.
Daniel screamed.
“You always win!”
Walter finally looked at him.
“No.”
He stood slowly.
“I lost my wife.”
He looked at Rebecca.
“I lost my daughter for thirty-one years.”
Then Sarah.
“I lost my granddaughter before I knew she existed.”
Walter faced his brother.
“There are no winners here.”
Daniel smiled.
“There will be one more loser.”
Walter frowned.
Daniel leaned toward the microphone.
“You still haven’t found all the children.”
Marcus froze.
Daniel whispered an address.
Police rushed there.
Beneath an abandoned church, they found a hidden room.
Three people were alive inside.
And one of them looked at Rebecca and called her by a name she had not heard since captivity.
“Annie.”
May you like
Rebecca went pale.
Because “Annie” was the name Daniel had used for the girl he once forced Rebecca to believe was her sister.
