Chapter 3 - THE SAFE
Ryan called the number back immediately.
Disconnected.
Detective Shaw took the phone.
“Don’t call again.”
“That was Mercer.”
“We know.”
“He mentioned my father.”
“We heard him.”
Ryan stood.
“I’m going to my mother’s house.”
“No.”
Ryan stared at Shaw.
“No?”
“We are.”
Ryan stepped closer.
“Then I’m coming.”
“Absolutely not.”
“That safe is inside the house I grew up in.”
“And this is now an active investigation.”
Ryan looked ready to argue.
Maya stopped him.
“Ryan.”
He turned.
She was looking through the glass at Oliver.
“Stay.”
Ryan’s anger disappeared immediately.
Maya took his hand.
“If your father’s records are there, the police will find them.”
Ryan looked at Shaw.
She nodded.
“We’ll contact you.”
Ryan hated it.
But Maya was right.
He stayed.
At 1:42 a.m., Oliver finally fell into a peaceful sleep.
His breathing had stabilized.
Maya sat beside the bed holding his hand.
Ryan stood by the window.
Rain streaked across the glass.
His phone remained silent.
At 2:07 a.m., it rang.
Shaw.
Ryan answered immediately.
“Did you find it?”
“We found a safe.”
His heart accelerated.
“And?”
“We need you to identify something.”
“What?”
“I’m sending you a photograph.”
Ryan’s phone vibrated.
He opened the image.
At first he didn’t understand what he was looking at.
It was an old photograph.
A family picture.
Ryan recognized himself at seventeen.
His father stood beside him.
Evelyn stood on the other side.
Someone had drawn a black circle around Richard Whitmore’s face.
Ryan frowned.
“What is this?”
“Turn the image over.”
Another photograph arrived.
This showed the back.
Three words were written there.
FIRST ATTEMPT FAILED.
Ryan’s body went cold.
“What the hell does that mean?”
“We don’t know.”
“You found this in the safe?”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
Silence.
“Detective?”
“Medical records.”
“Mercer was telling the truth.”
“Partially.”
Ryan gripped the phone.
“What does partially mean?”
“The records aren’t from one doctor.”
“How many?”
“Seven.”
Ryan leaned against the wall.
“Seven doctors?”
“Your father was apparently being evaluated by multiple specialists during the year before his death.”
“I never knew that.”
“There’s more.”
Ryan closed his eyes.
“Of course there is.”
Shaw continued.
“Several prescriptions are listed.”
“For what?”
“Heart medication.”
“Sedatives.”
“Anti-anxiety medication.”
Ryan frowned.
“My father didn’t take sedatives.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
He remembered his father refusing sleeping pills after long business trips.
Richard Whitmore hated medication.
He barely took aspirin.
Shaw spoke again.
“One prescription was issued by Andrew Mercer.”
Ryan opened his eyes.
“When?”
“Three months before your father died.”
Ryan felt the room tilt.
“Mercer knew my father?”
“Apparently.”
“How old is he?”
“Fifty-eight.”
Ryan calculated.
Mercer would have been in his forties.
Established.
Experienced.
Old enough.
“What did he prescribe?”
“A medication used for severe anxiety.”
“My father didn’t have severe anxiety.”
“According to the records, he did.”
“According to who?”
Another pause.
“Your mother.”
Ryan’s jaw tightened.
Maya had been listening.
She slowly stood.
Ryan put the phone on speaker.
Shaw continued.
“There are handwritten notes describing Richard as unstable.”
“Paranoid.”
“Aggressive.”
“Emotionally unpredictable.”
Ryan stared at Maya.
The same words.
The same pattern.
The same story Evelyn had been constructing around Maya.
Maya whispered.
“She did this before.”
Ryan’s stomach turned.
Shaw heard her.
“That possibility is being investigated.”
“No.”
Ryan’s voice sharpened.
“Don’t give me police language.”
“Ryan.”
“My father died.”
“I understand.”
“No, you don’t.”
He walked into the hallway.
“My mother spent the last three years telling everyone Maya was unstable.”
“Now you’re telling me she spent the year before my father died telling doctors he was unstable too.”
“That is what the documents indicate.”
Ryan closed his eyes.
Memories came back.
His father becoming quieter.
Arguments behind closed doors.
Evelyn telling Ryan his father needed rest.
Evelyn preventing visitors.
Evelyn saying Richard was “not himself.”
Ryan had believed her.
Everyone had.
Because Evelyn Whitmore controlled the truth.
“What was in the rest of the safe?”
Shaw didn’t answer immediately.
“Financial documents.”
“What kind?”
“Trusts.”
“Insurance.”
“Property.”
Ryan almost dismissed it.
Then something occurred to him.
“How much was my father insured for?”
“We’re verifying that.”
“You already know.”
Shaw remained silent.
“Tell me.”
“Twenty-five million dollars.”
Ryan sat down.
Maya covered her mouth.
Ryan whispered.
“My mother inherited it?”
“Most of it.”
His hands began shaking.
Then Shaw said something else.
“There’s also a file with your name on it.”
Ryan looked up.
“My name?”
“Yes.”
“What’s inside?”
“Medical records.”
Ryan froze.
“I don’t have medical records at my mother’s house.”
“These aren’t recent.”
“How old?”
“Some go back to when you were nineteen.”
Ryan felt an entirely different kind of fear.
“What do they say?”
“Ryan.”
“What do they say?”
Shaw’s voice softened.
“They describe episodes of aggression.”
Ryan stared into the darkness outside the hospital window.
“I never had episodes of aggression.”
“Depression.”
“No.”
“Alcohol abuse.”
“No.”
“Suicidal behavior.”
Ryan’s face went white.
Maya grabbed his hand.
“That never happened.”
Ryan could barely speak.
“I’ve never attempted suicide.”
“I understand.”
“Then why are there medical records saying I did?”
“We need time to determine whether they’re authentic.”
Ryan suddenly remembered something.
A car accident when he was nineteen.
He had fallen asleep at the wheel after driving home from college.
His car hit a guardrail.
Evelyn had told everyone he had been exhausted.
But she had insisted on taking him to a private clinic afterward.
Ryan had stayed there overnight.
He remembered a doctor asking strange questions.
Do you ever feel hopeless?
Do you ever think about hurting yourself?
Ryan had laughed.
He had thought it was routine.
Now he understood.
“Mercer.”
Shaw paused.
“What?”
“When I was nineteen.”
Ryan’s breathing quickened.
“There was a doctor.”
“Do you remember his name?”
“No.”
“But I remember his face.”
Shaw became very quiet.
“Would you recognize him?”
Ryan looked at the photograph of Andrew Mercer that Brooks had shown earlier.
He enlarged it.
Older now.
Gray at the temples.
But the eyes were the same.
Ryan whispered.
“It was him.”
Maya stared.
“Ryan…”
“It was Mercer.”
Shaw’s voice became urgent.
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
“He evaluated me after my accident.”
“When?”
“Fourteen years ago.”
The same year Richard Whitmore died.
Nobody spoke.
Then Shaw said something that made Ryan’s blood run cold.
“Ryan, I need you to remain at the hospital.”
“Why?”
“Because the file we found doesn’t end when you were nineteen.”
Ryan frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“There are newer documents.”
“How new?”
“The latest one is dated eleven days ago.”
Ryan stopped.
“What does it say?”
Shaw looked down at the page in front of her.
“It recommends emergency guardianship if you become psychologically unstable.”
Ryan almost dropped the phone.
“Guardianship over who?”
Shaw answered.
“Oliver.”
Maya gasped.
Ryan felt the pieces locking together.
Evelyn had prepared Maya to be declared unfit.
She had prepared Ryan to be declared unstable.
If both parents were removed—
Oliver would need someone else.
A guardian.
Ryan already knew the answer.
But he asked anyway.
“Who is listed as the recommended guardian?”
May you like
Detective Shaw’s voice was quiet.
“Evelyn Whitmore.”
