Chapter 5 - The Doctor’s Missing Hour
The river was freezing.
The moment I hit the water, my lungs locked.
Vincent pushed the waterproof bag toward me.
“Stay low!”
A flashlight beam swept across the bank.
We moved downstream beneath overhanging branches.
My clothes became painfully heavy.
I focused on one thing.
Do not lose the letter.
We reached the opposite bank and climbed through mud.
Vincent’s backup arrived twelve minutes later.
By then the men who attacked us had vanished.
So had their vehicle.
But they made one mistake.
A traffic camera two miles away captured their license plate.
The car belonged to a company called Meridian Protective Services.
Alexander owned forty percent of it.
When we returned to the estate at three in the morning, Alexander was waiting in the library.
Standing.
Barely.
But standing.
Rebecca hovered beside him looking furious.
“I told him he could have a cardiac event,” she said.
Alexander gestured toward me.
“She was being shot at.”
“As if your heart knows the difference.”
I was soaked, muddy and shaking.
Alexander crossed the room.
His expression changed when he saw the cut across my cheek.
“It’s nothing.”
He touched it gently.
“Who did this?”
“I don’t know.”
His jaw tightened.
For a second, I understood why grown men feared him.
Then I handed him my mother’s letter.
The final line had smeared slightly from moisture.
But the name remained readable.
His name is Sebastian Vale.
Alexander stared at it.
Vincent stopped moving.
Eleanor whispered, “No.”
Sebastian Vale had been Alexander’s father’s attorney.
More than that.
He had been Vittorio Romano’s closest friend.
And Vincent Hale’s uncle.
I turned toward Vincent.
“You knew him?”
Vincent’s face had gone white.
“He raised me.”
Alexander said nothing.
Vincent sat slowly.
“My father died when I was nine. Sebastian took me in.”
“Where is he now?” I asked.
“Dead.”
“When?”
“Seven years ago.”
“How?”
“Heart attack.”
Alexander looked at the letter again.
“Maybe.”
The documents from the box showed that Sebastian had created dozens of companies used to siphon money from Romano businesses.
But that wasn’t the most disturbing discovery.
One document listed ownership transfers.
Several of those shell companies had recently become active again.
Someone had inherited Sebastian’s operation.
Or Sebastian had never truly left it.
Vincent looked devastated.
“I built Alexander’s security system using protocols Sebastian taught me.”
There it was.
The explanation.
Whoever continued Sebastian’s plan might know the security architecture because Sebastian had designed its foundation.
Alexander walked to the fireplace.
“My father trusted him for thirty years.”
“My mother discovered what he was doing,” I said.
“And he threatened her.”
“She ran because of me.”
The truth hurt, but it also made me proud.
Margaret Bennett had been frightened.
She had still saved evidence.
Alexander turned.
“What else is in the box?”
We searched until dawn.
Bank records.
Property records.
Photographs.
One picture showed Sebastian standing beside Vittorio at a charity gala.
Another showed him beside a much younger Dr. Keller.
That caught my attention.
“Keller knew Sebastian.”
Vincent picked up the photo.
“Apparently.”
The date was twenty-two years earlier.
Rebecca joined us.
“Medical school fundraiser. Keller would have been a resident.”
Alexander’s gaze sharpened.
“Find Keller.”
Vincent did.
Or tried.
Dr. Keller had disappeared.
His home was empty.
His office hadn’t seen him since yesterday.
His phone was turned off.
And at 8:14 a.m., Keller’s wife reported both her husband and their teenage daughter missing.
The kidnapping was real.
But Keller might have known more than he admitted.
Vincent pulled hospital access logs.
Something immediately stood out.
Three nights before Alexander collapsed, Keller disappeared from the hospital for exactly sixty-one minutes.
No phone activity.
No credit card use.
No vehicle exit recorded.
Yet security footage showed him entering an elevator at 11:03 p.m.
He appeared again at midnight.
“What happened during that hour?” I asked.
Vincent froze the image.
“He changed clothes.”
Before the elevator, Keller wore blue scrubs.
Afterward, he wore a suit.
“Maybe he had clothing in his office.”
Rebecca shook her head.
“His office is on floor eight. That elevator went down.”
“To where?”
“Basement level two.”
The hospital’s old records archive.
We drove there.
Alexander stayed behind only because Rebecca threatened to sedate him herself.
Basement level two smelled of dust and old paper.
Security logs showed Keller entering room B214.
The room appeared empty.
Then I noticed scratches on the floor beneath a filing cabinet.
Vincent moved it.
Behind the cabinet was a safe.
The code was four digits.
I thought of Keller’s earlier signal.
212.
No.
Too obvious.
Then I remembered the photo date.
September 14.
914.
The safe opened.
Inside was a folder labeled ROMANO.
There were Alexander’s medical records.
Blood tests.
Prescriptions.
But one page didn’t belong.
It was a paternity test.
Alexander Romano.
Second subject: unidentified.
Probability of sibling relationship: 99.8%.
I stared at Vincent.
“Alexander has another sibling?”
Vincent took the paper.
“As far as he knows, only Julian.”
A handwritten note appeared at the bottom.
S.V. confirmed.
S.V.
Sebastian Vale.
Beneath the test lay a second photograph.
A young woman holding a newborn baby.
On the back:
Elena, 1991. Vittorio must never know.
Vincent leaned against the safe.
“This isn’t about money anymore.”
“No.”
Someone connected to the Romano family had been hidden for thirty-five years.
Someone Sebastian Vale knew about.
Someone with Romano blood.
My phone rang.
Alexander.
I answered immediately.
“What happened?”
His voice was low.
“Come back.”
“Why?”
A pause.
“Julian knows I’m awake.”
My stomach dropped.
“How?”
“He walked into the hidden room.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Apparently not.”
“What does he want?”
Alexander went silent.
Then said, “He claims he knows who has been poisoning me.”
“Who?”
“He won’t say unless you’re here.”
“Why me?”
Another pause.
“Because, Claire…”
Alexander’s voice became colder.
May you like
“Julian says the person behind this has been waiting for you for twenty years.”
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