Chapter 5 - The Woman in Room 614
Eleanor Moretti refused to answer questions about Carlo’s final night.
Not when Gabriel asked.
Not when investigators asked.
Not even when Vincent entered her hospital room.
She simply turned toward the window.
“Mom.”
Nothing.
Vincent sat beside her.
“Isabella is missing.”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
“Whitmore has her.”
Her eyes opened.
“What?”
Vincent showed her the photograph.
Eleanor made a sound Hannah would never forget.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
“You knew this could happen,” Hannah said.
The elderly woman stared at her.
“Who is Whitmore really protecting?”
Eleanor’s hand trembled.
“My daughter.”
Vincent stood.
“From what?”
“From herself.”
The answer made no sense.
Then Eleanor began telling the story she had buried.
Eight years earlier, Carlo had discovered Isabella was secretly transferring money from a family company.
But she had not stolen it.
She had been paying Whitmore.
“Why?”
Eleanor looked at Vincent.
“Because she thought she was saving you.”
Twenty years earlier, Vincent had suffered a serious childhood illness.
Whitmore had treated him.
Years later, when Vincent began experiencing occasional unexplained neurological symptoms, Whitmore convinced Isabella that Vincent suffered from a rare inherited disorder.
He told her Carlo knew but refused expensive experimental treatment.
Isabella believed him.
She secretly paid for therapies.
The payments continued for years.
“But I wasn’t sick,” Vincent said.
“No.”
Eleanor began crying.
“Samuel made you sick.”
Whitmore created symptoms.
Then offered treatments.
Then created worse symptoms.
A cycle of dependency.
He turned the Moretti family’s fear into control.
Carlo eventually became suspicious.
When Isabella discovered she had been deceived, she threatened to expose Whitmore.
But by then he possessed years of documents bearing her authorization.
Enough to make it appear that Isabella herself had ordered the treatments.
“So she stayed silent,” Hannah whispered.
Eleanor nodded.
“Samuel told her if she spoke, Vincent would believe she had tried to poison him.”
Vincent sat frozen.
“And Dad?”
“He confronted Samuel.”
“What happened?”
Eleanor began shaking.
“I don’t know.”
“You were there.”
“I found Carlo after.”
“After what?”
“He was on the floor in his study.”
The family doctor arrived before the ambulance.
Whitmore pronounced the episode consistent with cardiac failure.
And Eleanor believed him.
At first.
Days later she found Carlo’s hidden key.
But Isabella begged her not to open the box.
“She was terrified,” Eleanor said.
“Of Whitmore?”
“Of losing you.”
Vincent’s eyes filled with something Hannah had never expected to see.
Grief.
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“Because Samuel showed her forged records with her signature.”
Vincent looked at the photograph of his captive sister.
“Then why has she been helping him now?”
Eleanor looked away.
“That part I don’t know.”
A nurse entered.
“Mrs. Moretti needs rest.”
They left.
In the hallway, Hannah noticed a woman watching them.
Mid-fifties.
Dark coat.
Short brown hair.
The woman turned away.
Hannah followed.
“Excuse me.”
The stranger entered an elevator.
The doors closed.
Gabriel approached.
“What?”
“That woman was watching us.”
He checked the security desk.
There was no visitor registered under her description.
Twenty minutes later, Hannah saw her again.
Room 614.
She entered alone.
Hannah told Gabriel.
They approached carefully.
Inside was a woman recovering from minor surgery.
No stranger.
But sitting on the chair was a folded note.
Hannah opened it.
STOP TRUSTING REBECCA SLOAN.
Underneath was another line.
SHE DIDN’T DISCOVER THE TREATMENT RECORDS.
SHE HELPED CREATE THEM.
Hannah’s blood ran cold.
Gabriel immediately called the safe location where Rebecca had been placed.
No answer.
He called the guard outside.
Still nothing.
Then his phone rang.
The guard.
“Rebecca’s gone.”
“How?”
“She asked to use the bathroom at a gas station. There was a rear service exit.”
Hannah stared at the note.
“Why run if she was telling the truth?”
“Maybe because she wasn’t.”
Vincent joined them.
Gabriel showed him the note.
His expression hardened.
Hannah remembered Rebecca at the seminar.
Her warning.
Her fear.
Her knowledge.
Maybe it had all been real.
Or carefully designed.
Then Hannah remembered something else.
Rebecca had produced one flash drive from her coat.
But Walter had stored a different flash drive.
She had claimed the first was merely a copy.
They had never examined it.
Gabriel still had it.
He connected the drive.
There was only one file.
A video.
Security footage from the Moretti mansion.
Timestamped six weeks earlier.
Rebecca stood inside Eleanor’s medication room.
Whitmore entered.
Rebecca handed him a clipboard.
Then Isabella stepped into view.
The three of them spoke for almost six minutes.
There was no audio.
At the end, Isabella handed Rebecca an envelope.
Rebecca counted the money inside.
Hannah felt sick.
Then the final ten seconds played.
Whitmore left.
Isabella left.
Rebecca remained.
She looked directly toward the hidden security camera.
And smiled.
Someone had lied.
Perhaps all of them had.
May you like
And somewhere in Chicago, Dr. Whitmore still had Isabella.
Unless Isabella was never his prisoner at all.
