PART 2
Detective Mercer did not open the file immediately.
He placed both hands on top of it and studied me across the desk.
“Before I show you anything, Mr. Brooks, I need you to understand something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know that your wife has committed a crime.”
The word wife sounded strange coming from him.
“Then why am I here?”
“Because fifteen years ago, a woman disappeared from a town called Bellhaven, Ohio.”
I waited.
“And you think Rebecca knows something about her?”
Mercer’s expression did not change.
“I think Rebecca may be her.”
I stared at him.
Then I laughed.
I could not help it.
It was not funny.
It was the kind of laugh your body makes when your mind rejects what it has just heard.
“My wife is a missing person?”
“Possibly.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“I know.”
“We’ve been married thirteen years.”
“I know.”
“We have a house.”
“I know.”
“She has a job. A Social Security number. A passport.”
“I know.”
“She has a mother.”
“Margaret Ellis?”
“Yes.”
Mercer leaned back.
“Margaret Ellis is one of the reasons I asked you to come.”
Something in his voice made my stomach tighten.
“What does that mean?”
He opened the file.
The first thing he removed was a photograph.
He placed it face down.
“Tell me about your wife.”
I frowned.
“What do you want to know?”
“Where was she born?”
“Pennsylvania.”
“Where?”
I opened my mouth.
Then stopped.
Rebecca had told me.
Hadn’t she?
Some small town outside Pittsburgh.
Or maybe that was where she grew up.
“Near Pittsburgh.”
“Hospital?”
“I don’t know.”
“High school?”
“Westfield.”
“Which Westfield?”
“I don’t know.”
“College?”
“Penn State.”
“What year did she graduate?”
“2008, I think.”
Mercer watched me.
I suddenly felt defensive.
“You could ask me the same questions about half my friends and I wouldn’t know.”
“That’s fair.”
“So what are you doing?”
“Establishing what Rebecca told you about her life before she met you.”
I folded my arms.
“She had a normal childhood.”
“What was her father’s name?”
“David.”
“Last name?”
“Ellis.”
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
“When did he die?”
“Before we met.”
“How?”
“Heart attack.”
“Where is he buried?”
I stared at him.
“I don’t know.”
Mercer nodded once.
“Brothers or sisters?”
“No.”
“Aunts?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Uncles?”
“No.”
“Cousins?”
“She doesn’t talk about extended family.”
“Childhood friends?”
My irritation was becoming something else.
Because I could not answer.
In thirteen years of marriage, I had met people Rebecca knew from college.
Coworkers.
Neighbors.
Friends we made together.
But I could not remember meeting a single person who knew my wife when she was a child.
Not one.
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“No.”
Mercer turned the photograph over.
“Does this?”
I looked down.
A teenage girl smiled at the camera.
Brown hair.
Green eyes.
Small dimple in her left cheek.
My heart stopped.
It was Rebecca.
Not similar.
Not someone who could have been related to her.
Rebecca.
Younger.
Maybe seventeen.
But unmistakably my wife.
I reached for the photograph.
Mercer let me take it.
“What is this?”
“High school yearbook photograph.”
I looked at the name beneath the picture.
Emily Carter.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
“No.”
“Bellhaven High School. 2007.”
“No.”
“Emily Carter disappeared on September 18, 2008.”
I looked up.
“My wife’s name is Rebecca Brooks.”
“Rebecca Ellis before your marriage.”
“I know my wife’s name.”
Mercer did not argue.
That somehow made it worse.
I looked back at the photograph.
The girl had Rebecca’s eyes.
Rebecca’s smile.
Even the slight tilt of her head was familiar.
“People look alike.”
“They do.”
“This could be anybody.”
“Yes.”
“You have fingerprints?”
“No.”
“DNA?”
“Not from Rebecca.”
“Then you don’t know.”
“No.”
I pushed the photograph back.
“Good.”
Mercer did not take it.
Instead, he removed another photograph.
Emily Carter standing beside an older woman.
Then another.
Emily at a birthday party.
Another.
Emily beside a blue pickup truck.
Another.
Emily wearing a Bellhaven High sweatshirt.
In every picture, I saw my wife.
Then Mercer placed a close-up photograph beside them.
“Look at her right wrist.”
There was a pale crescent-shaped scar.
My mouth went dry.
Rebecca had the same scar.
She told me she got it falling from a bicycle when she was nine.
I stood.
“I need some air.”
Mercer nodded.
“Take your time.”
I walked into the hallway.
My chest felt tight.
This was absurd.
There had to be an explanation.
Rebecca had a birth certificate.
I had seen it when we applied for our marriage license.
Hadn’t I?
I tried to remember.
We had gathered documents.
Filled out forms.
She had handled most of it.
I remembered my passport.
My ID.
Her folder.
But did I actually see her birth certificate?
I could not remember.
My phone buzzed.
Rebecca.
Rebecca: Morning ❤️ Did you get to work okay?
I stared at the message.
She thought I was at work.
I had called my boss and taken a personal day.
For the first time in thirteen years, I was deliberately hiding where I was from my wife.
I typed:
Me: Yeah. Busy morning.
Three dots appeared immediately.
Rebecca: Everything okay?
Me: Fine.
Rebecca: You seem weird.
I stared at those words.
How could she know from two texts?
Then:
Rebecca: Did that cop say something to you yesterday?
My pulse jumped.
I did not answer.
The phone rang.
Rebecca.
I let it ring.
She called again.
Then a text.
Rebecca: Nathan, call me.
Another.
Rebecca: Please.
I switched the phone to silent and returned to Mercer’s office.
He looked at my face.
“She contacted you?”
“Yes.”
“What did you tell her?”
“Nothing.”
“Good.”
“Don’t say good.”
He nodded.
“Fair.”
I sat down.
“Tell me everything.”
Mercer closed the office door.
“Emily Carter was eighteen when she disappeared.”
“What happened?”
“She lived with her parents, Susan and Michael Carter, in Bellhaven.”
“Any siblings?”
“A younger brother named Jacob.”
My stomach twisted.
Rebecca had always told me she was an only child.
“September 18, 2008, Emily left her job at a local diner around 9:40 p.m.”
“Did she have a car?”
“Yes.”
“Where was it found?”
“At a bus station twenty-eight miles away.”
“Any sign of violence?”
“No.”
“Blood?”
“No.”
“Her purse?”
“Missing.”
“Phone?”
“Found inside the car.”
“Money?”
“Her bank account was never touched again.”
“Boyfriend?”
“Yes.”
“Suspect?”
“For a while.”
“What happened?”
“Cleared.”
“Parents?”
“Investigated.”
“Cleared?”
“Mostly.”
I caught the word.
“Mostly?”
Mercer leaned back.
“There were problems in the Carter home.”
“What kind?”
“Emily and her father argued frequently.”
“About?”
“Money. School. A boyfriend. Normal things, according to Michael.”
“According to Emily?”
“We never got to ask her.”
I looked at the photographs.
“Why did the trooper recognize her?”
“He was fourteen when Emily disappeared.”
“So?”
“His older sister was Emily’s best friend.”
That explained the expression on the roadside.
“He recognized Rebecca immediately?”
“He thought he did.”
“And her license?”
Mercer’s face changed.
“That was what bothered him.”
“What about it?”
“He ran it.”
“And?”
“It was valid.”
I waited.
“Why is that suspicious?”
“Because Rebecca Ellis’s identity has a history.”
My throat tightened.
“What history?”
He opened another folder.
“The Social Security number attached to your wife was issued when Rebecca Ellis was a child.”
“Okay.”
“The birth certificate is valid.”
“Then what are we doing here?”
“Rebecca Ellis was a real person.”
Was.
The word hit me.
“What do you mean was?”
Mercer slid a document toward me.
A death certificate.
Rebecca Anne Ellis.
Born February 4, 1990.
Died August 21, 1996.
Age six.
I stopped breathing.
“No.”
“Pennsylvania.”
I stared at the paper.
Cause of death:
Drowning.
“That isn’t my wife.”
“No.”
“But she uses this person’s identity?”
“It appears so.”
“How?”
“That is what we need to determine.”
I pushed away from the desk.
“This is insane.”
Mercer waited.
“My wife has passed background checks.”
“I believe you.”
“She works for a pharmaceutical distribution company.”
“I know.”
“She has access to controlled facilities.”
“I know.”
“She files taxes.”
“Yes.”
“She has credit cards.”
“Yes.”
“A mortgage.”
“Yes.”
Mercer folded his hands.
“A stolen identity can become very convincing after enough years.”
I looked at the dead child’s name.
Rebecca Ellis.
The name I had said at our wedding.
The name printed on our first apartment lease.
The name I had written on anniversary cards.
The name I thought belonged to the woman sleeping beside me for thirteen years.
“Who was the real Rebecca’s mother?”
Mercer said nothing.
I looked up.
“Who?”
He opened another page.
“Margaret Ellis.”
I felt the room tilt.
“No.”
“Margaret was Rebecca’s mother.”
“My mother-in-law.”
“Yes.”
“So Margaret had a daughter named Rebecca who died at six.”
“Yes.”
“And fifteen years ago Emily Carter disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“And sometime after that Emily became Rebecca?”
“That is one possibility.”
I stood again.
“Margaret would know.”
“Exactly.”
“She raised Rebecca.”
“Which Rebecca?”
I froze.
Mercer leaned forward.
“The woman you call Margaret could not mistake an eighteen-year-old stranger for her dead six-year-old daughter.”
My stomach turned.
“So if you’re right…”
“She participated.”
I thought about dinner.
Margaret talking about tomatoes.
Rebecca washing dishes.
Both of them laughing.
Normal.
So painfully normal.
“Why?”
“We don’t know.”
“Why would a woman give a missing teenager her dead daughter’s identity?”
“That is one of the questions that kept this case alive for me.”
“You knew about Margaret?”
“Not until recently.”
“How recently?”
“Seven months.”
“Why didn’t you arrest her?”
“For what?”
“Identity theft.”
“We needed evidence.”
“You have a death certificate.”
“And a living adult using the identity. But proving who knowingly created the false documentation, when it happened, and what other offenses may have occurred requires more.”
“Did you question Margaret?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because we were watching her.”
I stared at him.
“Watching her?”
“Not continuously.”
“For what?”
Mercer hesitated.
“Another person disappeared.”
My skin went cold.
“Who?”
He removed a photograph.
A middle-aged man.
Gray hair.
Glasses.
“His name was Dr. Alan Reeves.”
“Who is he?”
“A retired pediatrician.”
I waited.
“He signed Rebecca Ellis’s original death certificate.”
My stomach dropped.
“When did he disappear?”
“Seven months ago.”
“The same time you found Margaret?”
“Yes.”
“Coincidence?”
“We don’t know.”
“Was he murdered?”
“We don’t know that either.”
“Then why connect him?”
“Because three days before he disappeared, he called this department.”
Mercer opened an old digital transcript.
“He asked to speak to someone about Emily Carter.”
My mouth went dry.
“What did he say?”
“Very little.”
“He said he had made a mistake years ago.”
“What mistake?”
“He refused to explain over the phone.”
“He arranged a meeting.”
“And?”
“He never arrived.”
I stared at the doctor’s photograph.
“His car?”
“Found at Cleveland Hopkins Airport.”
“Flight?”
“None booked in his name.”
“Phone?”
“Destroyed.”
“Body?”
“No.”
I rubbed both hands over my face.
“Why are you telling me all of this?”
“Because if your wife is Emily Carter, we need to know whether she ran away voluntarily or whether someone helped her disappear.”
“And if she isn’t?”
“Then we need to know who she is.”
My phone buzzed again.
Rebecca: Nathan?
Rebecca: Please answer me.
Then:
Rebecca: I called your office.
My blood turned cold.
Mercer saw my face.
“What?”
“She called my work.”
“Does she know you’re not there?”
A new message appeared.
Rebecca: They said you took a personal day.
Then another.
Rebecca: Where are you?
Mercer stood.
“Don’t answer.”
“She’s my wife.”
“If she is Rebecca Ellis, then we have a problem.”
“If she is Emily Carter, she’s still my wife.”
“Legally, that becomes complicated.”
“I don’t care about legally.”
“You should.”
I looked at him.
He lowered his voice.
“Because you don’t know what she is afraid of.”
I remembered the traffic stop.
Rebecca’s fingers tightening around the steering wheel.
The mirrors.
The glances behind us.
She had known something had changed before I did.
“Why was she scared when the trooper took her license?”
Mercer nodded.
“That’s the question.”
“She has used the identity for years.”
“Yes.”
“So why would one traffic stop scare her?”
“Maybe she recognized the trooper.”
“Did he know her personally?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
Mercer walked toward a cabinet.
He removed another file.
This one was much thinner.
“Emily had one distinctive feature not visible in the yearbook photograph.”
“What?”
“A surgical scar below her left shoulder.”
My stomach tightened.
Rebecca had a scar there.
She told me it came from having a mole removed in college.
“What surgery?”
“Heart surgery.”
I closed my eyes.
Rebecca took medication.
Not heart medication.
At least I did not think so.
“Anything else?”
Mercer nodded.
“Emily was allergic to penicillin.”
Rebecca was too.
I sat down.
I could no longer tell myself this was resemblance.
“How certain are you?”
“Without DNA?”
“Yes.”
“Enough that I would not go home tonight.”
The exact warning from the trooper.
I looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because of Dr. Reeves.”
“You think my wife did something to him?”
“I did not say that.”
“Then say what you mean.”
Mercer hesitated.
“We traced Reeves’s final phone activity.”
“To Margaret?”
“No.”
“To Rebecca?”
“No.”
“To who?”
He placed another photograph on the desk.
A man I had never seen.
“His name is Daniel Voss.”
“Who is he?”
“He was a private investigator.”
“Was?”
“Died eleven years ago.”
“Then how did Reeves call him seven months ago?”
“He didn’t.”
Mercer tapped the photograph.
“Reeves called Daniel Voss’s son.”
I stared at him.
“Why?”
“Because Daniel investigated Emily Carter’s disappearance privately.”
“For her parents?”
“No.”
“Then who hired him?”
Mercer looked at me.
“Margaret Ellis.”
My head began to hurt.
“Margaret hired someone to investigate Emily?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Two months before Emily disappeared.”
I stared at him.
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No.”
“If Emily hadn’t disappeared yet, why was Margaret investigating her?”
“Exactly.”
I leaned forward.
“What was she investigating?”
“We don’t know.”
“Where are Voss’s files?”
“Mostly destroyed after his death.”
“Mostly?”
Mercer removed a photocopy.
“One page survived.”
It contained handwritten notes.
I read them.
E.C.
18.
Bellhaven.
Possible connection confirmed.
M.E. requesting immediate contact.
Do not approach parents.
Identity issue bigger than expected.
Then one line had been underlined twice.
R.E. DID NOT DIE THE WAY M.E. CLAIMS.
My stomach turned.
“What does that mean?”
“We don’t know.”
“The death certificate says drowning.”
“Yes.”
“Was that false?”
“We reopened the old file.”
“And?”
“The cemetery record exists.”
“Body?”
Mercer hesitated.
“The grave was exhumed six months ago.”
I stared at him.
“And?”
“The coffin was empty.”
I stopped breathing.
“No.”
“No remains.”
“So the six-year-old Rebecca didn’t die?”
“We don’t know.”
“Then who is my wife?”
“That is what I have spent seven months trying to answer.”
My phone rang.
Rebecca.
I watched it vibrate.
Mercer looked at me.
“Answer.”
“You just told me not to.”
“I changed my mind.”
“Why?”
“Because she knows you’re missing.”
“What do I say?”
“Act normal.”
I answered.
“Hey.”
Rebecca was silent.
Then:
“Nathan, where are you?”
“Out.”
“Where?”
“I needed to handle something.”
“What?”
“Work.”
“They said you weren’t there.”
“I know.”
Another silence.
Then she asked:
“Did the officer give you something yesterday?”
Mercer and I looked at each other.
“What do you mean?”
“I saw him hand you something.”
“A business card.”
“Whose?”
I hesitated.
Rebecca’s breathing changed.
“Nathan.”
“What?”
“Where are you?”
There was fear in her voice.
Not anger.
Not suspicion.
Fear.
“I told you.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Rebecca—”
“Please.”
Her voice cracked.
“Whatever he told you, please don’t believe it until I can explain.”
My chest tightened.
“Explain what?”
Silence.
“Rebecca?”
Then she whispered:
“My name.”
Mercer’s eyes locked onto mine.
I stopped breathing.
“What about your name?”
She began crying.
“Nathan, I was going to tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“I couldn’t.”
“For thirteen years?”
“I was scared.”
“Are you Emily Carter?”
The silence lasted so long I thought the call had disconnected.
Then:
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
Mercer wrote something quickly on a legal pad.
I barely noticed.
“Why?”
“I can’t tell you on the phone.”
“Why not?”
“Because Margaret may be listening.”
I opened my eyes.
Mercer froze.
“What?”
Rebecca whispered:
“She isn’t my mother.”
I felt my heartbeat in my throat.
“You’re at her house.”
“Not anymore.”
“Where are you?”
“I left this morning.”
“Where is Margaret?”
“I don’t know.”
“Rebecca—Emily—whatever your name is, what is happening?”
She sobbed.
“Nathan, the speeding wasn’t an accident.”
I looked at Mercer.
“What do you mean?”
“I needed the officer to stop us.”
Nothing in the room moved.
“You were speeding deliberately?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I saw the cruiser.”
My skin prickled.
“You wanted to be pulled over?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Her voice dropped.
“Because Margaret was following us.”
I remembered Rebecca checking the mirrors.
Again.
And again.
“Why would she follow us?”
“She knew I was going to tell you.”
“Tell me what?”
“Everything.”
“Then tell me now.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“No, Nathan.”
Her breathing became ragged.
“Not until I know you’re safe.”
“Safe from Margaret?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
A long silence.
Then:
“Because fifteen years ago, Margaret did not help me run away.”
I gripped the phone.
“What did she do?”
Rebecca whispered:
“She took me.”
Mercer stood so quickly his chair rolled backward.
“What?”
I said.
“She kidnapped me.”
My mouth went dry.
“Why?”
“I didn’t understand then.”
“And now?”
“Now I do.”
“What did she want?”
Rebecca began crying harder.
“Me.”
“Why?”
“Because I looked like her daughter.”
The dead Rebecca Ellis.
Or supposedly dead.
I stared at the empty-coffin report.
“Where is the real Rebecca?”
Another silence.
Then my wife said something that made Mercer’s face change completely.
“She’s alive.”
“What?”
“The real Rebecca Ellis is alive.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because she found me six months ago.”
The timing hit Mercer immediately.
Six months.
The grave exhumation.
Dr. Reeves disappearing.
The investigation.
Everything had started moving at the same time.
“What did she tell you?”
I asked.
“She said Margaret had been lying to both of us our entire lives.”
“About what?”
“About why she took me.”
“What was the reason?”
Rebecca’s voice became almost inaudible.
“She didn’t take me because I looked like her daughter.”
My stomach tightened.
“Then why?”
“Because I knew her daughter.”
I stared at Mercer.
“What does that mean?”
Rebecca inhaled shakily.
“Before I disappeared, I had already met Rebecca Ellis.”
“But she would have been—”
“Eighteen.”
I stopped.
“That is impossible.”
“No.”
“The real Rebecca was born in 1990.”
“The birth certificate is fake.”
Mercer grabbed another file.
Rebecca continued.
“She was my age.”
“What?”
“Margaret created the dead child identity later.”
I could barely follow.
“Why?”
“To bury the real Rebecca.”
“Why would she need to bury her?”
“Because Rebecca had seen something.”
“What?”
“I don’t know everything.”
“Then tell me what you know.”
Rebecca went silent.
Then I heard something in the background.
A car door.
She gasped.
“Nathan.”
“What?”
“I have to go.”
“Where are you?”
“She found me.”
“Who?”
“Margaret.”
Mercer reached for another phone.
I stood.
“Rebecca, call 911.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because Margaret isn’t alone.”
I heard footsteps.
Then Rebecca whispered:
“Nathan, listen carefully.”
“I’m listening.”
“If anything happens to me, go to our house.”
Mercer shook his head violently.
I said:
“The police told me not to go home.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because I wrote the note.”
I froze.
“What note?”
“The one the officer gave you.”
My entire body went cold.
The trooper had handed me a business card.
But before that, during the stop, I remembered him folding something.
Something I had shoved into my jacket pocket without thinking when Rebecca called me back toward the car.
I reached into yesterday’s jacket hanging over my chair.
My fingers touched paper.
I pulled it out.
A folded note.
Mercer stared.
I opened it.
The handwriting was Rebecca’s.
NATHAN,
IF THE OFFICER CHECKS MY NAME AND REACTS, IT MEANS THEY ARE STILL LOOKING.
DO NOT TAKE ME HOME.
DO NOT LET MARGARET KNOW WHERE YOU ARE.
CHECK THE FLOOR UNDER YOUR WORKBENCH.
TRUST THE RED KEY.
I read the last line twice.
“Rebecca, what is the red key?”
She inhaled sharply.
“You found the note.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
“What key?”
“Nathan, go to the garage.”
“You just said Margaret might be there.”
“Not our garage.”
“Then whose?”
“Your father’s.”
My heart stopped.
“My father has been dead for four years.”
“I know.”
“What does he have to do with this?”
Rebecca whispered:
“More than you know.”
Footsteps grew louder on her end.
“Rebecca.”
“I have to go.”
“Don’t hang up.”
“I love you.”
“Rebecca!”
“And Nathan?”
“What?”
“Your father knew my real name before you ever met me.”
The call ended.
I stood frozen.
Mercer stared at me.
“What was your father’s name?”
“Samuel Brooks.”
His expression changed instantly.
“What?”
I asked.
Mercer walked toward an old filing cabinet.
He opened the bottom drawer.
Pulled out a box.
Then another.
Finally, he found a thin folder.
He placed it on the desk.
SAMUEL BROOKS.
My father’s name.
My hands went numb.
“Why do you have a file on my father?”
Mercer did not answer.
He opened it.
Inside was an old photograph.
My father stood outside a motel.
Beside him was Detective Daniel Voss.
And between them stood a teenage girl.
Emily Carter.
My wife.
The photograph was dated six weeks before Rebecca and I supposedly met for the first time.
I could barely speak.
“My father knew her.”
Mercer nodded.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Then he turned the photograph over.
There was handwriting on the back.
Samuel,
If anything happens to me, Nathan must never be told how Emily came into his life.
D.V.
I stared at the words.
My father had been dead four years.
Daniel Voss had been dead eleven.
And suddenly my thirteen-year marriage no longer felt like something that had happened naturally.
It felt arranged.
Mercer looked at me.
“Nathan, how did you meet your wife?”
“At a coffee shop.”
“Randomly?”
“I thought so.”
“What happened?”
“She spilled coffee on my laptop.”
Mercer stared at me.
“What?”
“That was how we started talking.”
He slowly sat down.
“Your father owned the building containing that coffee shop.”
My blood went cold.
“No.”
“He did.”
I looked at Emily’s photograph.
Then Dad’s.
Then the message on the back.
And for the first time, a thought entered my mind that frightened me more than discovering my wife had lied about her identity.
Maybe Rebecca had not accidentally entered my life.
Maybe someone had put her there.
My phone buzzed.
A text from Rebecca.
Only an address.
Mercer read it.
His face drained of color.
“You know this place?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
He looked at me.
“The address where Emily Carter was last seen fifteen years ago.”
Another message arrived.
Rebecca: Nathan, Margaret has the real Rebecca.
Then:
Rebecca: And she says your father helped her take us both.
I stared at the screen.
One final message appeared.
Rebecca: Please hurry.
Rebecca: Because I just found out why she chose you.
