Chapter 13 - The Fourth Page
Grant Mercer was charged with multiple offenses before sunrise.
Kidnapping.
Child endangerment.
Fraud-related charges.
Witness intimidation.
Additional counts remained under review.
But he refused to discuss Julia Bennett.
Wade did the same.
The ledger became central.
The fourth marked page was missing.
Grant claimed it never existed.
Maya knew otherwise.
She had seen Julia’s blue star.
The recovered ledger contained a torn edge where one page had been removed.
Someone had taken it before Grant obtained the notebook at the library.
That meant the missing page had disappeared years earlier.
Possibly Julia.
Possibly Rebecca.
Daniel went back to the blue lockbox.
He and Ruiz searched everything again.
Receipts.
Photographs.
Volunteer badges.
Old cards.
Nothing.
Then Ethan picked up Rebecca’s anniversary photograph.
“Dad.”
“What?”
“Why is this thicker?”
Daniel looked.
The photograph had been mounted onto heavy cardstock.
He had handled it dozens of times.
Never questioned it.
Ruiz carefully separated the backing.
A folded sheet of paper was hidden inside.
Blue star in the corner.
The fourth ledger page.
Daniel stared.
Rebecca had possessed it for four years.
The page did not list money.
It listed locations.
Six addresses.
Five corresponded to damaged commercial properties.
One did not.
1389 Meadow Creek Road.
A rural house forty miles away.
Beside the address, Julia had written.
SAFE COPY.
R. KNOWS.
Rebecca knows.
Police obtained a warrant.
The property belonged to a shell company tied to North Crest.
Officers entered that afternoon.
The house had been empty for years.
Dust covered the floors.
Cabinets were bare.
The basement contained old filing boxes.
Most were empty.
But behind a loose wall panel they discovered copies of financial records.
Invoices.
Insurance documents.
Bank transfers.
Enough to reconstruct much of Grant’s network.
They found something else.
A woman’s coat.
Julia’s.
Maya identified it from photographs.
In the pocket was a pharmacy receipt dated seven months earlier.
The day Julia supposedly left.
There were no signs of violence.
No remains.
No clear explanation.
But investigators found tire tracks preserved beneath a collapsed section of a detached garage.
A vehicle had been stored there recently.
Registration records led to an old green Subaru once owned by Julia.
The Subaru had been sold for scrap six months earlier.
The scrapyard had records.
Grant sold it.
Ruiz confronted him.
He asked for his lawyer.
Again.
Then Wade changed everything.
Facing decades of exposure through the fraud investigation and kidnapping conspiracy, Wade requested a deal.
He offered information about Julia.
Daniel was not allowed in the interview.
Maya was certainly not.
Hours passed.
At 6:18 p.m., Ruiz came to Daniel’s house.
Her expression made him stand before she said a word.
“Is she alive?”
Ruiz nodded.
Daniel closed his eyes.
For the first time, the answer was good.
“Yes.”
“Maya!”
Ethan ran upstairs.
Daniel stopped him.
“Wait.”
Ruiz had not finished.
“Where is she?”
Ruiz sat down.
“Seven months ago, Julia tried to leave.”
“Grant intercepted her.”
Daniel’s relief vanished.
“He didn’t kill her.”
“But he convinced her the children would be safer if she disappeared.”
“How?”
“He threatened to frame her for the fraud.”
“He had accounts in her name.”
“Documents with her signature.”
“Evidence deliberately created to make her look involved.”
“Julia believed she could be arrested.”
“And if she was arrested?”
“Grant would keep the children.”
Daniel understood.
“So she ran.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Wade drove her to a bus station two states away.”
“She used cash.”
“No phone.”
“No bank cards.”
“Nothing Grant could trace.”
“Why would Wade help her?”
“He claims he thought getting Julia away would calm Grant down.”
“Do you believe him?”
“Partly.”
Ruiz continued.
“Julia believed Rebecca was still alive.”
Daniel felt the tragedy of that.
“She didn’t know?”
“Apparently not.”
“She spent years isolated.”
“Grant controlled what she saw.”
“She expected Maya’s twelfth-birthday instructions would eventually lead her to Rebecca.”
“So she left believing Rebecca would protect them?”
“Yes.”
Daniel sat slowly.
Julia had walked away from her children not because she did not love them.
But because Grant had convinced her leaving was the only way to protect them.
“Can you find her?”
“We have a lead.”
“What?”
May you like
“Wade remembered the city on the bus ticket.”
“Savannah.”
