Chapter 6 - Room W-17
“Roman...”
My father’s whisper stayed in my ear after the call went dead.
I stared at the black screen.
For three years, Thomas Whitlock had been dead.
For three years, I had grieved him.
Now he was somewhere behind a white hospital door while the man who may have ordered his murder walked freely beside him.
And my father had just warned me not to come.
Adrian grabbed the handle of the SUV door again.
Still locked.
“Move away from the glass.”
I slid toward the center.
He removed his jacket, wrapped it around his fist, and struck the corner of the window.
Once.
Twice.
The reinforced glass cracked.
On the third blow, it collapsed outward.
An alarm screamed.
Adrian climbed through first, then reached back for me.
“Come.”
I passed him the ledger.
Then I climbed out.
The underground garage was empty.
Too empty.
Our driver was slumped over the steering wheel.
Adrian checked his pulse.
“Alive.”
He pulled out his phone.
No signal.
“Jammer.”
My own phone had lost service too.
“Someone planned this.”
“They planned everything.”
He looked toward the garage exit.
“Stay close.”
I hated those words.
But this time I obeyed.
We moved behind concrete pillars until Adrian found a maintenance stairwell.
Halfway up, he stopped.
“What?”
He pointed.
A security camera above us was moving.
Following us.
Adrian stared directly into it.
Then raised the ledger.
“You want this?”
The camera stopped.
“They're watching.”
“Yes.”
“What do they want?”
“You.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“That is what we need to find out.”
He pulled the brass key from beneath his shirt.
W-17.
My father had given Adrian the key four days before the crash.
My father had known this moment might come.
“He knew,” I whispered.
Adrian looked at me.
“My father knew he might survive.”
“Or he knew where they would take him.”
“Then why give you the key?”
“Because he didn't trust anyone else to bring you to him.”
I stared at Adrian.
“But he just told me not to come.”
“That means something changed.”
We reached the street.
One of Adrian’s backup teams arrived less than five minutes later.
Nobody spoke while we drove.
Adrian issued orders from a secure phone.
Find Daniel.
Find Margaret.
Locate every hospital, clinic, warehouse, nursing facility, and private medical building connected to the code W-17.
Then he made one final request.
“Search Roman Voss.”
The man on the other end went quiet.
Adrian’s voice sharpened.
“All records. I don't care whether he's supposed to be dead.”
He ended the call.
I looked at him.
“What was Roman like?”
Adrian leaned back.
“I barely remember him.”
“But you met him.”
“Yes.”
“How old were you when he disappeared?”
“Seventeen.”
“What happened?”
Adrian watched the city through the window.
“My father and Roman built everything together.”
“The organization?”
“Yes.”
“Were they close?”
“Until they weren't.”
I waited.
“Roman wanted expansion. My father wanted control.”
“What does that mean?”
“Roman believed fear solved every problem.”
“And Viktor?”
“My father believed fear was useful only when people understood the rules.”
I looked at him.
“That isn't exactly comforting.”
“It wasn't meant to be.”
At least he didn't pretend his family was innocent.
“Why did they turn against each other?”
“Roman started operating without permission.”
“The second organization.”
Adrian nodded.
“He bribed police. Judges. Port officials. Anyone useful.”
“Then your father discovered it?”
“He discovered pieces.”
“What did Roman do?”
“He disappeared before Viktor could confront him.”
“And the burned car?”
“Found outside the city.”
“No body.”
“No.”
“Your father accepted that?”
“Eventually.”
“Why?”
“Because Roman's accounts stopped moving.”
I thought about the ledger.
“Maybe he created new ones.”
“That's what I think.”
Adrian’s phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
Then looked at me.
“We found W-17.”
My pulse jumped.
“Where?”
“A private rehabilitation facility forty miles north.”
“Who owns it?”
“Officially? A holding company.”
“And actually?”
“Someone named Elias Ward.”
The name meant nothing to me.
Adrian continued.
“Elias Ward was born eleven months after Roman Voss supposedly died.”
“Fake identity.”
“Likely.”
“Is my father there?”
“We don't know.”
“Then we're going.”
“No.”
I stared at him.
“No?”
“Not yet.”
“You don't get to decide that.”
“I get to decide whether we walk into an obvious trap without knowing what is waiting.”
“My father is waiting.”
“Your father told you not to come.”
“He was afraid.”
“Exactly.”
I leaned toward him.
“You promised him you would protect me.”
“Yes.”
“Then help me get him out.”
“I intend to.”
“When?”
“When doing it doesn't get both of you killed.”
I hated that he made sense.
I hated even more that he remained calm while everything inside me was collapsing.
The vehicle turned through iron gates.
We entered an estate surrounded by stone walls.
“This is your house?”
“One of them.”
Of course.
Inside, security moved immediately.
Phones.
Computers.
Maps.
Within minutes, Adrian’s dining room became a command center.
I sat at the end of a long table with the ledger open before me.
Page after page.
Codes.
Payments.
Initials.
Then I saw something.
W-17.
Not once.
Repeatedly.
I counted.
Seventeen entries.
Every year.
Same date.
My birthday.
“Adrian.”
He came over.
I showed him.
The first payment had been made when I was five.
The second when I was six.
Every year until my nineteenth birthday.
“What was my father paying for?”
Adrian examined the amounts.
They increased over time.
Ten thousand.
Fifteen.
Twenty.
Then fifty thousand.
“These aren't medical payments.”
“How do you know?”
“They're too regular.”
I followed the column.
Recipient:
MERCER FOUNDATION.
My blood went cold.
“Daniel.”
Adrian picked up the ledger.
“Not necessarily.”
“It says Mercer.”
“There could be another Mercer.”
“Daniel told me he was my father's attorney.”
“He was.”
“What aren't you saying?”
Adrian looked at me.
“Daniel had a daughter.”
I frowned.
“So?”
“She disappeared.”
“When?”
“Twenty years ago.”
I did the math.
Around the time the payments began.
“How old was she?”
“Six.”
My heart started beating faster.
“What was her name?”
Adrian hesitated.
“Claire.”
Clara.
Claire.
The similarity made my skin prickle.
“That doesn't mean anything.”
“No.”
But neither of us believed that completely.
A guard approached.
“Boss.”
He handed Adrian a tablet.
“We found footage from the clinic.”
My father appeared on screen.
Older.
Thinner.
Gray at the temples.
But alive.
I touched the image.
“Dad.”
The footage was timestamped that morning.
Two orderlies pushed him through a hallway in a wheelchair.
He looked weak.
But conscious.
Then the video changed.
A second camera.
My father was standing.
Walking.
Without assistance.
I stared.
“He isn't sick.”
“Maybe not physically.”
Another clip.
My father entering Room W-17 voluntarily.
No restraints.
No guards forcing him.
He opened the door himself.
“Why would he stay there?”
Adrian froze the frame.
“Look.”
My father was carrying something.
A photograph.
The image was blurry.
Adrian enhanced it.
Two little girls stood beside a lake.
One was me.
I recognized the yellow coat my father bought me when I was six.
The other girl was slightly older.
Dark hair.
Same smile.
I didn't recognize her.
“Who is that?”
Adrian said nothing.
A technician entered.
“We identified the second child.”
My heart started pounding.
“Who?”
He placed another photograph beside the first.
Daniel Mercer.
Much younger.
Holding the same dark-haired girl.
His daughter.
Claire.
I looked at Adrian.
“That photograph is impossible.”
“Why?”
“Daniel’s daughter disappeared before I was born.”
The technician shook his head.
“No.”
“What?”
“Public records were altered.”
He opened a file.
“Claire Mercer didn't disappear twenty years ago.”
A date appeared.
Twelve years ago.
I stared.
“I would have been twelve.”
“Yes.”
“Then why did Adrian think she disappeared earlier?”
“Because that's when Daniel reported her missing.”
I looked at the photograph again.
Two girls.
Claire and me.
Together.
Six years after Daniel claimed Claire had disappeared.
“Why would he lie?”
Adrian’s phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed.
“Where?”
A pause.
“Keep him alive.”
He ended the call.
“We found Daniel.”
I stood.
“And Margaret?”
“With him.”
“Where?”
“Three miles from the clinic.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Then we go.”
This time Adrian didn't argue.
The drive north took thirty-five minutes.
We stopped at an abandoned roadside motel.
Daniel sat inside one room under guard.
Margaret was in another.
The moment Daniel saw me, he stood.
“Clara.”
I placed the photograph on the table.
“Who is Claire?”
He went still.
“My daughter.”
“Why is she standing beside me?”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“Because Thomas found her.”
“Where?”
“With Roman.”
Adrian stepped forward.
Daniel looked exhausted.
“Roman took Claire to force me to cooperate. Thomas discovered she was alive years later.”
“The payments?”
“To keep her hidden after we got her away.”
“Where is she now?”
Daniel looked at me.
“I don't know.”
“Why did my father keep her photograph?”
“Because she saved his life.”
I stared.
“The crash?”
“No.”
“Then when?”
“After.”
My breathing stopped.
Daniel continued.
“Thomas wasn't kidnapped from the road.”
“What?”
“He disappeared willingly.”
“No.”
“He knew Roman would come after you if Roman believed Thomas was dead.”
“So he abandoned me?”
“He protected you.”
My anger exploded.
“Stop calling abandonment protection!”
Daniel flinched.
I stepped closer.
“He let me bury him.”
“He believed it was the only way.”
“For three years?”
“Roman had Claire again.”
Silence.
Daniel looked destroyed.
“Thomas offered himself in exchange.”
My anger disappeared.
“My father traded himself?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Claire knew where Roman kept the original evidence.”
Adrian stared at him.
“The ledger isn't the original?”
“No.”
“Then what is?”
Daniel looked toward me.
“A recording.”
“Of what?”
“Roman admitting everything.”
My pulse raced.
“Where?”
“Claire hid it.”
“Where is Claire?”
“I told you, I don't know.”
Adrian leaned closer.
“But Roman does.”
Daniel nodded.
“And Thomas stayed close to Roman because he was waiting for Claire to contact him.”
I thought about my father's call.
Don't come here.
Maybe he wasn't imprisoned.
Maybe he had been undercover inside Roman's world for three years.
And I had just exposed him by answering that phone.
A guard entered.
“Boss. Clinic security just changed shifts unexpectedly.”
Adrian looked at Daniel.
“Roman knows.”
Daniel stood.
“Then Thomas is out of time.”
We left immediately.
The private rehabilitation facility sat behind tall trees.
No sign.
No patients outside.
No ambulances.
Adrian’s men surrounded the property.
We entered through the service wing.
Empty.
Too empty.
Room after room.
Abandoned.
Machines still running.
Coffee still warm.
Everyone had left minutes earlier.
Then we reached the third floor.
A sign pointed toward WEST WING.
W-12.
W-14.
W-16.
My heart hammered.
W-17.
The brass key shook in my hand.
Adrian stood beside me.
“Clara.”
I looked at him.
“If anything feels wrong, we leave.”
“My father is behind that door.”
“We don't know that.”
“Yes.”
I could feel it.
I inserted the key.
It turned.
The door opened.
The hospital bed was empty.
Restraints hung from the sides.
Blood marked the white sheet.
“Dad?”
No answer.
Then I noticed a photograph taped to the wall.
The same photograph.
Claire and me.
Someone had written beneath it in fresh black ink.
ASK CLARA WHAT HAPPENED AT THE LAKE.
My head exploded with pain.
A memory surfaced.
Water.
Claire screaming.
A man dragging her toward a black car.
My father running.
And me hiding beneath a wooden dock.
I remembered Claire looking at me.
She had pressed something into my hand.
A tiny silver pendant.
I still had it.
I had always believed it belonged to my mother.
My fingers went automatically to the necklace beneath my dress.
Adrian saw.
“What is that?”
I pulled out the pendant.
Daniel appeared in the doorway behind us.
The moment he saw it, his face collapsed.
“Where did you get that?”
“Claire gave it to me.”
His eyes filled with tears.
“No.”
“What?”
“That wasn't Claire's.”
He stepped closer.
“It belonged to her mother.”
My hands began shaking.
A click sounded inside the pendant.
A hidden compartment opened.
Something tiny fell into my palm.
A memory card.
Adrian stared at it.
“The recording.”
Before anyone could move, every light in the hallway shut off.
A red emergency light appeared above W-17.
My phone vibrated.
One new message.
I opened it.
There was a live photograph of my father sitting in a chair.
Behind him stood a woman.
Her face was hidden.
But I recognized the pearls around her neck.
Margaret.
Then another photograph arrived.
This one showed Margaret from the front.
She wasn't being held prisoner.
She was smiling.
A final message appeared beneath the image.
YOUR STEPMOTHER WAS NEVER WORKING FOR ROMAN.
I read the next line.
My blood went cold.
SHE WAS WORKING FOR THOMAS.
Then footsteps stopped outside Room W-17.
The handle slowly turned.
May you like
And my father's voice came from the other side.
“Clara, don't let Adrian see what's on that card.”
