Chapter 10 - The Child Nobody Ever MentionedRebecca couldn't speak.
Rachel sat beside Eleanor.
“Claire was pregnant?”
Eleanor nodded.
“How far?”
“About twelve weeks.”
Rebecca looked toward the old photograph.
Daniel.
Twenty-one.
Claire.
Seventeen.
“Did Daniel know?”
“Yes.”
“What did he want to do?”
“Marry her.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
Of course Arthur exploded.
“He was twenty-one.”
“And Claire was seventeen.”
“Almost eighteen.”
“That doesn't make it better.”
“No.”
Eleanor wiped her face.
“Arthur wanted Daniel to end everything.”
“Did Claire want the baby?”
“Yes.”
“And Daniel?”
“Yes.”
Rebecca felt sick.
“What happened the night he died?”
Daniel argued with Arthur.
Arthur threatened to remove him from the company and trust.
Daniel left.
Claire met him at the river house.
The storm arrived.
The boat overturned.
Daniel drowned.
“What happened to the baby?”
Eleanor stared at her hands.
“Claire lost it.”
Rebecca's chest tightened.
“When?”
“Two weeks later.”
“Is that what she told you?”
Eleanor looked up.
Rebecca saw the answer before she heard it.
“No.”
“What actually happened?”
“I don't know.”
“Mom.”
“She disappeared.”
“Then how do you know she lost it?”
“Her mother told us.”
Rachel looked toward Rebecca.
“That could have been false.”
A terrible possibility emerged.
If Claire's child survived—
Daniel had a child.
Rebecca had a niece or nephew.
Arthur had another grandchild.
“Did Dad believe the baby died?”
“At first.”
“And later?”
“I don't know.”
Rebecca was tired of that phrase.
They searched Arthur's papers.
The hidden envelopes Claire took might have contained proof.
But Rachel found another clue in estate disbursements.
For seventeen years after Daniel's death, Arthur sent quarterly payments to a private educational trust.
Beneficiary name sealed.
The payments stopped seven years earlier.
Rebecca did the math.
“If the baby survived…”
Rachel nodded.
“The child would be twenty-seven now.”
Brooke had been standing near the doorway.
She suddenly sat down.
Rebecca noticed.
“What?”
Brooke looked ill.
“Nothing.”
“What?”
Brooke shook her head.
Then Rebecca saw fear.
“Brooke.”
The younger woman started crying.
“I didn't know.”
“Know what?”
“My mother.”
Everyone stared.
“What about her?”
“Her name is Claire.”
Silence.
Rebecca felt the room tilt.
“No.”
Brooke shook her head violently.
“No, no. My mom's last name is Reynolds.”
“Maiden name?”
Brooke covered her mouth.
“Caldwell.”
Rebecca stopped breathing.
Graham's sister Claire was Brooke's mother.
Graham had been sleeping with—
Rebecca couldn't complete the thought.
Brooke saw it.
“Oh my God.”
Rachel immediately stepped forward.
“Don't assume.”
Brooke's breathing became frantic.
“He's my uncle?”
“We don't know.”
“He said my mother was his cousin.”
Rebecca stared.
“He told you he knew her?”
“When we first…”
Brooke couldn't say affair now.
“He said our families were distantly related.”
Rachel looked horrified.
“Did he know Claire was your mother?”
“Yes.”
The room went silent.
Brooke stood.
“He knew.”
Rebecca felt disgust rise.
“But if Daniel was your father…”
Brooke turned toward her.
They stared at each other.
Brooke was twenty-seven.
The exact age.
Brown eyes.
Daniel had brown eyes.
The shape of her smile—
Rebecca suddenly saw something she hadn't noticed because she had never been looking.
Daniel.
Not strongly.
But enough.
Brooke whispered:
“You could be my aunt.”
Rebecca's heart pounded.
Eleanor started crying uncontrollably.
Brooke looked at her.
“You knew?”
“No.”
“You knew Claire was pregnant.”
“I thought the baby died.”
Brooke backed away.
“Graham knew who I was.”
Rebecca felt the horror deepen.
If Graham knew Brooke might be Daniel's daughter, why start an affair with her?
Then she remembered something.
Graham was Claire's younger brother.
If Brooke were Claire and Daniel's child—
Graham was her biological uncle.
Brooke ran toward the bathroom and vomited.
Rebecca followed.
Brooke sat on the floor afterward, shaking.
“He knew.”
Rebecca crouched nearby.
“We don't know whether you're Daniel's daughter.”
“He knew enough to lie.”
“Yes.”
Brooke looked at her.
“Why?”
That was the question.
Why would Graham pursue his own niece?
Unless—
Rebecca stopped.
The affair had begun seven months earlier.
Around the same time Graham began aggressively searching Arthur's files.
Maybe the affair wasn't originally about attraction.
Maybe Brooke herself was access.
A key.
A beneficiary.
A person Graham needed close.
Rebecca stood.
“What if your father matters to the reserve account?”
Brooke stared.
“What?”
Arthur created the account after Daniel's death.
If Daniel had a surviving child, Arthur might have created it for them.
Thirty-one million dollars.
Brooke's face changed.
“No.”
Rachel was already checking.
The sealed beneficiary.
The hidden authorization.
Arthur's watch.
Rebecca's pendant.
Maybe neither belonged to Graham.
Maybe the reserve account was built to protect Daniel's child.
Detective Bell entered quickly.
“We found Claire.”
Everyone stood.
“Where?”
“She called us.”
Rebecca's pulse accelerated.
“What did she say?”
Bell looked at Brooke.
“She wants to speak with her daughter.”
Brooke froze.
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Then he added:
“She says Graham has been lying to Brooke about who her father is her entire life.”
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