Chapter 7 - The Brother Who Didn't Exist
I had no brother. My whole life I had been an only child. My mother said the same thing every time a stranger asked, and my father had never corrected her.
Jo shut the recorder off. "Mara?"
"Play it again."
The second time hurt worse. My father sounded exhausted, but there was no mistaking the words.
The packet held a hospital intake form for a boy named Mateo Reyes, age four, admitted on the night of the Bellwether fire. Next to his name: TRANSFERRED. No destination. No discharge signature.
"If he's alive—" I began.
"We don't know," Adrian said gently.
I hated his gentleness. "Don't manage me."
"I'm not."
My phone rang. My mother. I answered so fast I nearly dropped it.
"Mara," she whispered, "don't say where you are."
"Where are you?"
"Somewhere safe for now. I'm sorry about Mateo."
My throat closed. "You knew?"
"He wasn't your brother by blood. After the fire, we were going to adopt him. Your father hid him when he realized someone was taking children out of the program. We told you he was your cousin visiting from out of town. You were seven. You forgot after the accident."
I remembered a small boy chasing me through a hallway, yelling that I was cheating at hide-and-seek. I had always thought it was a dream.
"Who took him?" I asked.
"I never found out. Daniel tried. Then they accused him of theft."
A vehicle rolled slowly past the terminal windows.
"Mom, listen. Where can I get you?"
"Not yet. The ledger is what they want. Don't trade it for me. Don't give it to Adrian either."
Adrian heard his name and went still.
"Why not?"
"Because his father was on the original board, Mara. His father signed the first order."
The line went dead.
May you like
Adrian stared at me. "What did she say?"
Outside, the slow-moving vehicle stopped. A man stepped out and knocked three times on the terminal glass. Then he held up a photograph of a grown man who had my father's eyes.
