Chapter 14 - My Brother's Vote

"Daniel."

He wouldn't look at me.

Vanessa smiled like she'd already won.

The secretary recorded his vote.

One more would give Vanessa the majority.

Then Daniel stood.

"Before my vote is counted, I need to disclose a conflict."

Vanessa's smile faded.

He placed a flash drive on the table.

"For the last three months, I've been pretending to cooperate with Vanessa."

The room erupted.

Daniel continued over the noise.

"She contacted me after Claire returned. She wanted access to internal archives. I gave her limited access while copying everything she touched."

Vanessa stood. "He's lying."

"Sit down," Daniel said.

He plugged the drive into the conference system.

Emails filled the screen.

Vanessa ordering deletion of security backups.

Vanessa instructing Luis to move Claire between safe locations.

Vanessa discussing Sophie's "behavior problem" and writing, Make the child afraid to repeat what she sees.

I couldn't look away from that sentence.

Claire covered her mouth.

The board members began whispering.

Vanessa's attorney leaned toward her.

She ignored him.

"Digital records can be fabricated," she said.

Daniel nodded. "True. That's why I brought the original server logs and notarized forensic images."

Marcus almost smiled.

The board chairman called for a recess.

Vanessa grabbed her bag.

Two detectives entered the room.

"Vanessa Mercer? We need to ask you some questions regarding the abduction of Sophie Mercer and Claire Mercer."

For one beautiful second, I thought it was over.

Then the fire alarm went off.

Sprinklers exploded from the ceiling.

People shouted and ran.

Smoke rolled from the hallway.

In the confusion, Vanessa disappeared.

Claire grabbed my arm.

"Ethan."

She pointed toward the table.

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Daniel's vote hurt because for one second it felt like childhood again: our father choosing sides, one brother rewarded, the other left guessing what rule he'd broken. Then I saw Daniel's hand tremble under the table. He wasn't betraying me. He was buying three more seconds for something I couldn't yet see.

The flash drive was gone.