Chapter 11 - The Safe in Room 614
Room 614 no longer existed.
Saint Matthew's had remodeled the administrative floor the year after Emma's birth. Walls moved. Offices changed. The old room numbers disappeared.
But building plans did not.
With a warrant, Detective Moreno and a hospital facilities manager located the former Room 614 behind what was now a records storage suite.
The floor safe was still there.
Nobody had bothered to remove it.
Grace and Jenna waited at the police station while the search was conducted. Alexander paced so much that Dana finally told him to sit down or pay rent for the carpet.
At 2:16 p.m., Moreno called.
"We found documents."
"What kind?" Grace asked.
"Enough that I don't want to discuss them on the phone."
They met at the station an hour later.
On the table were photocopies from the safe.
Payments from a Reed family holding company to a private transport service.
Emails between Harold Vane and an unnamed outside attorney.
A handwritten timeline of Jenna's delivery.
And a sealed envelope labeled LUCAS.
Jenna stared at it until Moreno slid it toward her.
"This is a copy. The original is evidence."
Inside was a letter written in Lucas Reed's handwriting.
Jenna recognized it immediately.
Grace watched her lips move as she read.
The letter said Lucas feared his father had discovered plans to leave the family business. He had placed money in a separate account for Jenna and the baby. If anything happened to him, Harold Vane was to make sure Jenna received the account information.
The last line made Jenna stop.
"Read it," she whispered.
Alexander did.
"If my father says I abandoned Jenna, he is lying."
Jenna bent forward and sobbed.
Grace sat beside her.
For three years, Jenna had believed the man she loved walked away.
Now she had proof that at least part of that story was false.
Moreno placed another page on the table.
"We traced Lucas's passport. He never left the United States."
Jenna looked up.
"Then where did he go?"
"His last confirmed transaction was at a gas station forty miles north of the city, two days before Emma was born. After that, nothing."
Alexander's phone rang.
It was the head of security.
He answered, listened, and stood.
"What?"
Grace felt dread before he said another word.
"Bright Hope House has been broken into."
Grace was already moving.
"Emma isn't there."
"No," Alexander said.
May you like
His face had gone pale.
"But Miss Anna is."
