Chapter 4 - THE MAN EVERYONE BLAMED
Daniel Mercer was alive.
Barely.
The body firefighters carried from the warehouse had suffered smoke inhalation and severe burns, but when Natalie reached Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Daniel was already in surgery.
Police wanted answers.
So did Natalie.
Detective Lena Ortiz interviewed her for ninety minutes.
By sunrise, local news had photographs of Natalie entering Elliot's SUV.
By eight, headlines were calling her Elliot Vale's “mystery woman.”
By nine, someone leaked the old photograph of Rebecca and Arthur.
The internet constructed its own story.
Rebecca Reeves had been Arthur Vale's secret lover.
Natalie was supposedly Arthur's illegitimate daughter.
Elliot and Natalie were supposedly siblings.
Natalie nearly threw her phone through a window.
“This is insane.”
Elliot took the phone from her.
“Stop reading it.”
“People think we're related.”
“We aren't.”
“How do you know?”
Elliot stared.
Natalie stared back.
“Oh God.”
That afternoon, they ordered DNA tests.
The forty-eight-hour wait was unbearable.
Elliot moved Natalie into a secure guest suite because whoever had started the warehouse fire knew she was involved.
She resisted.
Then someone broke into her apartment.
Nothing valuable disappeared.
Only one thing.
Her mother's silver drafting pencil.
Natalie stopped arguing.
The first night at Elliot's Gold Coast residence was awkward.
He gave her an entire floor.
She found him at two in the morning in the kitchen, eating cereal from a coffee mug.
“You own seventeen hotels.”
“Twenty-three.”
“And no bowls?”
“There are bowls.”
“Then explain that.”
“I prefer the mug.”
It was the first ridiculous thing she had learned about him.
She laughed.
He looked offended.
Then he laughed too.
For several minutes they were simply two exhausted people standing barefoot in a kitchen while the world outside tried to turn them into a scandal.
Natalie discovered Elliot hated olives, loved old jazz records, and couldn't cook anything more complicated than eggs.
Elliot discovered Natalie talked to herself while working and alphabetized spices without realizing it.
The monster Chicago whispered about seemed surprisingly human at two in the morning.
But daylight brought reality back.
Daniel regained consciousness.
Natalie went alone to his hospital room.
His face was bruised.
“I'm sorry,” he whispered.
“For what?”
“For recruiting you.”
She stared.
“You knew who I was.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Your mother asked me to watch over you.”
“Before she died?”
Daniel nodded.
Natalie's anger arrived hard.
“You could have told me.”
“She made me promise.”
“Everyone keeps protecting me with lies.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“That's what your mother used to say.”
Natalie fought tears.
“Who started the fire?”
“I don't know.”
“Who runs Crescent Harbor?”
Daniel looked frightened.
“Arthur believed it was his brother.”
Natalie frowned.
“Arthur Vale had a brother?”
“Half brother. Thomas Vale.”
Elliot had never mentioned him.
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
“When?”
“Twenty-seven years ago.”
Daniel looked toward the door.
“At least that's what everyone believes.”
Before Natalie could ask more, alarms sounded from his monitors.
Nurses rushed in.
She was pushed outside.
Daniel survived.
But he could no longer speak.
That evening the DNA results arrived.
Natalie opened them with Elliot beside her.
Probability of sibling relationship:
0.02%.
They weren't related.
Natalie laughed from sheer relief.
Elliot didn't.
“What?”
“You're relieved.”
“Obviously.”
His eyes remained on hers.
“Why obviously?”
Natalie suddenly understood.
The room changed.
Something that had existed quietly between them since the subway finally had nowhere to hide.
“Elliot.”
He stepped closer.
“Tell me to stop.”
She should have.
Instead Natalie whispered, “Your tie is crooked again.”
He looked down.
“It isn't.”
“I know.”
He smiled.
Then kissed her.
Slowly.
Carefully.
Nothing about Elliot's public reputation existed in that kiss.
No power.
No intimidation.
Only restraint.
He pulled away first.
“That's probably a terrible idea.”
“Definitely.”
“Good.”
He kissed her again.
Marcus interrupted thirty seconds later.
“I've developed a professional objection to entering rooms lately.”
Natalie stepped away, embarrassed.
Elliot looked considerably less embarrassed.
“What happened?”
Marcus handed him a folder.
“We identified Thomas Vale.”
Inside was an obituary.
Thomas Vale had supposedly died in a boating accident in 1999.
No body had ever been recovered.
Then Marcus produced another photograph.
Security footage from the hospital.
A gray-haired man stood outside Daniel's room.
Natalie recognized him immediately.
She had seen him before.
At Mercer & Rowe.
Several times.
He called himself Theodore Vance, a quiet investor who sat on the firm's advisory board.
Elliot stared.
“My uncle.”
“He's been alive all this time,” Marcus said.
Natalie suddenly remembered something else.
“Theodore recommended me for the Vale Harbor project.”
Silence.
Elliot's expression hardened.
“He didn't discover you.”
Natalie understood.
“He positioned me.”
The crooked tie.
The project.
The photographs.
None of it had been random.
Someone had spent years moving Natalie closer to Elliot.
The question was why.
Marcus opened another file.
“We found something else.”
Bank records.
Crescent Harbor Trust still existed.
Its controlling beneficiary had changed only once in thirty years.
Natalie read the current name.
Her heart stopped.
Natalie Elaine Reeves.
She looked up.
“I've never seen this account.”
May you like
Marcus nodded.
“There's $184 million in it.”
