Chapter 4 - THE MAN ON THE CAMERA
By sunrise, Luke had reviewed every camera.
Emma appeared in the hallway at 1:43 a.m.
At 1:44, the feed went black.
It returned thirty-four minutes later.
Emma was gone.
My bedroom camera showed me sleeping until 2:20.
Then the image distorted.
A figure appeared beside my bed.
Tall.
Male.
Motionless.
Then darkness.
Luke froze the frame.
“Enhance it.”
The image sharpened enough to show the outline of a face.
Emma entered the security room behind us.
She saw the screen.
And stopped breathing.
“That’s my father.”
Luke turned.
“You said your father was dead.”
“He is.”
“When?”
“Sixteen years ago.”
I stared at the figure.
“Then someone wants us to believe he isn’t.”
That afternoon Emma sat across from my desk.
“Start from the beginning.”
“My father’s name was Thomas Carter. He worked in private security.”
“For people like me?”
“Yes.”
“How did he die?”
“He disappeared when I was eleven. My mother told me he was dead.”
Emma removed an old photograph.
Thomas stood beside a black sedan.
Behind him was my estate.
I looked up sharply.
“Where did you get this?”
“My mother.”
“When?”
“Three days before I started here.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
Emma hesitated.
“She told me that if I ever wanted to understand what happened to Dad, I had to get inside Danny Mercer’s house.”
Luke went still.
“So this job was never random.”
“No.”
I stared at her.
“You lied.”
“I needed the money too.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
Emma met my eyes.
“I came because my mother said my father spent the last year before he disappeared terrified of you.”
Something cold moved through me.
“I never knew Thomas Carter.”
Emma looked toward Luke.
Then back at me.
“My mother said you wouldn’t remember.”
The room went silent.
Luke suddenly walked toward the door.
“Where are you going?”
“To check something.”
Emma watched him leave.
When the door closed, she leaned toward me.
“There’s one more thing.”
“What?”
Her voice dropped.
“My mother warned me never to trust Luke Mercer.”
Luke wasn’t actually my brother.
But fourteen years earlier, I had given him my name.
And in my world, that meant more.
May you like
For the first time in fourteen years…
I wondered if I had made a mistake.
