Chapter 5 - THE NAME ON THE TRUST
The DNA test took forty-eight hours.
Those forty-eight hours felt like years.
Elliot barely slept.
Maddie refused to leave Emma's side.
Maria Alvarez, a temporary caregiver Marla had found through the firm's emergency network, stayed with them during the day.
But Maddie trusted almost nobody.
She trusted Elliot a little.
She trusted Marla.
And she trusted Maria because Maria never tried to separate her from Emma.
On the second evening, Elliot found Maddie sitting beside the window.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Want to talk?”
“No.”
“Fair.”
He sat beside her anyway.
After a minute, Maddie whispered, “If Emma is my sister, why did everyone lie?”
Elliot looked at her.
“I don't know.”
“Adults always say they don't know.”
“I know.”
“Then they usually do.”
Elliot smiled faintly.
“You're probably right.”
Maddie looked at him.
“Do you have kids?”
The question struck deeper than she could know.
“No.”
“Did you want them?”
Elliot looked toward Emma.
“I did.”
“What happened?”
“My wife died.”
Maddie went quiet.
“I'm sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“Did she have a baby?”
Elliot swallowed.
“We thought she did.”
Maddie frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“It means…”
He struggled to explain something he had spent years avoiding.
“She was pregnant when she died.”
Maddie looked at Emma.
Then back at him.
“Maybe your baby didn't die either.”
Elliot stared at her.
The simplicity of the statement broke something open inside him.
Maybe.
The next morning, the DNA results arrived.
Elliot opened the envelope.
He read the first page.
Then the second.
He had to sit down.
The probability of maternity was greater than 99.99 percent.
Rachel Brooks was Emma's biological mother.
Then came the paternal result.
Elliot Whitaker.
Probability of paternity: 99.9999 percent.
Elliot closed his eyes.
For four years, he had believed his family had ended on a wet October road.
Now a ten-month-old baby was sleeping upstairs.
His daughter.
His and Rachel's daughter.
He walked into the nursery.
Emma was awake.
Maddie was feeding her.
Elliot stood in the doorway.
“Maddie.”
She looked up.
“What?”
“She's mine.”
Maddie stared.
“What?”
“The DNA test.”
He knelt.
“Emma is my daughter.”
Maddie's eyes filled with tears.
“Then you're her daddy?”
Elliot nodded.
“Yes.”
Maddie looked down at Emma.
Then back at him.
“Does that mean you're going to take her?”
“No.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
“What about me?”
Elliot's voice softened.
“I'm not leaving you either.”
Maddie stared at him for a long moment.
Then she did something she had never done.
She walked over and hugged him.
Elliot froze.
Then slowly wrapped his arms around her.
She was so small.
Too small to have carried the weight she had been carrying.
“I'm sorry,” she whispered.
“For what?”
“For asking for a job.”
Elliot closed his eyes.
“You never needed to work.”
“But we needed food.”
“You should have been asking adults to protect you.”
“I did.”
His eyes opened.
“What?”
Maddie pulled back.
“I asked Tracy.”
Elliot's face hardened.
“What did she say?”
“She said if I told anyone, they'd take Emma away.”
That afternoon, Marcus arrived with new evidence.
The anonymous million-dollar donation to Northbridge had been connected to a trust.
A trust established by Nathan Whitaker.
The beneficiary was listed as:
EMMA RACHEL WHITAKER.
Elliot stared at the name.
“Why would Nathan establish a trust for my daughter?”
Marcus placed another document on the table.
“Because Nathan knew she existed.”
Elliot looked up.
“When?”
“Before she was born.”
Marcus handed him a second document.
Nathan had written a letter.
Elliot read it silently.
I FOUND OUT WHAT THEY ARE DOING WITH THE MONEY.
RACHEL KNOWS.
THE BABY IS THE ONLY WAY TO KEEP THEM FROM TAKING EVERYTHING.
IF THEY THINK THE BABY DIED, THEY WILL STOP LOOKING.
IF THEY EVER FIND HER, PROTECT HER.
Elliot's hands began shaking.
“Who are they?”
Marcus hesitated.
“We found a company.”
“What company?”
“Whitaker Capital Partners.”
Elliot stared.
“That was my family's original investment firm.”
“Your father created it.”
“My father died before Nathan.”
“Yes.”
“Who runs it now?”
Marcus placed one final document on the table.
“Miriam Whitaker.”
Elliot went completely still.
His aunt.
The woman who had helped raise him after his father's death.
The woman who had always told him Nathan was reckless.
The woman who had attended his wedding.
The woman who had cried at Rachel's funeral.
Elliot whispered, “Miriam?”
Marcus nodded.
“She controls the trust assets.”
“Why?”
“Because Nathan's trust becomes active only if Emma is alive.”
Elliot looked at the documents.
“How much money?”
Marcus took a breath.
“Forty-eight million dollars.”
Silence.
“And if Emma is legally dead?”
“The money remains under Miriam's control.”
Elliot stood.
“So someone made sure my daughter was declared dead.”
“Yes.”
“And someone kept Maddie afraid.”
“Yes.”
“And someone put cameras in their apartment.”
“Yes.”
Elliot's voice became cold.
“Then we stop looking at this as a child custody case.”
Marcus nodded.
“What is it?”
Elliot looked toward the nursery.
“A murder.”
That night, the phone rang.
Maddie answered before Elliot could reach it.
A woman's voice came through.
“Maddie?”
Maddie's face drained of color.
“Tracy?”
The voice laughed softly.
“You shouldn't have trusted him.”
Elliot grabbed the phone.
“Who is this?”
Silence.
Then the voice said:
“Ask your daughter what happened the night Rachel died.”
The line went dead.
Elliot looked at Maddie.
“What did she mean?”
Maddie began crying.
“She knows.”
“Knows what?”
Maddie shook her head.
May you like
Then she whispered:
“Mom didn't die in the car.”
