Chapter 4: The Brother I Never Knew
“No,” I said.
“My father never told me I had a brother.””
Daniel Mercer lowered his eyes to the photograph.
The man standing beside my father looked about fifty, with dark hair graying at the temples and a crooked smile that seemed painfully familiar. He had Dad’s eyes. Not the color, exactly, but the way they narrowed when he was trying to understand something difficult.
I turned the photograph over.
On the back, my father had written a name.
*Samuel James Braddock.*
Beneath it was a date from seven years earlier.
“Who is he?”” I asked.
Daniel folded his hands on the desk.
“Your half-brother. Your father had a son before he married your mother.””
Marjorie rose so abruptly that her chair struck the wall.
“This is ridiculous.””
Daniel glanced at her.
“Please sit down, Mrs. Braddock.””
“No. I will not sit here while you rewrite Raymond's history for the benefit of a daughter who abandoned him.””
“I didn't abandon him,” I said.
Marjorie swung toward me.
“You walked out of his house.””
“I was eighteen.””
“Old enough to know right from wrong.””
“Old enough to know when nobody wanted me there.””
“Enough,” Scott snapped.
He was no longer pretending to be sympathetic. His hands were flat on the table, and his face had turned a blotchy red.
“Daniel, what does this man have to do with the will?””
“Quite a lot, as it happens.””
Daniel removed a second document from the cream-colored envelope.
“Samuel's mother was a young woman named Catherine Hale. She and your father were involved briefly before Raymond met Elaine. Catherine placed the child for adoption. Raymond was led to believe the baby had died shortly after birth.””
“Was that true?”” I asked.
“No. Your father discovered the truth much later.””
Marjorie gave a short, disbelieving laugh.
“Raymond was nearly fifty when this supposed son appeared. A complete stranger walked into his life, claimed to be his child, and expected money. Your father was lonely. That's all there was to it.””
Daniel's expression hardened.
“Samuel provided documentation from the adoption agency and submitted to a DNA test. There was no ambiguity about his identity.””
Scott pushed his chair backward.
“Dad never mentioned a DNA test.””
“Perhaps he didn't think it was your business.””
“My business?”” Scott's voice rose.
“I worked beside him for twenty years.””
“And Samuel was his son.””
“He was a stranger!””
“So was I, apparently,” I said.
Scott looked at me.
“What?””
“You've known me for thirty-four years, and yesterday you told me I wasn't family. Now you're shouting because another son exists.””
He opened his mouth.
No words came out.
For the first time that morning, I saw something other than contempt in his expression. It wasn't guilt exactly. It was the look of someone realizing that a locked door had been opened from the other side.
Daniel continued.
“Your father and Samuel developed a relationship over several years. Samuel visited Hendersonville. He and Raymond exchanged letters. They met privately, including at the storage facility on Asheville Highway.””
I remembered Martin saying Dad had visited three weeks earlier.
“Did Sam know about the piano?”” I asked.
“Yes. He helped your father arrange for its storage.””
I leaned forward.
“Then why didn't my father simply give it back to me?””
Daniel looked at Marjorie before answering.
“Because your father was afraid of what would happen if she found out.””
Marjorie slapped the table.
“That is a lie!””
Daniel didn't flinch.
“Raymond told me himself that he believed certain family members were being prevented from communicating with one another. He asked me to investigate some financial irregularities at Braddock Supply. During that investigation, I found evidence that correspondence addressed to you had been intercepted.””
My heart began beating harder.
“Did you find my letters?””
“I found references to them in your father's private records.””
“Who intercepted them?””
Daniel paused.
“I have not yet established every detail.””
Marjorie stood again.
“This meeting is over.””
“No,” Daniel replied.
“It isn't.””
“You cannot accuse me of stealing correspondence without evidence.””
“I haven't accused you of anything.””
“You just said—”
“I said your husband suspected his correspondence had been intercepted. I am telling you what he documented. Those are different statements.””
Marjorie's hands trembled as she gathered her purse.
“Raymond was ill. He forgot conversations. He misread documents.
Sometimes he didn't recognize the neighbors. You all want to believe every paranoid thought he ever had because it suits your own interests.””
I looked at her.
“Was he ill when he wrote my name on those envelopes?””
She froze.
“Was he ill when he kept my letters in a storage unit?”” I continued.
“Was he ill when he wrote that he hadn't heard me say I didn't want him in my life?””
Marjorie stared at me.
The silence answered something she refused to say.
Scott seized the photograph from the table.
“Give me that.””
Daniel rose.
“Put it down.””
“It's a picture of my father.””
“And it belongs to his estate.””
Scott's fingers whitened around the edges.
For a moment, I thought he would tear it in half.
Instead, he dropped it onto the table.
“Samuel was trouble from the beginning,” he muttered.
I looked at him sharply.
“You knew him.””
Scott's gaze flicked toward his mother.
“I met him once.””
“When?””
“Years ago.””
“Where?””
“Why does it matter?””
“Because you looked at that photograph like you'd seen a ghost.””
“Stop interrogating me.””
“Then stop answering questions I didn't ask.””
He stepped toward me.
“You think that uniform gives you the right to come in here and act like you own the place?””
“No. I think being his daughter gives me the right to ask what happened to my family.””
Daniel struck the table with the flat of his hand.
“That will be enough.””
The room fell silent.
He picked up the letter.
“Your father left instructions that I read this only after confirming that Quinn had received the brass key. Since that condition has been met, I will now read the letter in full.””
Marjorie sank slowly into her chair.
Daniel unfolded the paper.
“Quinnie, if Daniel is reading this to you, then I have run out of time. There are things I should have told you years ago. I cannot repair the years I lost with you, but I can tell you the truth.””
My vision blurred.
Daniel continued.
“When I learned Samuel was alive, I thought I had been given a second chance. I told myself I would not make the same mistakes twice. I would protect both my children. I would tell the truth before another person I loved disappeared from my life.””
He stopped for a moment.
Then he read the next paragraph.
“I failed at that, too.””
A sob caught in my throat.
“Samuel helped me examine the accounts at the business after my stroke. He found transactions I could not explain. Land had been transferred without my permission.
Company money had been moved through accounts I had never authorized. When I questioned Scott, he told me I was confused.””
Scott stared at the floor.
“I wanted to believe him,” Daniel read.
“He was the boy who had lived in my house. He called me Dad. I mistook familiarity for honesty, just as I once mistook silence for peace.””
Marjorie covered her mouth.
The letter continued.
“Samuel told me I had to speak to Quinn. He said I owed her the truth. He was right.
But every time I reached for the telephone, I remembered the letters I had received in which Quinn supposedly told me to leave her alone. I believed those letters. It was easier than admitting someone I trusted might be lying to me.””
I closed my eyes.
There it was.
My father had been deceived.
But he had also chosen the explanation that required the least courage.
Daniel read on.
“I eventually discovered that the letters did not tell the truth. Some were altered. Others were never written by Quinn at all.
I have kept copies of everything I could find. Samuel knows where the complete records are. If he cannot be reached, Daniel knows how to contact the people who can verify them.””
The final lines were written in a different ink.
“Quinnie, I do not expect you to forgive me. I would not forgive myself in your place. But there is one thing I need you to know.
I never stopped loving you. I simply allowed my fear to speak louder than my love, and you paid for my cowardice.””
Daniel lowered the page.
I stared at the grain of the table.
For sixteen years, I'd believed I had been abandoned.
Now I was discovering that my father had spent those same years believing I had abandoned him.
We had both been grieving the same loss, separated by lies that one honest conversation might have destroyed.
But the letters weren't the only question anymore.
“Where is Samuel now?”” I asked.
Daniel looked at the photograph.
“I don't know.””
“Didn't he know my father was dying?””
“He knew Raymond was seriously ill. They were scheduled to meet two days before your father's death. Samuel never arrived.””
Scott lifted his head.
“He didn't arrive because he knew what he'd done.””
Daniel looked at him.
“What exactly do you believe Samuel did?””
“Extorted Dad. Threatened to expose the business. He wanted money, and when Dad refused, he ran.””
“That's not what the records show.””
“You don't have all the records!””
The words erupted from Scott before he could stop himself.
Everyone turned toward him.
He swallowed.
“I mean,” he said more carefully, “you don't know the whole situation.””
Daniel closed the folder.
“No, I don't. Which is why I intend to find Samuel.””
My phone vibrated inside my coat.
I pulled it out. An unknown number had sent a message.
*If you want to know what happened to your father, ask why your brother's truck was found abandoned beside the French Broad River.*
A second message appeared.
*And ask who had the keys.*
I read both messages twice.
“Quinn?”” Daniel asked.
I turned the phone toward him.
His face changed when he finished reading.
Scott stood so abruptly that his chair toppled backward.
“That's nonsense,” he said.
“Anyone can send a text.””
“Who had the keys, Scott?”” I asked.
He stared at me.
For a moment, his face was empty.
Then Marjorie reached for her purse, and I noticed something that made my blood run cold.
A brass key ring hung from the zipper.
There were three keys on it.
One of them was identical to the key Miss Opal had given me.
May you like
Except this one bore a small white tag.
And on that tag, written in black ink, was the number fourteen.
