Chapter 7 - DON'T BELIEVE DAD DIED FROM HIS HEART The recovered message read:
I'M ALIVE. DON'T BELIEVE DAD DIED JUST FROM HIS HEART.
Daniel stopped breathing.
Gregory Carter had died five years earlier.
Heart attack.
At home.
Marcus Hale had signed the medical documentation.
Of course he had.
Claire's files included notes.
Medication changed.
Hale prescription.
Dad said Marcus was pressuring him.
Daniel remembered.
Gregory's dizziness.
His fatigue.
The fall in the hallway.
Marcus visiting constantly.
Rebecca reopened the case.
The body was exhumed.
Tests found abnormal levels of a medication Gregory had never officially been prescribed.
Not enough to prove deliberate murder.
Enough to prove something had been wrong.
Then came a call from Quebec.
A woman had walked into a public clinic.
Dehydrated.
Injured wrist.
No identification.
She told staff:
"My name is Claire Carter."
DNA confirmed it.
Rebecca looked at Daniel.
"We found her."
Daniel dropped the phone.
Then he cried.
No restraint.
No embarrassment.
Noah ran into the room.
"What happened?"
"They found Aunt Claire."
Noah screamed.
Lily started laughing because Noah was laughing.
For the first time since the whip cracked through their living room, joy entered the house.
A supervised video call was arranged.
Claire appeared on-screen.
Thinner.
Pale.
Hair unevenly cut.
She stared at Daniel.
Then:
"You got old."
Daniel laughed through tears.
"So did you."
"Rude."
They both broke.
Claire whispered:
"I thought you weren't looking for me."
Daniel's face collapsed.
"I believed the messages."
"They weren't mine."
"I know."
Then Claire became serious.
"Daniel."
"What?"
"Marcus killed Dad."
Rebecca leaned closer.
Claire explained.
She had overheard Marcus speaking with Vanessa at Saint Gabriel.
Gregory had discovered the fraud.
Marcus had been manipulating his medication while controlling access to his care.
But then Claire revealed something unexpected.
"Vanessa wasn't there when Marcus first attacked me."
Daniel frowned.
"What?"
"She helped later. She did terrible things. But the first night... she tried to stop him."
Daniel didn't know what to feel.
Then Claire said:
"Marcus wasn't working alone."
"Who?"
"A board member."
Daniel's stomach tightened.
"Name."
Claire looked directly into the camera.
"Samuel Price."
Daniel went still.
Samuel.
The chairman who had comforted him when Claire disappeared.
The man who advised him not to hire private investigators.
The man who told him to trust Claire's messages.
The man Daniel had treated like family.
And suddenly Daniel understood something devastating.
Marcus had controlled Claire's body.
May you like
Vanessa had controlled the house.
But Samuel Price had controlled Daniel's decisions.
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