Chapter 4 - Grant Mercer’s Missing Year
Grant laughed once.
Coldly.
“What exactly was my wife investigating about me?”
Vivienne answered:
“Your childhood.”
That was ridiculous.
Grant grew up in Connecticut.
Private school.
College.
Mercer Financial.
Nothing mysterious.
Then Vivienne asked:
“What happened when you were four?”
Grant frowned.
Nothing.
He remembered being five.
Kindergarten.
His mother Eleanor.
His father Charles.
The old Mercer house.
Before four?
Fragments.
Normal childhood amnesia.
Vivienne placed an old hospital admission record on the table.
Patient:
Grant Ellis.
Age four.
Grant stared.
“My last name was never Ellis.”
Apparently it had been.
For eleven months.
Grant had lived with a woman named Rebecca Ellis.
Then suddenly returned to Charles and Eleanor Mercer.
No adoption record.
No custody order Grant remembered.
Why?
Caroline discovered the file while investigating Haven Bridge.
The nonprofit had existed under another name decades earlier:
Mercer Children's Foundation.
Founded by Grant's grandfather.
Grant's family had run temporary-placement programs for children whose parents were hospitalized or otherwise unable to care for them.
Grant had been placed through his own family's program.
Why would his parents send him away?
Vivienne didn't know.
Caroline wanted to find out.
Then Tessa revealed Rebecca Ellis was still alive.
Seventy-one.
Living in Rhode Island.
Grant went.
Rebecca opened the door and cried when she saw him.
“You have Charles's eyes.”
Grant did not know how to respond.
“Why did I live with you?”
Rebecca invited him inside.
His mother Eleanor suffered a severe psychiatric crisis after Grant's younger brother was born.
Grant's father traveled constantly.
Rebecca was Eleanor's cousin.
She took Grant temporarily.
Nothing sinister.
But the younger brother changed everything.
Grant stared.
“I don't have a brother.”
Rebecca closed her eyes.
“Yes, you do.”
Name:
Nathan Mercer.
Born eighteen months after Grant.
Grant had been told his mother suffered a miscarriage.
Nathan survived.
Why erase him?
Nathan was born with significant medical needs.
Eleanor became overwhelmed.
Charles arranged a private placement.
Temporary at first.
Then permanent.
Nathan was raised by another family.
Grant's parents told everyone the baby died.
Grant felt ill.
“Is he alive?”
Rebecca nodded.
“Caroline found him.”
Where?
Philadelphia.
Age thirty-eight.
Name:
Nathan Ellis.
Rebecca's adopted son.
Grant stared at her.
“You raised my brother?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't he contact me?”
Rebecca looked toward the hallway.
“Because he did.”
Footsteps.
A man appeared.
Grant looked at him.
Nathan walked with a cane.
His face resembled Grant's enough to make denial impossible.
Nathan's first words were not emotional.
“I wrote you six times.”
Grant stared.
“I never received anything.”
May you like
Nathan replied:
“Caroline did.”
