Chapter 24 - Adam’s Last Arrangement
Claire did not sleep.
For a few hours, she hated Adam with complete certainty.
It was easier that way.
Adam knew about Thomas.
Adam hid Grace.
Adam lied about the pregnancy.
Adam stood on Harbor 6 shortly before Thomas vanished.
Then Claire remembered what she had told Lily.
Evidence first.
The Harbor 6 meeting occurred six years after the lake.
Two years before Adam's stroke.
Thomas had spent years searching for Lily.
Adam had spent years moving her.
Why would they meet?
Ben located Harbor 6 through old marina maps.
A private dock attached to an abandoned coastal research facility.
Not a murder site.
Not obviously.
The facility had once belonged to a nonprofit called North Harbor Medical Ethics Project.
Margaret Reeve had served on its board.
So had Thomas.
Claire felt the narrative change.
Adam had not necessarily lured Thomas somewhere dangerous.
He might have gone to Thomas.
The facility's archive contained visitor logs.
Adam entered at 8:42 a.m.
Thomas at 8:51.
Richard Brooks at 10:07.
Only Richard left that day.
Claire's stomach tightened again.
Then Ben found a ferry record.
Adam and Thomas departed from another dock at 11:20.
Alive.
Together.
Richard had lied on his investigator's report.
Why?
The answer waited inside Adam's bank records.
That afternoon he withdrew $80,000.
Over the next three weeks, money moved through a law firm's client account.
Eventually it purchased a small house in Nova Scotia.
Owner:
Thomas Reed.
Not Reeve.
Reed.
Claire stared.
“Adam helped him disappear.”
Ben nodded.
Thomas had not been killed.
He had been relocated.
Why?
Because his life was being threatened?
File Seven contained a voice recording.
Adam and Thomas at Harbor 6.
Adam:
“They're following you.”
Thomas:
“I know.”
Adam:
“Margaret too.”
Thomas:
“Then tell Claire.”
Adam:
“If I tell her now, they'll follow her.”
Thomas:
“You've said that for fifteen years.”
Adam:
“I know.”
Silence.
Then Adam said something Claire did not expect.
“Take the money. Go north. I'll get Lily out. When she's safe, you tell Claire yourself.”
Thomas:
“You think she'll forgive either of us?”
Adam:
“No.”
The recording ended.
Claire stared at nothing.
Adam had not been arranging Thomas's death.
He was arranging his escape.
Not noble.
Not innocent.
Still built on another lie.
But different.
Lily sat beside her.
“Do you hate him?”
“Which one?”
“Dad.”
Claire thought.
“Yes.”
Lily looked startled.
Claire continued.
“And I love him.”
“Can you do both?”
“Apparently.”
That night investigators traced the Nova Scotia property.
Thomas Reed sold it four years later.
Then disappeared again.
But not completely.
A utility account in Vermont had used the same Social Security derivative.
Current.
Thomas might still be alive.
Claire's pulse accelerated.
Lily did not smile.
She looked frightened.
“What happens if he is?”
Claire understood.
Biological father sounded simple in documents.
In real life it meant a stranger potentially entering a fifteen-year-old girl's identity after she had only just reclaimed it.
“Nothing you don't want.”
“You promise?”
“Yes.”
Claire held her gaze.
“Biology doesn't give him ownership of you.”
Lily nodded.
The next morning, Ben received confirmation.
Thomas Reeve was alive.
Age sixty-one.
Living under his own name again in a small Vermont town.
No criminal record.
No medical license.
He repaired antique clocks.
He had never married.
Claire sat with the phone number for twenty minutes.
Then called.
A man answered.
“Reeve Clock Repair.”
Claire couldn't speak.
“Hello?”
She finally said:
“My name is Claire Dawson.”
Silence.
Then something hit the floor on his end.
Thomas whispered:
“Oh God.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“You know who I am.”
“Yes.”
“Are you Lily's biological father?”
A long pause.
“Yes.”
“Did you hire Michael to photograph my daughters?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know they switched places?”
“No.”
Claire listened to him breathing.
Then she asked:
“Why didn't you come back after Adam died?”
Thomas began crying.
“Because Adam didn't die before I came back.”
Claire stopped breathing.
May you like
“What?”
“I saw him three months after his funeral.”
