Chapter 3 - Lucy Ward
Emma's mother, Catherine Ward, died seven years earlier.
Natural causes following stroke.
No mysterious disappearance.
No hidden mansion dungeon.
Catherine had two daughters.
Emma.
And Rebecca.
Rebecca Ward, Emma’s older sister, was thirty-five.
Alive.
Estranged.
Ethan had met her only twice.
Rebecca and Emma had similar faces as teenagers, but adulthood changed them enough that Ethan never would have mistaken one for the other under normal circumstances.
Under dim kitchen light, with Emma’s hairstyle, clothing and makeup?
Possibly.
Police found Rebecca at a motel forty miles away.
She denied kidnapping Emma.
DNA from kitchen hair matched Rebecca.
So she had impersonated Emma at breakfast.
Why?
Rebecca broke down.
She had received message the previous evening:
IF YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT CATHERINE DID WITH LUCY, GO TO EMMA’S HOUSE AT 6:45 A.M. WEAR WHAT IS WAITING IN LOCKER 12.
Locker contained Emma-like clothes, wig extensions and instructions.
Rebecca followed because of one name.
Lucy.
Not child downstairs.
A Lucy from their childhood.
“Who?”
Rebecca looked at Emma.
“Lucy Hale.”
Emma remembered.
Lucy Hale had lived with Catherine for approximately five months when Emma was eight.
Not sister.
Not adopted daughter.
Temporary kinship/foster placement.
Catherine worked with county family-support network.
Lucy’s mother was hospitalized after serious car accident.
Catherine cared for six-year-old Lucy temporarily.
Then Lucy returned to relatives.
Emma remembered almost nothing.
But why would modern little girl be called Lucy Ward?
Rebecca said someone had been sending her documents claiming Catherine falsified Lucy Hale’s records.
Police checked.
No kidnapping.
No missing child.
Lucy Hale grew up normally.
Now thirty.
Alive in Maryland.
She had daughter.
Six-year-old:
Lucy Hale Jr.? Better name Olivia. But second girl said Lucy. Maybe child uses mother's name? Avoid duplicate weird. The little girl could be Lucy Hale's daughter named Grace, told to call herself Lucy. Need payoff later.
Police contacted adult Lucy Hale.
She was horrified.
Her daughter Grace, age five, had disappeared that morning from babysitter’s home.
Photograph arrived.
Ethan's breath caught.
Grace resembled Lily strongly.
Not identical.
Same curls.
Similar face.
Similar height.
When dressed alike and seen by frightened adults in unstable lighting, resemblance became startling.
No biological relation.
DNA later confirmed none.
So “second Lily” was Grace Hale.
Someone had dressed her as Lily and apparently instructed her to call herself Lucy.
But why?
And where was Grace now?
Police searched service passage.
A concealed exit opened behind garden retaining wall.
Whoever brought Grace downstairs could remove her without steel door.
That solved impossible entry.
Not motive.
Then Emma asked adult Lucy:
“Why would anyone use your daughter against us?”
Lucy was silent.
Finally:
“Because someone wants you to remember your mother.”
“What did Catherine do?”
Lucy answered:
“She saved me.”
Rebecca stared.
“From whom?”
May you like
Lucy whispered:
“From the man who owned this house before Ethan.”
