Chapter 9 - The Aunt Who Never Stopped Looking.
Mara Rowan had filed twenty-seven documented requests for information about Nick over seven months.
The number stunned Henry when Valerie told him later.
"Twenty-seven?"
"Yes."
"And nobody answered?"
"Some people answered."
"But they didn't help."
Valerie hesitated.
"Not enough."
Henry stared at Nick's cap.
"What if she thought he was dead?"
Valerie's throat tightened.
"She was afraid of that."
Henry became quiet.
Then he said something Valerie did not expect.
"I thought you were choosing Dad too."
Valerie looked at him.
"Like Nick thought nobody would choose him?"
Henry shrugged.
"Maybe."
Valerie sat beside him.
"I cannot change the times I made you feel that way."
"I know."
"But I can stop asking you to protect me from hard truths."
Henry looked at her.
"What if the truth makes you sad?"
"Then I get sad."
"What if it makes you mad?"
"Then I handle being mad without making it your job."
Henry considered that carefully.
"Okay."
It was not forgiveness.
It was a small contract between them.
Valerie treated it like one.
Valerie learned that before she ever heard the woman's voice.
Twenty-seven requests.
Emails.
Certified letters.
Phone logs.
One petition sent through an attorney in Ohio.
Another forwarded through a family-services office after Mara relocated to Pennsylvania.
Harbor House had responded to some and ignored others.
Three messages claimed Nick had been moved to a new placement.
Two listed phone numbers that no longer worked.
One stated that Nick did not want contact with extended family.
According to Tori, that last statement was a lie.
"He talked about her all the time."
Tori sat inside a police interview room with a blanket around her shoulders.
"He had a picture."
Valerie remembered the photograph from Door Twenty-Seven.
"Did he trust her?"
"More than anybody."
"Then why didn't he reach her after he ran?"
Tori looked down.
"He tried."
"What happened?"
"The first bus ticket got canceled."
Rachel frowned.
"Who canceled it?"
"He didn't know."
"And after that?"
"He called her from a library."
Tori hesitated.
"A man picked up."
Valerie's stomach tightened.
"What man?"
"He said he was with social services and told Nick to wait at the library."
"Did Nick wait?"
Tori shook her head.
"He saw a black SUV outside."
The same detail Henry had remembered from the garage.
Valerie looked at Detective Ortiz.
Lena was already writing.
"Did Nick get a license plate?"
"Part of one."
"Do you remember it?"
Tori gave four characters.
Lena left the room to run them.
Rachel turned back to Tori.
"How did you end up at the archive?"
The girl wrapped the blanket tighter.
"Nick told me if anything happened, Door Twenty-Seven had proof."
"Proof of what?"
"That the money was fake."
Valerie corrected gently.
"The money was real."
Tori looked at her.
"Not for us."
The distinction silenced the room.
Valerie nodded.
"You're right."
Tori seemed surprised by the admission.
The police located Mara Rowan at 11:16 a.m.
She was alive, healthy, and living in a small town outside Pittsburgh.
When Detective Ortiz called, Mara began crying before Lena finished identifying herself.
Valerie heard only one side of the conversation.
"Yes, ma'am."
"He is alive as far as we know."
"No, he is not under arrest."
"No."
"Listen to me."
"Nicholas is not in trouble."
Mara's voice became loud enough through the phone that Valerie heard one sentence.
"Then why wouldn't anybody tell me where my nephew was?"
Valerie looked down.
Lena answered.
"We're investigating that too."
Mara arrived by early evening after taking the first available flight.
She came into the station wearing jeans, a red wool coat, and the expression of someone who had spent months preparing for bad news.
Valerie recognized her immediately from the photograph.
Mara recognized Valerie too.
Not personally.
From newspapers.
From the foundation website.
Her face hardened.
"You're Daniel Mercer's wife."
Valerie stood.
"For the moment."
Mara did not smile.
"Where is Nick?"
"We don't know."
The answer hit her like a physical blow.
She gripped the back of a chair.
"You said he was alive."
"He was seen recently."
"Recently when?"
Lena intervened before panic could take over.
She explained what they knew, what they did not know, and why they believed Nick might be hiding or being moved by someone connected to the investigation.
Mara listened with her arms crossed tightly.
When Lena mentioned Daniel's photograph of Nick, Mara turned toward Valerie.
"He knew my nephew?"
Valerie forced herself not to look away.
"It appears so."
"How long?"
"I don't know."
"You were funding Harbor House."
"Yes."
"And you didn't know?"
Valerie swallowed.
"No."
Mara laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
"Amazing how rich people can put their names on buildings without knowing what happens inside them."
Rachel shifted in her chair.
Valerie raised a hand to stop her from defending.
"You're right."
Mara looked surprised.
Valerie continued.
"I should have known more."
"That doesn't help him now."
"No."
"Then don't apologize to me."
Mara's eyes filled.
"Find him."
Valerie nodded.
"We will."
Mara's expression sharpened.
"Don't promise what you can't control."
The sentence sounded like Nick.
Valerie corrected herself.
"We will do everything we can to find him."
That, Mara accepted.
Henry met Mara later that evening through a secure video call.
The moment she saw Nick's baseball cap in his hands, her face broke.
"Where did you get that?"
Henry held it up.
"He left it when he ran."
Mara touched the screen.
"I gave him that cap."
Henry looked at the faded fabric differently.
"He wears it all the time."
"I know."
Mara wiped her eyes.
"It belonged to his mom."
Henry's grip loosened as though the hat had suddenly become fragile.
"I didn't know."
"He probably didn't tell you."
"He doesn't tell people much."
Mara smiled sadly.
"He used to."
The words settled heavily.
Henry asked.
"What changed?"
Mara looked away.
"Too many adults made him sorry he trusted them."
Valerie heard that from beside Henry and felt every syllable.
The partial license plate from Tori led investigators to six black SUVs registered in the region.
One belonged to a security subcontractor used by Mercer Risk Solutions.
The driver listed on recent work orders was Calvin Pike.
Valerie knew the name vaguely.
Daniel had used Calvin for executive protection during a shareholder dispute the year before.
Police reached his apartment after midnight.
He was gone.
His closet was half-empty.
His company phone sat on the kitchen counter wiped clean.
But the building's garage camera captured his SUV leaving at 10:41 p.m. the night of the banquet.
In the passenger seat sat a small figure wearing a gray hoodie.
Valerie stared at the image.
"Nick."
Lena enlarged it.
The face was turned away.
"Likely."
Mara stepped closer.
"That's him."
"How can you tell?"
"The sleeve."
She pointed at the black thread repairing the torn fabric.
"I taught him that stitch."
Valerie's stomach dropped.
The vehicle crossed a toll bridge forty minutes later.
Then it disappeared from traffic cameras near an abandoned freight district.
At 2:07 a.m., Lena received another update.
Calvin Pike had used a company fuel card at a truck stop near the state line.
The purchase included gasoline, bottled water, two sandwiches, and a prepaid phone.
Valerie latched onto the sandwiches.
"Two."
Rachel understood.
"He may have been feeding Nick."
Mara's face hardened.
"Or pretending to."
The prepaid phone activated twenty minutes later.
Its first outgoing call was not to Daniel.
It was to Graham Vale at Harbor House.
The second call lasted seven seconds.
It went to Valerie.
Her phone rang while everyone was still looking at the call record.
Unknown number.
Lena signaled for her to answer on speaker.
Valerie's hand shook.
"Hello?"
Static.
Then breathing.
"Nick?"
A whisper came through.
"Don't say my name."
Henry stood so fast he knocked over his chair.
Valerie forced herself to stay calm.
"Okay."
Nick whispered again.
"He thinks I don't know the code."
Lena silently motioned for the technical team to trace the call.
Valerie asked.
"Are you safe?"
"No."
Mara covered her mouth.
Nick continued.
"Tell Henry the third door isn't a place."
Valerie looked at the numbers.
"What is it?"
Nick's breathing quickened.
A man's voice sounded faintly in the background.
Nick rushed the words.
"It's a date."
Then the line went dead.
Valerie stared at 4-19-27.
April 19, 2027 had not happened yet.
Rachel shook her head.
"Not that order."
Mara looked at the numbers and went completely pale.
"I know the date."
Valerie turned.
Mara whispered.
"April 27, 2019."
"What happened then?"
May you like
Mara's eyes filled with fear.
"That's the day Nick's mother died."
