CHAPTER 8 – THE WOMAN WHO WAS NEVER VANESSA
CHAPTER 8 – THE WOMAN WHO WAS NEVER VANESSA
Thomas discovered modern surveillance equipment hidden inside the nursery walls.
Someone had watched every moment since they entered.
The woman in the old photograph was identified as Anna Caldwell.
She was Richard Caldwell's daughter.
She had disappeared the same night as the twins.
The real Vanessa Cole had died in a car accident six years earlier.
Someone had continued using her identity.
Margaret listened to the hidden speaker recording again.
"That voice was in the manor the night Sophia disappeared."
A movement outside the nursery window drew Daniel's attention.
Vanessa stood on the lawn below in a black coat.
Lightning flashed.
When they reached the ground floor, she was gone.
Thomas traced one of her fake passports to a private cemetery outside the city.
Sophia Ashford's name appeared on a stone there.
The grave had never been opened.
They arrived after midnight.
Fresh soil surrounded the marker.
Beneath the empty grave they found a steel box.
Inside lay a pink ribbon, one silver child's shoe, and a cassette labeled:
THE REAL NIGHT SOPHIA DISAPPEARED.
Daniel reached for it.
A gunshot struck the gravestone.
Emily dropped behind the stone wall.
A black-gloved figure rushed from the trees, seized the cassette, and disappeared between the graves.
Daniel fired after the figure but missed.
The cemetery fell silent.
On the inside of the child's shoe, Emily found a message written in faded ink.
May you like
Sophia was never buried.
Look beneath the west chapel.
