Chapter 9 - The Escape From Saint Augustine
The emergency doors slammed shut automatically.
Red lights began flashing.
Elias pulled me and my mother away from the window.
“Stay behind me.”
Catherine clung to my hand.
“They’ll say I’m unstable.”
“You’re leaving anyway.”
She looked at him.
“Who are you?”
“Elias Vance.”
My mother’s face changed.
She knew the name.
“Thomas trusted your father.”
Elias froze.
“What?”
There was no time for explanation.
His security team called from the hallway.
“Movement downstairs.”
Elias turned toward us.
“Another exit?”
My mother pointed toward the bathroom.
“There’s an old maintenance staircase.”
She had clearly spent years studying every path out.
We entered the narrow service stairwell.
Catherine moved slowly.
Seventeen years inside the facility had weakened her.
I wrapped her arm around my shoulder.
Elias supported her other side.
Halfway down, we heard men entering above.
“Room seventeen is empty!”
Catherine trembled.
I squeezed her hand.
“You’re not going back.”
We reached the basement.
A locked steel door blocked the exit.
Elias kicked it once.
Nothing.
Again.
Still nothing.
One of his guards caught up and forced it open with a pry bar.
Freezing air rushed inside.
A black SUV waited behind the facility.
We ran.
A second vehicle appeared near the far gate.
Then another.
Mercer’s people.
Elias pushed us inside.
“Drive.”
The SUV accelerated.
Catherine looked through the rear window.
“They won’t stop.”
“Neither will we,” Elias said.
I held my mother while vehicles chased us through snow-covered roads.
For the first time since the bridge, I did not feel helpless.
Terrified, yes.
Helpless, no.
We had evidence.
We had Arthur.
We had Daniel.
And now we had the woman Mercer had spent seventeen years hiding.
My mother.
Eventually Elias’s second security team intercepted the pursuing vehicles near the interstate.
Our SUV continued south.
Catherine finally looked at me properly.
“You have children?”
I smiled through tears.
“Two girls.”
Her eyes filled.
“Twins?”
I nodded.
Something strange crossed her expression.
“What?”
She looked toward Elias.
Then back at me.
“Your grandmother was a twin.”
I had never known that.
Catherine touched my cheek.
“Your grandfather changed the trust because of what happened to her sister.”
“What happened?”
“She disappeared.”
My stomach tightened.
“When?”
“Before I was born.”
Elias leaned forward.
“Her name?”
“Margaret Bennett.”
He went still.
I had seen that name recently.
Then I remembered.
The Mercer Foundation’s original corporate documents.
Its founder was Margaret Bennett Mercer.
I looked at my mother.
“Mercer is related to us?”
Catherine closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
My blood chilled.
“Vincent Mercer is your cousin.”
The SUV became silent.
Catherine continued.
“And he believes the Bennett property should have belonged to his side of the family.”
Elias’s phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed almost immediately.
“What happened?”
May you like
He looked at me.
“Daniel escaped.”
