Chapter 1 - THE WOMAN ACROSS THE HALL.
Colonel Marsh inserted Emily’s evidence drive into a secure tablet. The first recovered clip showed Victor locking the hospital door while eight relatives blocked the corridor and ignored Emily’s pleas for an ambulance.
Then Nurse Mary opened the guarded room across the hall.
A frightened woman sat upright in bed, conscious and stable, wearing the silver family bracelet Emily had not seen since childhood.
“Claire?” Emily whispered.
The woman began to cry. “You were told I ran away.”
Victor shouted that Claire was a mentally ill patient using a stolen name. Detectives separated him from the witnesses before he could approach.
Claire looked at Jason.
“They hid me because I found the contracts. Emily was targeted because she refused to sign the same one.”
A detective opened Claire’s file. It declared her legally dead seven years earlier, yet Victor’s company had billed her insurance every month.
Emily gripped Jason’s hand.
“What contract?”
May you like
Claire pointed toward the drive.
“The one that turns frightened women into property.”
