Naomi insisted Evelyn go to a hospital.
Evelyn refused.
"No hospitals connected to Hart Foundation."
"Then a private neurologist."
"Later."
Adrian looked furious. "You nearly passed out."
"And my dead mother may be alive, my dead sister is definitely alive, and I just remembered seeing my dead father on a bridge eleven months after his funeral. Forgive me if dizziness isn't my priority."
That silenced him.
Naomi pulled old cell records and traffic-camera archives through a former investigator. Most data from nine years ago was gone. But one piece remained in an insurance litigation file.
A toll record.
Evelyn's old car had crossed the Hudson at 11:08 p.m. on the night Mara vanished.
It crossed back at 12:42 a.m.
Evelyn's calendar placed her at a charity dinner in Manhattan until 10:15.
Her next confirmed sighting was at 1:06 a.m., when a doorman helped her from a taxi outside her apartment.
Forty-seven minutes of her life had no explanation.
"You didn't drive back," Naomi said. "No entry photo for your car. Someone else brought it."
"And I came home in a taxi."
"Which means you left the car somewhere."
Evelyn stared at the bridge toll record.
"Or someone wanted it to look like I did."
Adrian was quiet.
Too quiet.
"What?" she asked.
He looked at her scar.
"After Mara disappeared, you had a panic episode."
"I had dozens."
"This was different. You woke up at three in the morning and kept asking where your coat was."
"I don't remember."
"You said there was blood on it."
Evelyn's mouth went dry.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Dr. Bell said grief could create false memories."
There it was again.
Dr. Miriam Bell.
The family physician.
The woman who had treated Evelyn after nearly every major death in her family.
Naomi immediately searched her current practice.
Closed two years ago.
License voluntarily surrendered.
Address unknown.
"That's not suspicious at all," Naomi said.
Theo Grant's sister, meanwhile, agreed to meet them in a diner in Newark. She arrived alone and slid a motel key card across the table.
"Theo can't come," she said.
"Why?" Evelyn asked.
"Because Gideon has him watched."
"Then why is he still working for Gideon?"
"Because your sister asked him to."
Evelyn leaned forward.
"You've spoken to Mara?"
"Not directly. Theo has."
"Where is she?"
"I don't know. Theo doesn't tell me locations."
The woman tapped the motel card.
"Room 214. Green Finch Motel. Check the vent above the bathroom mirror."
Lily looked up immediately.
"Green bird."
The motel where Mara had stayed.
They reached it just after dark.
Room 214 had been cleaned and rented again, but Naomi paid the current occupant triple to switch rooms for an hour.
Inside the bathroom vent they found a plastic pouch.
It contained a flash drive, a hospital bracelet bearing the name NORA REED, and a photograph of Evelyn standing on a bridge.
The photograph had been taken from behind.
In front of her stood Mara.
Beside Mara stood Malcolm Hart.
Alive.
On the back, Mara had written:
EVIE, THEY TOOK FORTY-SEVEN MINUTES FROM YOU. FIND OUT WHY BEFORE YOU TRUST YOUR OWN MEMORY.
Adrian plugged the flash drive into an offline laptop.
One video file appeared.
The timestamp matched the night Mara vanished.
The footage came from a dashboard camera.
Evelyn watched herself stumble into frame near the bridge railing.
Mara ran toward her.
Malcolm Hart stepped from a black SUV.
Then a fourth person appeared.
Dr. Bell.
She held a syringe.
The video had no sound, but Evelyn watched Bell grab her arm.
Watched herself fight.
Watched Malcolm strike Mara.
Watched Mara fall against the hood of her car.
Then headlights flooded the camera.
The image cut.
The next file was only twelve seconds long.
It showed Mara's car rolling backward toward the ravine.
No one was inside.
A man's hand reached through the open driver's window and shifted it into neutral.
On his wrist was a distinctive square gold watch.
Evelyn knew that watch.
Gideon still wore it every day.
