Chapter 8 - THE BROTHER WHO STAYED PUBLIC
Nolan Voss turned himself in before we could find him.
Not to Starlight County.
To state police.
That was smart.
By the time we returned from Charleston, he was sitting in an interview room seventy miles away with two attorneys and a signed proffer agreement that guaranteed nothing except the possibility prosecutors might consider cooperation.
He looked almost exactly like the man on Claire’s attic camera.
Almost.
The missing wedge from the top of his left ear made the difference undeniable once you knew to look.
He was fifty-three.
Gray at the temples.
Still carried the polished, ordinary appearance of a public official who spent his life explaining property assessments to irritated voters.
I watched through glass with Rachel, Grant, and a state investigator.
Mark refused.
“I’ll hit him.”
No one argued.
Nolan began with Claire.
“I did not kill her.”
The investigator said:
“That wasn’t the first question.”
“I know.”
“Then why start there?”
“Because Daniel Mercer is listening.”
He looked toward the mirror.
My hands tightened.
The investigator asked:
“Were you at Claire Mercer’s crash?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Evan called me.”
“When?”
“Ten minutes before.”
“What did he say?”
“That she had gone off the road.”
“Did he say how?”
“No.”
“What did you do?”
“I drove there.”
“In your county jacket.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I was working late.”
“Did you call 911?”
Nolan closed his eyes.
“No.”
My vision narrowed.
“Why not?”
“He said she was dead.”
The investigator leaned forward.
“Did you verify?”
Nolan’s voice broke.
“Yes.”
I stood.
Rachel said my name softly.
I stayed behind the glass.
Nolan continued.
“I checked pulse.”
“Then?”
“I took her phone.”
My fist hit the counter.
Not hard.
Enough.
Nolan looked toward the mirror again.
“I’m sorry.”
I wanted to go through the glass.
The investigator did not let emotion change pace.
“Why did you take her phone?”
“Evan said she had pictures.”
“Did she?”
“Yes.”
“What pictures?”
“Archive pages. Him. Me.”
“Did you delete them?”
“Some.”
“Cloud?”
“Tried.”
“Dash camera?”
“I didn’t know there was a separate card.”
Claire had outplanned them.
Nolan continued.
“I told Evan we had to call it in.”
“What did he say?”
“That if responders came too fast, they’d find him.”
“Was he injured?”
“No.”
“Did he cause the crash?”
Nolan hesitated.
There.
“I didn’t see it.”
“What did he tell you?”
“He said he scared her.”
“How?”
“Pulled alongside. Followed close.”
“Anything else?”
Nolan looked at his attorneys.
One whispered.
Then Nolan said:
“He had been under her car earlier.”
My entire body went cold.
“What did he do?”
“He said he loosened a brake-line fitting.”
There.
Not an accident.
Not just reckless pursuit.
Sabotage.
“Did he intend to kill her?”
“I don’t know.”
Good.
Even now, facts.
“He said he wanted her to stop before the curve.”
“That makes no mechanical sense.”
“I know.”
“Did you know before?”
“No.”
“After?”
“Yes.”
“And you covered it up.”
“Yes.”
Nolan’s face crumpled.
Not enough for me.
Nothing would be.
The investigator asked:
“Why protect him?”
Nolan stared at the table.
“Because I had been protecting him since I was sixteen.”
There it was.
Caleb Voss’s sons.
One public.
One ghost.
Their father began the switching as games.
Then alibis.
At seventeen, Nolan took Evan’s shift at a county maintenance job after Evan assaulted someone.
At nineteen, Evan wore Nolan’s jacket at a bar so witnesses placed Nolan there while Evan helped their father intimidate a landowner.
At twenty-nine, when Evan became a suspect in Simon Ortega’s disappearance, Caleb staged his disappearance.
Nolan filed the missing report.
From then on, Evan lived through aliases and family money.
“How often did he use your identity?” the investigator asked.
Nolan laughed without humor.
“I stopped counting.”
“Did you ever use his?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To move him across state lines. Sign leases. Cash checks.”
“Criminally?”
“Yes.”
“Did your father force you?”
“At first.”
“And later?”
Nolan looked toward the mirror.
“No.”
That mattered.
He was not a child forever.
The investigator asked about the land scheme.
Nolan admitted he learned enough by his mid-twenties to know some Voss properties were tainted.
He did not create the original deeds.
He helped preserve them.
When county records digitized, he pushed for scans of replacement pages rather than damaged originals.
“Why?”
“To keep the chain clean.”
“Clean?”
Nolan winced.
“On paper.”
Rachel whispered beside me:
“He maintained it.”
Yes.
His father stole.
Nolan curated.
Like so many people before him.
Then:
“Did you know Rebecca Hale was alive?”
“No.”
“Thomas?”
“No.”
“Anna Hollis?”
“No.”
He looked genuinely shocked by Anna’s later life.
Not everything connected.
Good.
Then the current intrusion.
“Who entered Daniel Mercer’s farmhouse two nights ago?”
“Evan.”
“How do you know?”
“He called me afterward.”
“What did he say?”
“That Claire moved the ledger.”
“Why dress like Daniel?”
Nolan’s expression became sick.
“He said the girl was awake.”
My hands went cold.
“He intended to frighten Lily?”
“He intended her to go back to bed.”
“By impersonating her father.”
“Yes.”
“How did he get the voice?”
“County fair video. He downloaded clips and used a soundboard.”
Exactly.
The investigator asked:
“Where is Evan now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Bullshit.”
Nolan looked up.
“I don’t.”
“Where does he stay?”
“Several places.”
“List them.”
He did.
Cabin near South Fork.
Trailer under another name.
Old Voss equipment shed.
Apartment over a tire shop two counties away.
State police hit all four.
Empty.
One had been left within twenty-four hours.
Then Nolan said:
“He’ll go back to the farm.”
I stared.
“Why?”
“Parcel thirty-one.”
“What about it?” the investigator asked.
“Claire had the only copy of Raymond’s side agreement.”
Rebecca’s ledger did not.
My father’s survey tube did not.
“What side agreement?”
Nolan said:
“A handwritten indemnity. Raymond promised Caleb and Malcolm shares of future sale proceeds if they made the title problem disappear.”
Direct conspiracy.
Signatures.
Percentages.
Parcel 31.
“If that exists,” Nolan said, “the civil case opens everything.”
“Where is it?”
“Evan thinks Claire hid it in the room.”
The bait.
Then Nolan looked toward the mirror again.
“But she didn’t, did she?”
I said nothing.
He could not hear me.
Maybe.
Then the investigator asked:
“Why now? Claire has been dead eighteen months.”
“Because Daniel started restoring the west hall.”
I frowned.
I had hired a roofer three weeks earlier to inspect a leak near the sealed room.
Someone saw work.
Thought door might be opened.
Moved first.
Then Nolan’s eyes shifted.
“Also because Mark came back into it.”
Mark.
“Evan hates him.”
“Why?”
“Anna.”
The investigator waited.
Nolan said:
“My father blamed Anna Hollis for getting Rebecca out of the cannery.”
Of course.
Old grievance inherited.
“Evan still blames her?”
“He blames everyone his father blamed.”
That sounded tragically plausible.
Then:
“Did Evan send Mark the photo today?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“He asked me for Mark’s number yesterday.”
“Did you give it?”
Nolan closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Even cooperation arrived late.
The investigator sat back.
“You are telling us Evan will return to the Mercer farmhouse.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
“What will he do?”
Nolan looked tired beyond description.
“Whatever he thinks Dad would have done.”
That was not useful enough.
Then Nolan added:
“He will not hurt Lily if he can avoid it.”
My chair scraped back.
Rachel grabbed my forearm.
The investigator’s voice hardened.
“If he can avoid it?”
Nolan looked toward the mirror.
“That’s why I came in.”
Too late.
Always too late.
But perhaps not useless.
---
We did not go home that night.
Lily and I stayed at a state police safe location.
She hated it.
The room smelled like industrial detergent and had a television bolted to the dresser.
“This hotel is ugly.”
“It’s not a hotel.”
“Then it’s worse.”
I laughed.
Good.
She looked at me.
“Did you find the man?”
“Not yet.”
“The other Daddy?”
I sat on the bed.
“He isn’t another me.”
“He looked like you.”
“In the dark.”
“And sounded.”
“He used a recording.”
She thought.
“So he cheated.”
“Yes.”
That framing helped.
Not supernatural.
Not replacement.
A trick.
Then she asked:
“Why?”
I chose carefully.
“He wanted to get into Mom’s room without you stopping him.”
“Why?”
“He thought something was hidden there.”
“Was it?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes widened.
“What?”
“Old papers.”
She looked disappointed.
“Boring.”
“Very.”
Good.
Keep her world small where possible.
Then:
“Did Mom know him?”
“Sort of.”
Lily hugged her fox.
“Mom knew too much.”
The sentence stopped me.
She had absorbed more than we realized.
“Yes.”
“Is that why she died?”
My throat closed.
I could lie.
Not now.
“We think someone may have damaged her car because she was asking questions.”
Lily’s face changed.
I added immediately:
“That person is not allowed near you, and a lot of police are looking for him.”
She looked toward the door.
“Police didn’t stop him last time.”
True.
I nodded.
“No.”
She appreciated truth.
Children usually do, even when adults are afraid of it.
Then she said:
“Can I sleep with the light on?”
“Yes.”
She did.
At 2:06 a.m., my phone vibrated.
Rachel.
Motion alert at farmhouse.
The locked room.
Someone had entered through the attic passage.
May you like
Evan was back.
And this time the police were waiting.
