CHAPTER 4 — My Dead Brother Answered the Phone
Nobody in my office spoke.
The silence wasn't ordinary.
It was the kind of silence that arrives after reality breaks.
Emily's bruised face still burned in my memory.
Don't trust your brother.
But that made no sense.
I didn't have a brother anymore.
Daniel Sterling had died eight years ago.
I buried him.
I stood beside his coffin.
I delivered his eulogy.
I watched people cry.
I watched dirt cover the casket.
How could a dead man become the final warning from the woman I loved?
Margaret slowly looked toward me.
"Alexander..."
I couldn't answer.
My hands were trembling too violently.
Lucas tugged gently on my sleeve.
"Daddy?"
I forced myself to look down.
His blue eyes were full of fear.
"Who's Emily?"
The question pierced my heart.
I knelt in front of both boys.
"Emily..."
I swallowed.
"Emily is your mother."
Noah frowned.
"Then why did she tell us to call you Daddy if she never let us meet you?"
Children ask questions adults spend years avoiding.
I had no answer.
Only pain.
Within thirty minutes, my private conference room had become a war room.
The police.
Cybersecurity experts.
Former military consultants.
My executive security team.
Every screen displayed maps, surveillance footage, phone records, and security logs.
Detective Ryan Mercer stood beside the main monitor.
"The caller knew about the DNA test before the lab reported it."
He pointed toward the timeline.
"Only six people knew the results."
Dr. Carter.
The laboratory director.
Margaret.
Myself.
Lucas.
Noah.
Someone had access to information that should have been impossible to obtain.
Mercer folded his arms.
"That means one of two things."
"Either someone inside your company is feeding information..."
"...or someone has already penetrated every system you own."
Neither possibility comforted me.
The cybersecurity director entered carrying a laptop.
"We recovered the signal that hijacked your office monitors."
"And?"
"It didn't come from outside."
My eyes narrowed.
"What do you mean?"
"It originated..."
He hesitated.
"...inside Sterling Tower."
The room froze.
Someone in my own building had broadcast the kidnapping video.
Someone had been close enough to watch me discover my sons.
Someone had watched me cry.
The realization made my stomach twist.
"They're still here."
I said it quietly.
Every security officer immediately reached for their radios.
Lockdown became a full tactical search.
Floor by floor.
Office by office.
Server room.
Maintenance tunnels.
Mechanical levels.
Nobody entered.
Nobody left.
Meanwhile, Lucas wandered around my office studying family photographs I had never bothered to replace.
There weren't many.
My parents.
Business partners.
Award ceremonies.
No children.
No wife.
No Emily.
He stopped in front of a framed newspaper clipping from years ago.
The headline read:
STERLING HEIR SURVIVES TRAGIC HIGHWAY ACCIDENT
Lucas looked confused.
"Daddy?"
"Yes?"
"Why is Uncle Danny smiling?"
The room went silent.
I slowly turned.
"What did you say?"
He pointed at the newspaper.
"The man beside you."
My younger brother.
Daniel.
Twenty-seven years old forever.
"You know him?"
Lucas answered naturally.
"Of course."
Every heartbeat became louder.
"Where did you see him?"
The little boy shrugged.
"At our house."
Everything inside me stopped.
"When?"
"Lots of times."
Noah nodded.
"He came when Mama wasn't home."
My vision blurred.
"What... did he tell you?"
Lucas thought carefully.
"He always brought us presents."
"What kind of presents?"
"Toy cars."
"Books."
"Candy."
"He said someday he'd introduce us to our real family."
Margaret dropped the notebook she had been holding.
The sound echoed through the room.
I stared at my sons.
No.
Not possible.
Daniel had died.
Unless...
Unless he hadn't.
"Detective."
I turned toward Mercer.
"I want my brother's case reopened."
He frowned.
"Alexander..."
"I attended his funeral."
"I know."
"I identified the body."
"I know."
"I signed the death certificate."
Mercer remained quiet.
Then he asked the question nobody else dared ask.
"Did you actually see his face?"
My mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
The accident had happened after a warehouse explosion.
The coffin had remained closed.
Everyone had said the damage was too severe.
My father insisted I shouldn't remember Daniel that way.
I had agreed.
God...
I had never actually seen him.
Margaret hurried back into the room carrying an old archive box.
"I found something."
She emptied decades of company records across the conference table.
Employment contracts.
Insurance files.
Board minutes.
Then one faded envelope slid free.
Addressed to my father.
CONFIDENTIAL
Inside was a single photograph.
Three men stood outside an old warehouse.
One was my father.
One was a man I didn't recognize.
The third...
My breath caught.
Daniel.
On the back, written in my father's handwriting:
The Project Must Never Be Discovered.
Project?
What project?
Why had my father hidden this?
The date was exactly one week before the car crash that killed my parents.
A coincidence?
Or motive?
Hours later, the police forensic team returned from the parking garage.
Their lead investigator looked unsettled.
"We identified the blood."
I stood.
"Emily?"
He slowly shook his head.
"No."
My heartbeat accelerated.
"Then whose?"
The investigator placed another report on the table.
"It belongs to a male."
I frowned.
"We ran it through every available database."
"And?"
"There wasn't a full match."
He looked directly at me.
"But there was a partial familial match."
Every instinct screamed before he finished.
"It belongs to someone closely related to you."
My voice barely worked.
"How closely?"
The investigator answered with visible hesitation.
"Statistically..."
"...the blood most likely belongs to your brother."
The room exploded into chaos.
Mercer immediately grabbed the report.
Margaret stared at me in disbelief.
Security officers exchanged shocked looks.
Lucas whispered to Noah,
"I told you Uncle Danny was real."
I couldn't hear anything else.
Because at that exact moment—
My private cellphone vibrated.
A number with no caller ID.
I answered instantly.
One slow breath came through the speaker.
Then...
A voice I hadn't heard in eight years.
A voice I would have recognized anywhere.
"Hello, Alex."
My knees nearly gave out.
"Daniel?"
A soft chuckle.
"I've missed hearing my big brother say my name."
I couldn't breathe.
"You're dead."
"So everyone believes."
My heart pounded against my ribs.
"Where's Emily?"
A pause.
Then his voice turned frighteningly calm.
"Safe."
"For now."
"What do you want?"
Another laugh.
"I don't want your company."
"I don't want your money."
"I want something much more valuable."
"What?"
His answer came like a knife.
"I want my sons back."
The line went dead.
Every person in the room stared at me.
But none of them noticed what Lucas quietly whispered while looking at the family photograph on the table.
"He lied."
I turned toward him.
"What did you say?"
Lucas looked up with innocent certainty.
"Uncle Danny always said..."
May you like
"...he wasn't really our father."
End of Chapter 4...
