Chapter 14 - THE OTHER BABY
The receipt came from a pharmacy in Lowell.
Security footage was long gone.
But the loyalty account attached to the purchase belonged to Mara Caldwell.
Mara looked confused when Adrian asked.
Then she remembered.
"It wasn't for me."
The formula was for a baby belonging to a young Whitmore subcontractor named Tessa Nolan.
Tessa had come to Daniel terrified.
Her husband, Seth, worked under Richard's operations group and had discovered fake inspection data.
Richard threatened his job.
Tessa and the baby were staying in a motel.
Daniel bought formula because they had no money left.
Marissa stared at the receipt.
Twenty-eight dollars.
The same amount she had begged her mother for fourteen months later.
"He would do that," she whispered.
Adrian felt the strange symmetry like a hand on his chest.
Daniel had spent his last full day alive helping someone else's family survive.
They found Tessa in Maine.
She had left Seth months earlier.
When Adrian said Daniel's name, she invited them inside.
"He saved my husband from going to jail for something Richard ordered."
Seth had been told to alter material-tracking records.
Daniel secretly copied the original logs and told him to refuse further changes.
After Daniel died, Seth panicked and obeyed Richard again.
"He's the man arrested at the school," Adrian said.
Tessa nodded.
"Richard told him if the old samples were tested, Seth would take the blame for everything."
She gave Ortiz a box of messages.
One was from Richard.
REMOVE THE OLD CORES. DANIEL IS GONE. DO NOT CREATE A SECOND PROBLEM.
That was enough for prosecutors to expand the case.
But Tessa had one more thing.
"Daniel left this with us."
A storage receipt.
Boston Harbor Lockers.
Unit 408.
Adrian opened it with a court order that night.
Inside was a hard drive and a child's wooden toy boat.
The drive contained Whitmore project files.
The toy boat had one word burned into the bottom.
OWEN.
Marissa went silent.
Daniel had made it before he died.
May you like
He had known they were having a boy.
And hidden beneath the boat was a key taped to the wood.
