Chapter 7 - THE NEXT CHILD
Jacob Bell was missing.
His mother discovered his empty bed at 6:12 a.m.
The window was open.
The screen had been cut.
There was no ransom note.
No struggle.
Just one muddy footprint beneath the window.
Caleb’s cousin Rachel called him screaming.
“They took him!”
Caleb felt as though Vale had reached through the phone and wrapped a hand around his throat.
Tom mobilized every available deputy.
An Amber Alert went out.
Roadblocks appeared within an hour.
Investigators searched Vale’s records for references to Jacob.
They found eleven.
Jacob had undergone blood testing at Vale’s clinic two months earlier after Margaret convinced Rachel the boy needed a “family genetic screening.”
Vale had everything.
Blood type.
Medical history.
Allergies.
School.
Home address.
Routine.
“He planned this,” Caleb said.
Tom nodded.
“Possibly as a replacement subject.”
Rachel overheard.
“What does that mean?”
Nobody wanted to tell her.
She demanded an answer.
When she understood, she collapsed against the wall.
Margaret was brought into an interview room again.
Rachel refused to look at her.
“You sent us to him.”
Margaret sobbed.
“I didn’t know.”
“You always say you didn’t know!”
“I thought he was doing tests!”
“You said he saved Caleb’s girls!”
“I believed—”
Rachel slapped the table.
“Stop saying believed!”
Tom intervened.
“Rachel.”
She turned away.
Margaret covered her face.
Then said, “There’s another place.”
Everyone looked at her.
Caleb’s voice went cold.
“How many places does this man have?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then why are you suddenly remembering them one at a time?”
“Because some things I didn’t understand were important.”
“Where?”
“A closed children’s clinic outside Kerrville. Theodore invested in it years ago.”
Tom immediately dispatched officers.
The clinic was empty.
But not unused.
A bed was warm.
Medical packaging lay on the floor.
And a security camera showed Melissa Vale entering with Jacob at 4:03 a.m.
Jacob was walking.
Alive.
Behind her came Theodore Vale.
He looked directly into the camera before disappearing inside.
Three hours later he left alone.
Tom replayed the footage.
“Where is the boy?”
Investigators searched every room.
Nothing.
Then a deputy noticed fresh tire tracks behind the building.
Vale had switched vehicles.
Rosa studied a photograph of the tire pattern.
“Truck.”
Tom nodded.
“Likely.”
“What kind?”
“Too early.”
She looked toward the clinic.
“Where would he go if he needed privacy, electricity, refrigeration, and no neighbors?”
Tom opened a regional map.
Dozens of possibilities.
Ranches.
Storage buildings.
Hunting properties.
Abandoned industrial sites.
Caleb stared at the map.
Then Emma, who was sitting in a wheelchair nearby after insisting she wanted to help, spoke quietly.
“The blue house.”
Everyone turned.
Caleb crouched.
“What blue house?”
“Dr. Vale talked about it.”
“When?”
“When he thought I was sleeping.”
Emma rubbed her hands together.
“He and Nurse Caroline argued.”
“What did they say?”
“She said something about supplies. He told her, ‘Take them to the blue house if Mercer becomes difficult.’”
Tom spread property photographs across a table.
None were blue.
Then Rachel whispered, “The old Langford place.”
Caleb looked at her.
“What?”
“Granddad used to call it the blue house.”
“Where?”
“West of Junction. It was painted blue when we were kids.”
Margaret’s head snapped up.
“Oh God.”
Caleb turned.
“You know it?”
“The property belonged to William’s mother.”
“Who owns it now?”
Margaret whispered, “Mercer Family Holdings.”
The drive took ninety minutes.
Police ordered Caleb to remain behind.
He ignored them until Tom threatened to arrest him.
Rosa stayed with the girls.
Rachel waited at the command post.
Officers approached the abandoned farmhouse shortly after noon.
The outside was now white.
But beneath peeling paint, blue boards showed through.
They found Jacob in the basement.
Alive.
Unconscious.
An IV line ran into his arm.
Vale was gone.
Melissa was gone.
But they had left less than fifteen minutes earlier.
Paramedics rushed Jacob to the hospital.
Toxicology tests showed he had been sedated but had not yet received the poison used on the Mercer girls.
Rachel held him for almost an hour after he woke.
When Margaret tried to visit, Rachel refused.
By evening, police had identified the truck.
It belonged to a former Vale Foundation employee.
The owner claimed it had been stolen.
Then another piece of evidence surfaced.
A traffic camera captured the truck heading east.
Toward Mercer Ranch.
Caleb looked at Tom.
“He’s going home.”
“Maybe.”
“Why?”
“Destroy evidence.”
Rosa shook her head.
“No.”
Everyone turned.
“If he wanted to destroy evidence, he could burn the house when nobody was there.”
“What are you thinking?”
“He wants Caleb.”
Caleb stared at her.
“Why?”
“Because Vale blames him for everything collapsing.”
Tom ordered the ranch secured.
Deputies entered at 8:05 p.m.
The house appeared empty.
Then one officer found the back door unlocked.
Another found blood on the kitchen floor.
Not much.
A few drops.
They followed them toward the library.
Inside, Margaret Bell sat tied to a chair.
She had been released earlier that afternoon under strict conditions because prosecutors wanted her cooperation.
Vale had been waiting for her.
Tape covered her mouth.
A small cut marked her forehead.
Pinned to her dress was a note.
BRING CALEB TO THE SOUTH PASTURE.
MIDNIGHT.
ALONE.
OR I FINISH WHAT I STARTED.
Tom crumpled the note.
“You’re not going.”
Caleb looked at the clock.
Three hours.
“Yes, I am.”
“No.”
“He wants me.”
“He wants control.”
“Then give him what he thinks he wants.”
Rosa stepped forward.
“Caleb.”
“I’m not risking my daughters.”
“Going alone risks them too.”
“I’m not actually going alone.”
Tom stared at him.
Caleb pointed toward the pasture map.
“Vale spent six months at this ranch. He knows the roads, barns, and buildings.”
“So?”
“So he’ll expect police.”
Tom’s expression shifted.
“He’ll choose somewhere he can see them coming.”
Caleb nodded.
“But there’s one place he doesn’t know.”
“What place?”
Caleb looked at Rosa.
“The old irrigation tunnel beneath the south pasture.”
At 11:53 p.m., Caleb walked alone toward the pasture carrying no visible weapon.
Police officers crawled through the tunnel beneath him.
Rosa watched from a surveillance vehicle despite Tom ordering her to remain at the hospital.
“I’ve become terrible at listening,” she said.
At midnight exactly, a figure appeared near the cattle shed.
Theodore Vale.
He held a pistol.
“Caleb.”
Caleb stopped.
“Where’s Melissa?”
Vale smiled.
“Always asking the wrong question.”
“What do you want?”
“My research.”
“It belongs in an evidence locker.”
“You think those fools understand what I accomplished?”
“You poisoned children.”
“I learned to reproduce disease states.”
“You poisoned children.”
“I could have revolutionized diagnostic science!”
“You poisoned my daughters.”
Vale’s smile vanished.
“They were supposed to recover.”
“Grace wasn’t.”
For the first time, Vale seemed surprised Caleb knew.
“You read the files.”
“All of them.”
“Then you know Emma would have become proof.”
“Proof of what? That you could almost murder a nine-year-old?”
Vale raised the gun.
“You destroyed twenty-seven years of work.”
Caleb took one more step.
“No.”
He looked directly at Vale.
“Rosa smelled it.”
Vale’s face twisted.
And from somewhere behind him, a woman screamed.
“THEODORE!”
Melissa emerged from the darkness.
Blood covered her sleeve.
Behind her came two deputies.
“Drop the gun!” one shouted.
Vale spun.
A shot exploded across the pasture.
Caleb dove.
Police rushed forward.
When the dust settled, Vale lay on the ground.
Alive.
Wounded in the shoulder.
Handcuffed.
Melissa was arrested ten yards away.
Caleb stood shaking beneath the moonlight.
Tom approached.
“It’s over.”
Caleb looked toward the ranch house.
“No.”
He thought of eleven dead children.
Three recovering daughters.
Jacob.
Margaret.
May you like
Rosa.
“It’s just finally stopped.”
