Chapter 4 - A Photograph of Two Identical Boys
For the next ten seconds, I forgot how to breathe.
“You met Gabriel yesterday.”
“I met someone who claimed to be Gabriel.”
“But you said you didn’t know he survived.”
“I didn’t. Not until yesterday.”
Sébastien sat at the kitchen table while I remained standing across from him.
No touching.
No comforting.
No marriage between us for the moment.
Just questions.
“Start at the beginning.”
He nodded slowly.
“Yesterday afternoon, I received an email at work.”
“From Gabriel?”
“From someone using that name.”
“What did it say?”
“‘Your brother didn’t drown.’”
My stomach tightened.
“I thought it was some disgusting joke.”
“What happened?”
“He sent the photograph.”
The same lake photograph.
“I agreed to meet him in a parking garage near my office.”
“And the man looked like you?”
“Almost exactly.”
“Did he have the scar?”
“I didn’t ask him to lift his shirt, Lucie.”
“That’s not funny.”
“I know.”
He looked exhausted.
“What did he want?”
“Money.”
“How much?”
“Two million.”
I laughed in disbelief.
“For what?”
“He claimed our father left assets in a hidden trust and that my mother illegally transferred everything to me after Gabriel was declared dead.”
“Is that true?”
“I don’t know.”
“You run a financial company.”
“That doesn’t mean I know what my parents did when I was nine.”
“What happened after you refused?”
“He threatened you.”
My skin prickled.
“What did he say?”
“That accidents happen to families.”
I thought of the crashed SUV.
“You gave him your ring?”
“No.”
“Your watch?”
“No.”
“Wallet?”
“No.”
“Phone?”
“No.”
“Then how did the dead man get them?”
Sébastien looked at me.
“After the meeting, I went downstairs to another office. When I left, my briefcase was gone.”
“With everything inside?”
“Wallet and secondary phone.”
“What about your ring and watch?”
“I had taken them off during a medical appointment that morning and put them in the briefcase.”
“Why?”
“An MRI.”
That explanation could be verified.
For the first time, something felt solid.
“Why was your SUV stolen?”
“My keys were in the briefcase.”
I closed my eyes.
“So the man you met could have taken everything.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you report it?”
“I received another message.”
“What did it say?”
“If I involved police, you’d disappear before sunrise.”
I stared at him.
“So you came home and said nothing.”
“I thought silence would protect you.”
“It almost got me killed by fear.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
I walked away.
A knock came at the door.
Both of us froze.
Detective Delon stood outside.
He entered with another investigator.
“We have DNA preliminary results.”
My knees weakened.
“And?”
Delon looked at Sébastien.
“The deceased is closely related to you.”
“How closely?”
“Most likely a full sibling.”
Gabriel.
Except Gabriel had been in my apartment alive less than two hours earlier.
I looked at Sébastien.
He looked at me.
Then at Delon.
“My brother is alive.”
Delon frowned.
“What?”
“I saw him,” I said.
The detective stared at me.
“When?”
“This morning.”
Now everybody began talking at once.
Delon demanded details.
Description.
Timing.
What he said.
How he entered.
Then he asked to see the flash drive.
I hesitated.
Sébastien noticed.
“So you do have something from him.”
I handed it to Delon.
He placed it in an evidence bag.
“Do not connect unknown storage devices to your computers,” he said. “We’ll examine it.”
“What about the dead man?” I asked.
“We need full DNA sequencing, but if Mr. Reyes had an identical twin…”
“He did,” I said.
Delon’s expression became grim.
“Then things become complicated.”
“How?”
“Standard testing can have difficulty distinguishing identical twins.”
I felt sick again.
“So how do we know who’s who?”
“Medical history. Dental records. Fingerprints if recoverable. Epigenetic analysis. Acquired injuries.”
“The shoulder scar,” I said.
“Yes.”
Sébastien looked confused.
“What shoulder scar?”
“Yours.”
He touched his left shoulder instinctively.
“The dead man didn’t have it.”
Relief moved through his face.
Then Delon said, “But the victim had something else.”
He placed a photograph on the table.
An old surgical image.
“A metal fixation pin in the right ankle.”
Sébastien shook his head.
“I’ve never broken my ankle.”
“Did Gabriel?”
“I don’t know.”
The detective looked at both of us.
“We tracked hospital records from twenty-three years ago.”
He opened a folder.
“A boy matching Gabriel Reyes’s age was admitted after a river rescue.”
My heart accelerated.
“He survived.”
“Yes.”
“Where did he go?”
“Into state care temporarily. Then records become strange.”
“How strange?”
“He was released to a legal guardian named Elena Marceau.”
Sébastien frowned.
“I’ve never heard that name.”
Delon continued.
“We searched her records. She died eleven years ago.”
“And Gabriel?”
“No record after age seventeen.”
“Nothing?”
“Officially, no.”
The investigator beside him spoke.
“But we found something in the dead man’s clothing.”
Another photograph.
Recent.
Three men stood outside an industrial warehouse.
One was the dead man.
Before the accident.
His face clearly visible.
Identical to Sébastien.
The second was unknown.
The third—
My stomach dropped.
It was the man who had entered my apartment that morning.
Gabriel.
Two identical men.
Standing side by side.
I looked at Sébastien.
Then at Delon.
“That means…”
The detective nodded.
“There may have been three brothers.”
Silence.
“No,” Sébastien whispered.
Delon turned over the photograph.
On the back were three handwritten names.
Sébastien. Gabriel. Nicolas.
My husband sat down hard.
“My mother only had twins.”
“That’s what the records say,” Delon replied.
I looked again.
Three identical faces.
Three grown men.
One alive beside me.
One who had entered my home.
One dead in a morgue.
And suddenly the mystery became much bigger than stolen identification.
Detective Delon’s phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
His face tightened.
“When?”
A pause.
“We’re coming.”
He ended the call.
“What happened?” I asked.
He looked at me.
“The forensic lab examined the dead man’s phone.”
My throat went dry.
“And?”
“There are dozens of photographs of you.”
My heart stopped.
“Me?”
“Taken without your knowledge.”
He looked toward Sébastien.
“Some date back almost four years.”
I felt the room tilt.
The dead man hadn’t appeared yesterday.
Someone with my husband’s face had been watching me for years.
Then Delon added one final detail.
“There’s also a video.”
“What kind of video?”
“A recording inside your bedroom.”
I could barely form the words.
“When?”
Delon’s answer destroyed what little sense of safety I had left.
May you like
“Three weeks ago.”
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