Chapter 14 - THE MAN IN DANIEL’S UNIFORM
Daniel’s patrol vehicle camera proved he was across town at 8:11.
He could not have been inside the Carter house.
The person in the footage wore his face, uniform, and police walkie-talkie, but moved differently. The left shoulder remained stiff. Daniel had no shoulder injury.
Rebecca had built a physical impersonation.
Police searched her office inventory and found receipts for silicone facial prosthetics, uniform fabric, and voice-modeling equipment.
She intended to create visual evidence that Daniel participated in the family confrontation before responding officially.
If released, the footage could suggest he coached Eli, planted the syringe, or colluded with Hannah.
The impersonator’s identity remained unknown until Nathan Cole reviewed the video.
“That’s the man from the maintenance corridor after Hannah’s bathroom call.”
The same person had appeared during the first hidden ambulance incident six months earlier.
He worked with Rebecca before the pension theft.
Robert’s plan had been developing far longer than anyone understood.
The figure’s gait matched a former Halcyon security contractor named Peter Sloan.
Rebecca’s husband.
She had told colleagues he died from cancer two years earlier.
No death certificate existed.
Peter used a false identity to enter hospitals, homes, and company facilities. He copied Daniel’s uniform, carried forged orders, and helped manipulate camera records.
Police traced a vehicle registered under his alias to a rural property owned by Northstar.
Tactical teams entered before dawn.
They found prosthetics, uniforms, copied badges, and recordings of Daniel’s voice.
Peter and Rebecca were gone.
A wall map displayed three marked locations:
The Carter house.
Halcyon headquarters.
The county hospital.
A fourth location had been added recently.
Eli’s temporary recovery home.
Hannah had not yet moved him there. The address was known only to police, hospital staff, and the protective-services coordinator.
The leak continued.
Daniel ordered an immediate change of plans.
Eli remained at the hospital under a new identity while police announced publicly that he had been transferred.
Rebecca took the bait.
A dark SUV approached the recovery house that evening. Officers stopped it before anyone entered.
Peter Sloan was driving.
Inside were sedatives, restraint ties, a copied police walkie-talkie, and a court order authorizing Eli’s removal for psychiatric evaluation.
Rebecca was not with him.
Peter refused to reveal her location.
He claimed she had become obsessed with proving that Eli’s memories could be rewritten.
“She says the watch made him too certain,” Peter told Daniel.
“Certain of what happened?”
“Certain adults can be wrong.”
Peter spoke as though that belief were dangerous.
Rebecca intended to separate Eli from Hannah and play altered recordings until he doubted which voices were real.
The plan was psychological, but the equipment in the SUV showed she was willing to use force.
Police searched every Northstar property.
Nothing.
Then Hannah’s company badge activated at Halcyon headquarters.
The building was closed and under federal control.
Security footage showed Rebecca entering the executive floor using Hannah’s identity.
She carried Eli’s smartwatch.
The original was still inside evidence.
Or should have been.
Daniel called the vault.
The evidence package remained sealed.
When technicians opened it, they found the duplicate watch from the Carter-house operation.
Someone had switched them.
Rebecca now possessed the authentic device.
She accessed Halcyon’s central server and began uploading its encrypted files.
Not deleting them.
Broadcasting them.
Across every company monitor appeared Eli’s recording of Robert ordering Ryan to silence him.
Then Rebecca’s own voice followed:
“Truth survives numbers.”
Hannah stared at the screen.
Rebecca was using Eli’s phrase.
A final message appeared through the audio system:
May you like
“Hannah, come to your father’s office alone if you want the unedited final minute.”
👉 Rebecca had returned the truth to the company—but she still controlled the part of Eli’s recording no one had heard.
