The Child They Never Stopped Searching For

CHAPTER 3 - The Woman Without Her Name

Police accompanied the Vale family to St. Catherine's Recovery Home.

They found Laura sitting beside a window on the third floor.

She was thinner, and her dark hair had turned gray at the temples, but Adrian recognized her immediately.

Noah stopped in the doorway.

Laura looked at him without recognition.

His face fell.

"I thought she would know me."

A doctor explained that Laura suffered a serious head injury before being admitted. She remembered horses, the estate, and parts of her childhood, but many personal memories were missing.

Victor had registered her as a woman without relatives. He paid the facility to prevent visitors and transferred her whenever investigators asked questions.

Noah sat across from her and showed her the pendant.

Laura's fingers began to shake.

"Where did you get that?"

"You gave it to my aunt."

He told her his name.

Laura repeated it quietly.

"Noah."

She touched his face.

Then she began crying.

"I left you with Rose."

Noah nodded.

"You said you would come back."

"I tried."

Laura remembered driving toward Adrian's house with the financial records. Victor followed her and forced her car off the road.

She woke in a hospital, confused and unable to explain who she was. Victor arrived before the police identified her.

He moved her to St. Catherine's and told the staff she had no family.

Adrian promised that Victor would never control her again.

But Noah had another concern.

He showed Laura the sharp metal found beneath the white horse's bridle.

Laura recognized it as a cruel device used to make a trained horse rear without warning.

"Victor used the same trick years ago when he wanted an owner to sell an expensive horse cheaply," she said.

Adrian remembered Grace's accident.

Six months earlier, her horse suddenly reared during a private lesson. She fell and injured her spine.

The saddle and bridle disappeared before anyone examined them.

Noah opened Rose's letter again. She had written down the name of a stable worker who continued sending her information after Laura disappeared.

The worker, Thomas Reed, still worked at the arena.

Police found Thomas attempting to leave town.

He confessed that Victor paid him to place the metal beneath the white horse's bridle. He had also prepared Grace's horse before her accident.

Victor wanted Adrian to believe the estate was unsafe. He planned to convince him to sell the property to a development company.

The company secretly belonged to Victor.

As police prepared an arrest warrant, Adrian received a message from the arena.

Victor had locked himself inside the financial office.

He was burning the remaining records.

The man who stole Laura's name and Grace's ability to walk was trying to destroy the last evidence before the family could reach him.