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“You have an answer for everything, don’t you?” Marlowe said curtly.
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks at my company,” Bowie replied.
Chapter 16
Everyone who filed into the boardroom the next day was aware of the conspicuously empty chair at the conference table.
Ace’s chair.
Marlowe could see by the looks on her siblings’ faces that they all felt as awful about Ace’s absence as she did. Oddly enough, she had the feeling that her father felt the same way that the rest of them did.
All of them except for Selina, of course. Her father’s haughty ex looked like the cat that had eaten the canary—and had enjoyed every bite.
Selina leveled her gaze at Marlowe, looking at her expectantly. “Well, go ahead, tell us what you learned, Marlowe,” she urged. As if she and that woman had a close relationship, Marlowe thought, rather than the antagonistic one that existed between them.
“We didn’t learn anything,” Marlowe informed Selina coolly.
“Well, that doesn’t sound right,” Selina commented. The woman cocked her head, as if trying to understand. “Why not?” she asked.
Marlowe fought the really strong desire to scratch the woman’s eyes out. She had a feeling that Selina already knew the answer to that.
Taking a breath, Marlowe managed to get her temper under control. Going down to Selina’s level wouldn’t accomplish anything or lead anywhere, Marlowe told herself.
Deliberately turning toward the other people who were around the table, she said, “According to the hospital administrator, the day Ace was born, there was a fire in the maternity ward. All the records there at the time were destroyed in that fire.”
“A fire?” Ainsley repeated, surprised. “I don’t remember ever hearing about a fire breaking out at the hospital before.”
Marlowe nodded. “From what Callum and I could piece together, it was just a small fire, and it was quickly gotten under control before any lives were threatened,” Marlowe told the group.
“But not before the maternity records were destroyed,” Rafe concluded.
“No, not before then,” Marlowe said, knowing how suspicious that had to sound to them. It did to her, as well.
“That sounds awfully convenient to me,” Selina said to the other board members. There was more than a trace of sarcasm in her voice.
“Yes, it would seem that way,” Marlowe was forced to agree. It was obvious that she was far from satisfied with this outcome. “But I’m not giving up until we get to the bottom of this—and to an explanation of what sounds like a Christmas miracle.”
Her siblings exchanged looks. Marlowe had lost them with her last sentence.
“How’s that again?” Ainsley asked.
“Dad, didn’t you say that when he was born, Ace was very frail and sickly. So frail and sickly, the doctors didn’t expect him to live through the night. And yet, he not only lived, but he actually went on to thrive, almost overnight. The night after his birth,” Marlowe specified.
Remembering, Payne smiled sadly. “I thought those were just the Colton genes, coming to the forefront and taking over,” he told the rest of his children.
“Or,” Marlowe suggested, “it could be someone switching babies that night, substituting a healthy son for an unhealthy one.”
Marlowe knew that, on the outside, it sounded preposterous. “But why?” Ainsley asked. “Why would someone do that? Who stood to benefit from the switch?”
“Well, from where I’m sitting, that sounds like the million-dollar question,” Rafe told the others.
“So you all think we should go looking for the real Ace—provided he survived his sickly infancy.” The statement came from Payne and surprised everyone. He was not in the habit of asking anyone for advice, least of all his children.
Ainsley put her two cents in. “I think we should look for the real Ace, but we should check him out before we risk telling him who he really is,” she told her father. “You don’t want to take a chance on bringing in someone who was shortchanged in the morals department. We have no way of knowing what sort of influences the real Ace had in his life while growing up. For all we know, he might have turned into some kind of serial killer.”
Payne was shaking his head.
“Blood or not, the Ace we knew was—is my son,” Payne insisted, clearly upset by the discussion, despite the fact that he had been the one who had ousted Ace from the boardroom to begin with. It was obvious to Marlowe that for the first time in his life—as far as they knew—Payne regretted something that he had done.
