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CHAPTER 18

Raleigh, North Carolina Sunday, July 21, 2024

SLEEP WAS ELUSIVE. HER CONVERSATION WITH AGENT MICHAELS RAN in a repetitive loop through her thoughts. Her mind stirred with terrors about being snatched from her birth parents and sold off to an unsuspecting couple so desperate for a child that they bypassed the mainstream channels for something shadier. Sloan held no ill will toward her parents. She loved them and always would. But she also felt a foreign pull toward Preston and Annabelle Margolis, and a blossoming need to find out what happened to them.

She finally pushed the covers to the side and climbed from bed. The alarm clock told her it was 2:30 in the morning. In the kitchen she grabbed her phone and wrote a short text to James the genealogist.

James,

Is there a way you can get me Nora Margolis’s home address? She’s the woman whose husband’s DNA profile I matched to.

Just curious, Sloan

She opened her laptop, ready to spend another obnoxious chunk of time reading about the Margolis family, Sandy Stamos’s death, and the mysterious hit-and-run case from 1995. But before she got the chance, her phone buzzed with a reply text from James.

Sloan,

As an admin of the site, I have access to users’ personal information. But I could lose my job if I shared it with you. Also, IMO showing up on your aunt’s doorstep and announcing that your DNA profile matches that of her missing niece sounds like a really bad idea.

Sloan typed back.

Oh, James, that ship has sailed. If you can’t give me her address, is there another way for me to get in touch with her?

The reply was instant.

Yes, you can direct message her through the site.

Sloan stared at her phone and thought again about her birth parents. She picked up one of the printed pages that rested on her kitchen table. It was of Preston and Annabelle Margolis from the cover of a tabloid. It was difficult to imagine them as her biological parents since Annabelle Margolis was younger in the photo than Sloan’s present age. Still, the sight of that young couple touched her heart. She felt sorry for Preston and Annabelle Margolis, whose two-month-old daughter had been taken from them and sold off through the adoption black market. God only knew what had happened to them.

Sloan looked back at her phone and typed a short reply to James.

Thanks.

With a new sense of resolve and responsibility, she turned back to her laptop and pulled up her Your Lineage profile page. Before she had the opportunity to access the family tree that James had created and find Nora Margolis’s profile, Sloan noticed a red circle at the top right of the screen indicating that another user had messaged her.

An eerie feeling sent her stomach into free fall. She looked around her dark apartment and took a moment to shake the sensation that she was not alone. Finally, she clicked on the message.

Dear Sloan,

My name is Nora Margolis and I’m taking a chance here . . .

I see that your profile matched to my husband, Ellis, indicating that you’re his biological niece. Such a strange question, but in light of the news that law enforcement delivered to us just a couple of days ago . . . are you Charlotte?

—Nora

Sloan’s DNA profile was public. It was the only way James could set up the account to see if she matched to other users. Nora Margolis would have been informed about the connection, as the website called it, when Sloan’s DNA profile matched to the Margolis family. It was likely the only hit Nora Margolis had received in the last week. And after the FBI informed the family that Charlotte Margolis had been found, it wouldn’t take a seasoned detective to figure out how it happened, just an aggressive user of online ancestry sites, which Nora Margolis was.

Sloan stared at the message for several minutes. Where this situation was headed, she had no idea. She only knew that a mounting sense of duty was bubbling up inside of her, one that called her to look into what happened to her birth parents all those years ago.

She dug Eric Stamos’s card from her purse and fired off a quick text.

Eric, it’s Sloan Hastings. I think I found a way into the Margolis family.