The four girls ch0se a stranger as their father—then their m0ther revealed why Mercer wanted their family 10025

He was in his early forties, perhaps, clean-shaven and carefully dressed.

There was nothing openly threatening about him.

If I had seen him across a boardroom, I might have assumed he was an attorney, an investment adviser, or one of those men who used the phrase “long-term strategy” while quietly arranging everyone else’s future.

“Mr.

Hayes,” he said.

So he knew me.

That made two of us.

“Mr.

Mercer.”

His eyes flickered.