Chapter 5 - THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
The necklace felt warm from Victor's hand.
I stared at it.
“I don't understand.”
Victor looked tired.
“You weren't supposed to.”
Adrian stepped between us.
“What did my mother know about Nora?”
Victor shook his head.
“Nothing.”
“Then why mention her?”
“She didn't.”
That stopped Adrian.
Victor pointed toward the frame.
“She described a woman who would someday choose the frame.”
I looked at the old photograph.
“She couldn't have known me.”
“No.”
Victor's voice softened.
“She knew you.”
Adrian frowned.
“How?”
Victor looked at him.
“Because she knew what kind of man you would become.”
Adrian didn't respond.
Victor continued.
“Your mother believed you would build walls around yourself.”
“She was right.”
“She also believed someone would eventually walk past those walls without wanting anything from you.”
Everyone in the room seemed uncomfortable.
Caroline looked away.
Vanessa folded her arms.
I could feel the attention on me.
I hated it.
“This isn't romantic,” I said.
Victor smiled faintly.
“No.”
“It sounds like some arranged destiny.”
“No.”
“Then what is it?”
“Evidence.”
That answer surprised me.
Victor pointed to the necklace.
“Look at the clasp.”
I examined it.
There was a tiny metal compartment.
I hadn't noticed it.
Adrian took a small pocketknife from his coat and carefully opened it.
Inside was a rolled piece of paper.
Three lines.
MERCER 214.
BLUE COAT.
ASK WHO PAID THE BOY.
Adrian read it twice.
Grant looked at Victor.
“What boy?”
Victor's expression changed.
“The messenger.”
“What messenger?”
“The boy who delivered the envelope to Evelyn.”
I felt a chill.
“She was expecting someone?”
“No.”
Victor sat down.
“She was followed from the warehouse.”
“By whom?”
“Thomas Wren.”
Adrian's face hardened.
“But Wren wasn't working alone.”
Victor looked toward Grant.
“Neither was I.”
Grant closed his eyes.
Adrian turned.
“You knew?”
Grant nodded.
“I knew Wren was involved.”
“You kept that from me.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
Adrian's voice rose.
“You let me spend twenty years believing my father killed my mother.”
Grant flinched.
“I didn't know the truth.”
“Then what did you know?”
“That your father was terrified.”
Adrian stopped.
Victor spoke.
“Malcolm Vale discovered someone inside the company was stealing millions.”
“Who?”
“Thomas Wren.”
Adrian looked at the notebook.
“Then why was my father protecting him?”
“He wasn't.”
Victor pointed at the initials.
“Wren used your father's name to authorize transfers.”
Adrian stared.
“Forgery?”
“Yes.”
“And my mother discovered it.”
“Yes.”
“Then who killed her?”
Victor didn't answer.
That silence was worse.
I looked at the old photograph.
Something bothered me.
“The boy.”
Victor looked at me.
“You said a boy delivered the envelope.”
“Yes.”
“How old?”
“About twelve.”
“What happened to him?”
Victor looked down.
“He disappeared.”
Adrian stiffened.
“Disappeared?”
“His family moved.”
“Where?”
“No one knows.”
I looked again at the note.
ASK WHO PAID THE BOY.
“Maybe he wasn't just a messenger,” I said.
Victor looked at me.
“What do you mean?”
“Maybe he saw something.”
Adrian's eyes sharpened.
“What did the boy see?”
Victor's silence answered enough.
Then one of the women spoke.
It was Lauren.
“My father used to talk about a delivery boy.”
Everyone turned.
Lauren looked pale.
“He worked around the shipping docks.”
Adrian stared at her.
“What was his name?”
“Eddie.”
Victor stood.
“Eddie Mercer?”
Lauren nodded.
“Yes.”
Grant's face changed.
“Mercer?”
Adrian looked at him.
“Why does that matter?”
Grant didn't answer.
Lauren spoke softly.
“Because my father said Eddie disappeared after witnessing a meeting between Thomas Wren and someone from the Vale family.”
Adrian's jaw tightened.
“Who?”
Lauren shook her head.
“He never said.”
Victor walked to the old desk.
He opened a drawer.
Inside was a faded child’s drawing.
A house.
Three people.
A boy.
A woman.
And a man standing beside a black car.
On the back was written:
Eddie — 1998.
Victor stared at it.
“That boy drew this the morning after your mother died.”
Adrian picked it up.
The man beside the car had one detail drawn clearly.
A ring.
The same signet ring.
Victor's voice dropped.
“Eddie saw the killer.”
I looked at the drawing.
“Then why did he disappear?”
Victor looked toward the dark window.
“Because someone paid his family to leave.”
“Who?”
Victor slowly turned back.
“I don't know.”
Then Grant noticed something on the child's drawing.
A tiny word beneath the car.
He leaned closer.
“That's not a name.”
“What is it?” Adrian asked.
Grant whispered—
“It's a license plate.”
Adrian took the drawing.
His face went cold.
May you like
Because he recognized the plate.
“It belonged to my father.”
