Chapter 4 - The Man We Buried
I had buried Paul eleven years earlier.
Or believed I had.
The body recovered after his boating accident had been badly damaged.
Identification came through dental records.
I never saw his face.
Now Detective Collins examined the photograph and confirmed there was no obvious sign it had been altered.
The man looked older.
Thinner.
But he was Paul.
The investigation into his death was reopened.
Within hours, discrepancies appeared.
The dental identification had been signed by a physician connected to St. Matthew’s.
Elaine Mercer.
Paul had disappeared deliberately.
Why?
The answer arrived inside Bertha’s fourth encrypted folder.
She had recorded her father secretly.
Paul admitted that he had helped establish the financial scheme years earlier.
At first, it involved hiding assets for wealthy clients.
Then Mercer transformed it into something darker.
Insurance fraud.
Estate manipulation.
Patients dying at convenient times.
Paul tried to leave.
Mercer threatened his family.
So he staged his death and disappeared.
I wanted to hate him.
Part of me did.
But another question mattered more.
Why had he returned?
Because Bertha found him.
She had traced old payments.
She demanded the truth.
Paul agreed to testify.
Before he could, Bertha died.
Police began searching for him.
Christopher finally started talking.
He admitted helping conceal financial transactions.
He denied planning Bertha’s death.
According to him, Mercer ordered him to sedate Bertha so they could search for copied records.
He claimed he gave her too much accidentally.
But the autopsy contradicted him.
Bertha had been suffocated.
Christopher blamed Mercer.
Mercer remained missing.
Then Christopher said something that changed everything.
“Paul was there.”
Detective Collins stared at him.
“At Bertha’s house?”
“Yes.”
“When she died?”
Christopher nodded.
I watched through the interrogation-room glass.
My stomach twisted.
Christopher said he had left Bertha unconscious but breathing.
When he returned, Paul was standing over her body.
Was he telling the truth?
Or inventing another villain?
That evening, Veronica sat beside me on the couch.
“Grandma?”
“Yes?”
“Grandpa isn’t bad.”
I froze.
She had never met Paul.
“What did you say?”
“Mommy told me.”
“When?”
“Before she died.”
I sat beside her.
“What exactly did Mommy say?”
“She said Grandpa made a big mistake. But he was trying to fix it.”
Then Veronica reached beneath her stuffed rabbit’s shirt.
There was a tiny brass key sewn inside.
“Mommy gave me this.”
I stared.
“What does it open?”
“She said Grandpa would know.”
Police traced the key to an old railway storage facility.
Unit 118.
We went the following morning.
Inside were boxes of records.
Enough evidence to dismantle the entire scheme.
But Paul wasn’t there.
On the table was a recorder.
I pressed play.
Paul’s voice filled the room.
“Margaret, if you hear this, I owe you more apologies than I have years left to give.”
I closed my eyes.
He explained everything.
His disappearance.
Mercer.
His cowardice.
His decision to remain hidden because he believed it kept us safe.
Then Bertha found him.
“She was braver than I ever was.”
His voice broke.
“She told me hiding wasn’t protection. It was abandonment.”
Tears ran down my face.
The recording continued.
“Christopher drugged her. Mercer killed her. I arrived too late.”
My breath stopped.
Paul had witnessed Mercer leaving Bertha’s house.
He tried CPR.
Bertha was already dead.
He panicked.
Instead of calling police, he fled.
Cowardice again.
But before leaving, he took something Mercer dropped.
A syringe.
It contained Mercer’s fingerprints and traces of the sedative.
He hid it in the storage unit.
Police found it exactly where he said.
It was enough to strengthen the murder case.
But Mercer was still missing.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
“Margaret.”
I knew the voice.
Paul.
For eleven years, I had imagined hearing it again.
Now I couldn’t speak.
“I’m sorry.”
“Where are you?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“The police need you.”
“I know.”
“Then come in.”
Silence.
“I will.”
“When?”
“After I finish one thing.”
“Paul—”
“Mercer is coming for Veronica.”
My blood froze.
“How do you know?”
“Because Veronica saw her.”
I looked at my granddaughter.
Paul continued.
“Bertha wasn’t talking about Christopher when she said someone would burn the proof.”
“What?”
“She was talking about Elaine.”
The line crackled.
May you like
Then Paul whispered:
“And Elaine is already inside your house.”
