Chapter 4 - Cassandra’s Version
Everyone heard him.
Reporters.
Lawyers.
Court staff.
Me.
Cassandra’s face went white.
Martin kept shouting as the agents handcuffed him.
“She knew! Ask her about the meeting! Ask her what Daniel threatened to expose!”
Cole ordered him silent.
Cassandra backed away.
Her attorney grabbed her arm.
“Don’t say anything.”
She looked at me.
Not with arrogance.
With panic.
Then she left.
I returned to the cabin that afternoon instead of the house.
Naomi argued.
I refused.
“I need to understand what Daniel was doing here.”
So we went back.
Agent Cole questioned Martin for six hours.
Martin requested counsel.
Then requested a deal.
Men like Martin believed rules were walls for other people.
When the walls closed around them, they suddenly became cooperative.
Cole called that evening.
“Martin admits following Daniel.”
I gripped the phone.
“Why?”
“He says Cassandra asked him to.”
“Did he cause the crash?”
“He denies it.”
“Do you believe him?”
“No.”
Neither did I.
According to Martin, Daniel had discovered a laundering network using property developments as fronts.
Martin handled the legal structures.
Several executives supplied money.
Cassandra had introduced Martin to two of them.
She insisted she believed they were legitimate investors.
Daniel discovered otherwise.
Then he found money missing from his company.
He confronted Cassandra.
She claimed Martin manipulated the accounts.
Martin claimed Cassandra knew.
Each blamed the other.
Daniel began recording conversations.
He contacted federal investigators.
Then he died.
“Why would Cassandra send me to the cabin if she knew Daniel hid evidence here?” I asked.
Cole replied, “Maybe she didn’t know where it was hidden.”
“Then why send me here?”
“We’ve wondered the same thing.”
The answer came the next morning.
Earl found an envelope at the general store addressed to me.
No stamp.
Someone had slipped it under the door.
Inside was a photocopy of a handwritten note.
Daniel’s handwriting.
Mom will be safest at the cabin if things go wrong.
Below it was a date.
Two months before his death.
I sat down.
Maybe Cassandra had seen that note.
Maybe she thought sending me here fulfilled something Daniel had arranged.
But that made no sense.
Her cruelty had been real.
Her words had been real.
Go die in the mountains.
I flipped the photocopy over.
A message was typed on the back.
ASK CASSANDRA WHY SHE WAS CRYING THE NIGHT DANIEL DIED.
No signature.
I called Naomi.
She came immediately.
Agent Cole arrived an hour later.
He bagged the note.
“Who knew Daniel wrote this?” I asked.
Cole shook his head.
“We’ll find out.”
I remembered that night.
The police had called Cassandra first.
She called me.
Her voice had been strange.
Not hysterical.
Flat.
She said, “Daniel’s gone.”
When I arrived, she was sitting on the kitchen floor.
Her hands were shaking.
She kept repeating, “I didn’t mean for this.”
At the time, I thought she meant she didn’t mean for him to drive in bad weather after their argument.
Now those words returned like ice water.
I didn’t mean for this.
That evening Cassandra came to the cabin alone.
No luxury car.
No lawyer.
She drove Daniel’s old pickup.
She stood outside in the rain.
I almost didn’t open the door.
Then I did.
She looked exhausted.
Her hair was wet.
No makeup.
No polished armor.
“I need to tell you what happened,” she said.
I stepped aside.
She sat at the table where Daniel’s photograph rested.
For a long time, neither of us spoke.
Then Cassandra began.
Daniel had confronted her three months before his death.
He showed her transactions.
Names.
Contracts.
He accused Martin of laundering money.
He accused Cassandra of helping.
She admitted introducing investors.
She denied knowing they were criminals.
“Daniel didn’t believe me,” she said.
“Should he have?”
Her eyes lowered.
“No.”
That surprised me.
“I liked the money,” she continued. “I liked the access. I liked people treating me like I mattered.”
“You mattered to Daniel.”
“That stopped feeling like enough.”
At least she was finally honest.
She confessed that Martin had paid her referral fees.
She knew some arrangements were questionable.
She convinced herself they weren’t criminal.
Daniel threatened to report everything.
Cassandra panicked.
She called Martin.
“I told him Daniel was going to meet federal agents.”
My stomach turned.
“Where?”
“At a lodge outside Pine Hollow.”
“Why tell Martin?”
“I thought he would destroy documents. Transfer money. Run.”
“You knew he was dangerous.”
“I knew he was desperate.”
“That’s the same thing.”
Tears filled her eyes.
“I didn’t know he would follow Daniel.”
I stood.
“You told the man stealing from my son exactly where my son would be.”
“Yes.”
“And Daniel died.”
“Yes.”
I wanted to hate her cleanly.
It would have been easier.
But grief is rarely clean.
Cassandra was guilty of greed.
Cowardice.
Betrayal.
Perhaps not murder.
Still enough to destroy a family.
“What happened after the crash?”
“Martin called me.”
“When?”
“Before the police.”
My breath stopped.
“What did he say?”
Cassandra whispered, “He said, ‘It’s handled.’”
The cabin went silent.
“You never told police?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I was terrified.”
“For yourself.”
“Yes.”
That word mattered.
She didn’t pretend otherwise.
“Then why throw me out?”
She covered her face.
“At first I wanted the house sold because Martin said investigators might freeze everything.”
“And the cabin?”
“I found Daniel’s note.”
Mom will be safest at the cabin if things go wrong.
“So you sent me here.”
“I told myself I was protecting you.”
“You told me to die here.”
Cassandra cried harder.
“I wanted you to hate me enough not to come back.”
I stared at her.
“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
“I know.”
“Why not tell me?”
“Because Martin was watching you.”
That changed the air.
“What?”
“He asked constantly what you knew. After the funeral, I caught him searching Daniel’s study.”
“Why didn’t you call police?”
“I was already implicated. I thought no one would believe me.”
I thought of Martin in the living room.
His nervous expression.
His almost-helpful tone.
Cassandra looked at me.
“I knew Daniel had hidden something at the cabin, but I didn’t know what. I thought if Martin believed I hated you, he wouldn’t think I’d sent you somewhere safe.”
“You sent me without food.”
“I had Earl check the place the day before.”
I remembered canned goods.
Water containers.
Fresh matches.
I had assumed Daniel left them years ago.
“You arranged that?”
“Yes.”
“Why the cruelty?”
“Martin was in the house.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
“The day I threw you out. He was there listening.”
I remembered Martin standing behind her.
Of course.
She continued.
“I needed him to believe you meant nothing to me.”
“You were convincing.”
She flinched.
I didn’t apologize.
“I’m not asking forgiveness,” she said. “I’m asking you to understand that Martin thinks Daniel gave you something.”
“He did.”
Her eyes widened.
I immediately regretted saying it.
“What?”
“Nothing that concerns you.”
She stood.
“Helen, if Martin told anyone else—”
“He’s in federal custody.”
“Yes.”
“But he wasn’t working alone.”
That was true.
Cassandra took a folded page from her pocket.
“I found this in Daniel’s study yesterday.”
I opened it.
A list of initials.
Dates.
Dollar amounts.
At the bottom was one full name.
Charles Merrick.
I knew it.
Everyone in the state knew it.
Merrick Development had built malls, office towers, entire neighborhoods.
Charles Merrick was a billionaire.
A donor.
A man photographed with governors.
Daniel had written beside his name:
MASTER ACCOUNT.
Cassandra whispered, “Martin was never the top.”
Agent Cole arrived thirty minutes later.
He read the page.
His expression changed.
“We’ve suspected Merrick.”
“Of what?” I asked.
“Everything.”
Then his phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
His face went hard.
“What happened?” Naomi asked.
Cole lowered the phone.
“Martin Vale was being transported to federal detention.”
“And?”
“The vehicle was hit.”
My stomach tightened.
“Is he alive?”
Cole looked at us.
“For now.”
Then another agent ran toward the cabin.
“Cole!”
He held up his phone.
A photograph filled the screen.
My four-million-dollar house.
May you like
Smoke pouring from an upstairs window.
And someone had just set Daniel’s study on fire.
