Chapter 3 - What Vanessa Knew
Nathan moved in front of me.
“Stop right there.”
Vanessa shut the door behind her.
“I’m not here to hurt her.”
“You assaulted her four hours ago.”
“I know.”
“That is not helping your case.”
She looked at me.
Something about her had changed.
The arrogance was gone.
So was the rage.
What remained looked like fear.
Real fear.
“Where did the blood come from?” I asked.
She glanced at her sleeve.
“Not mine.”
Nathan reached for his phone.
Vanessa said, “If you call security before I explain, Charles Harlan will know where this box is within five minutes.”
Nathan stopped.
My stomach tightened.
“Preston’s father?”
“Yes.”
“He’s seventy years old and supposedly living in Switzerland.”
“He’s in Boston.”
I looked at Nathan.
He was as surprised as I was.
Vanessa lowered herself into a chair.
For the first time since I had met her, she looked exhausted.
“I deserve whatever Emma thinks of me.”
“That’s convenient,” I said.
“I slept with your husband.”
“Yes.”
“I hit you.”
“Yes.”
“I hated you before I knew you.”
“That one I had figured out.”
Her mouth tightened.
“But I did not come to this hospital today to attack you.”
I almost laughed.
“Your shoe disagrees.”
“I came because Preston told me you had been sent a key.”
Nathan and I exchanged a look.
“How did Preston know?”
Vanessa stared at me.
“Because he arranged it.”
My father’s letter flashed through my mind.
If Preston ever gives you the key...
“He put it on my cup?”
“No. He arranged for someone else to.”
“Why?”
“Because Charles found out the locker still existed.”
Nathan sat opposite her.
“Start at the beginning.”
Vanessa looked at the badge on the table.
Her mother’s face stared back at us.
“She discovered what Harlan Equity was doing in 2012.”
“You knew?”
“I was seventeen. I knew she was scared. I didn’t understand why.”
Her fingers curled together.
“She told me Mr. Mercer was helping her. Then she died.”
Her voice broke once.
Only once.
“The fire report said faulty wiring. My father accepted a settlement from the hospital and moved us away. Two years later he drank himself to death.”
“I’m sorry,” I said before I could stop myself.
Vanessa looked at me in surprise.
“So am I.”
“Did you know my father?”
“Barely. He tried to contact me after my mother died. Charles prevented it.”
“How?”
“He became our family’s benefactor.”
The word sounded poisonous.
“He paid for my school. My apartment. College. Later he gave me a job at Harlan Equity.”
Nathan’s expression darkened.
“He kept you close.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he knew grief can turn into curiosity.”
I thought about Preston.
“Where does my husband fit?”
Vanessa closed her eyes briefly.
“Preston found part of the records when he was twenty-one.”
That would have been before we met.
“He confronted his father. Charles told him the acquisitions were aggressive but legal. Preston believed him at first.”
“At first?”
“Then your father died.”
My stomach turned.
“Preston knew my father was connected to this when he met me?”
“Yes.”
The betrayal cut deeper than the affair.
Our first meeting at a Boston museum fundraiser.
The champagne he accidentally knocked from my hand.
The joke about terrible modern sculpture.
The way he had asked for my number.
I had replayed that night for years as fate.
Now it looked like surveillance.
“He approached me because of my father?”
Vanessa said nothing.
“Answer me.”
“At first.”
The room blurred.
Nathan touched my arm.
I pulled away.
I needed the pain.
It kept me clear.
“He dated me for information.”
“Yes.”
“And then married me?”
Vanessa’s eyes met mine.
“That part wasn’t planned.”
I laughed bitterly.
“You expect that to comfort me?”
“No.”
“Did he love me?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t get to answer that.”
“I know.”
Nathan interrupted.
“You said Charles is here.”
Vanessa nodded.
“When Preston decided to give Emma the key, Charles learned about it.”
“How?”
“I told him.”
The room went silent.
I stared at her.
“You told him?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I was still working for him.”
“You were spying on Preston?”
“Yes.”
“And sleeping with him.”
“Yes.”
I felt sick.
“Why attack me?”
Vanessa swallowed.
“That wasn’t planned.”
“Again, your heel disagrees.”
“I saw the key fall. I panicked. If you picked it up, everything would move too quickly. Charles had people watching. I thought if I created a scene, Preston could take it before anyone noticed.”
“You kicked an eight-month-pregnant woman to protect a key?”
Her eyes filled.
“I know how insane that sounds.”
“It doesn’t sound insane. It sounds monstrous.”
“You’re right.”
That stopped me.
No excuses.
No accusation.
Just agreement.
I didn’t forgive her.
But I listened.
“Who did the blood belong to?” Nathan asked again.
Vanessa’s hands began trembling.
“The volunteer who put the key on Emma’s cup.”
My heart stopped.
“What happened?”
“Charles’s men found him.”
“Is he alive?”
“Yes. Barely. I got him into an emergency room under another name.”
Nathan stood.
“Which hospital?”
“Mass General.”
He immediately called a colleague.
While he spoke, I studied Vanessa.
“Why come here?”
“Because Charles thinks I’m still loyal.”
“Are you?”
“No.”
“When did that change?”
She looked at her mother’s badge.
“Today.”
“Because you kicked me?”
“Because Preston finally told me the truth about your father.”
I froze.
“What truth?”
Vanessa looked toward Nathan.
Then at me.
“Charles didn’t cause your father’s car accident.”
A strange hope rose in me.
It lasted two seconds.
“He ordered someone else to.”
“Who?”
Vanessa didn’t answer.
“Who?”
“Preston knows.”
I stood.
“Where is he?”
“At Harlan House.”
The name alone made my chest tighten.
The Harlan family’s Beacon Hill mansion.
I had attended Christmas there.
Hosted charity dinners there.
Announced my pregnancy there.
“What is he doing?”
“Confronting Charles.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
Nathan ended his call.
“Then he’s a fool.”
“No,” Vanessa whispered. “He’s trying to buy Emma time.”
“For what?”
“To copy the drive.”
I looked at the flash drive on the table.
Vanessa pointed to it.
“That is not the original evidence.”
“What?”
“It’s an encrypted index. The actual files are stored somewhere else.”
“Where?”
“Preston knows.”
Of course he did.
The husband who watched me fall knew everything.
Or enough.
I picked up my phone.
Nathan said, “Emma, don’t call him.”
“I need answers.”
“Not while we don’t know who is listening.”
Vanessa’s phone rang.
She looked at the screen.
All color vanished from her face.
“Who is it?”
“Charles.”
“Answer.”
She shook her head.
Nathan said, “Put it on speaker.”
Vanessa did.
“Hello?”
Charles Harlan’s voice was older than I remembered, but unmistakable.
“Vanessa.”
“Yes.”
“Did Emma open the locker?”
“No.”
A pause.
“You were always a poor liar.”
Vanessa shut her eyes.
Charles continued.
“Put Dr. Mercer on.”
Nathan took the phone.
“This is Mercer.”
“I wondered when you would become inconvenient.”
“You’re threatening a hospital administrator on a recorded line?”
Charles chuckled.
“Still David’s brother.”
Nathan’s jaw tightened.
“Where is Preston?”
“With me.”
I grabbed the phone.
“Let me speak to him.”
Silence.
Then Preston came on.
“Emma?”
His voice sounded strained.
“Are you hurt?”
“Now you ask?”
“I deserve that.”
“Where are you?”
“Don’t come here.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“Emma, listen to me. Give the drive to Nathan and leave Boston.”
I laughed.
“You spent years lying to me, and now you want obedience?”
“I want you alive.”
“Did your father kill mine?”
Silence.
“Preston?”
“I don’t know.”
“Vanessa says you do.”
“I know who was driving the other car.”
My blood went cold.
“There was another car?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Before he could answer, Charles took the phone.
“That is enough family therapy.”
“Charles—”
“You have something that belongs to me, Emma.”
“My father left it for me.”
“Your father stole it.”
“My father died because of it.”
Charles sighed.
“Your father died because he believed righteousness made him untouchable.”
Nathan’s hand tightened into a fist.
I said, “And Marianne Cole?”
Another pause.
“Collateral damage.”
Vanessa made a sound behind me.
Not a sob.
Something deeper.
Charles continued calmly.
“Bring the drive to Harlan House. Come alone. Your husband leaves with you.”
“And if I don’t?”
“He doesn’t.”
The line went dead.
Nathan immediately said, “You are not going.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No.”
“My husband may be an adulterous coward, but I’m not letting him die.”
Vanessa stared at me.
“You still care about him?”
“I care about who I am.”
Nathan paced.
“We call police.”
“With what? A fourteen-year-old letter and an encrypted drive?”
“We have Charles threatening Preston.”
“Not directly.”
Vanessa shook her head.
“He has judges. Police. Politicians.”
Nathan looked at her.
“So what do you suggest?”
Vanessa hesitated.
“Give him what he wants.”
I stared.
“And lose the evidence?”
“No.”
She reached into her purse.
For one terrifying second, I thought she had a weapon.
Instead, she removed another flash drive.
Identical.
“Give him this.”
“What is it?”
“A copy of the index.”
“Then why would he care which one?”
“He won’t.”
I understood.
“We keep the original.”
She nodded.
Nathan still looked unconvinced.
Then my phone vibrated.
A photograph arrived.
Preston sat in his father’s study.
Blood ran from his temple.
Behind him stood a man I recognized from every childhood photograph my mother had hidden after my father’s funeral.
I dropped the phone.
Nathan picked it up.
His face went rigid.
“No.”
“What?” Vanessa asked.
Nathan turned the screen toward us.
The man standing behind Preston had been declared dead fourteen years ago.
He was my father’s former business partner.
And the last person to see my father alive.
Richard Vale.
May you like
The message underneath contained five words.
HE IS WAITING FOR EMMA.
