Chapter 4 - The Reflection in My Father's Study
It was Julian.
For several seconds I couldn't reconcile the man in the photograph with my brother standing across the lobby.
Same jaw.
Same haircut.
Same silver watch.
The photograph had been taken at 10:41 p.m.
Dad's official time of death was estimated between ten thirty and eleven.
Julian had told police he hadn't seen Dad that evening.
I walked toward him.
He noticed my face.
"What?"
I held up the phone.
His expression changed immediately.
That frightened me more than denial would have.
"Where did you get that?"
"Why were you there?"
My mother moved between us.
"Claire, this isn't the place."
"No. You're right."
I looked at the federal investigators.
"This is."
Julian cursed under his breath.
One investigator stepped forward.
"Mr. Mercer, we'd like you to come with us."
"I'm not under arrest."
"No."
"Then I'm calling my attorney."
"That's your right."
He turned toward me.
"Claire, you have this wrong."
"Then explain the picture."
He looked around.
Employees were watching.
Vivian whispered, "Don't."
Julian ignored her.
"Dad called me."
"When?"
"That night."
"Why?"
"He'd found out about Harbor Point."
I felt sick.
"So he knew."
"Some of it."
"What happened?"
"We argued."
"Did you hurt him?"
"No!"
The word echoed.
Federal investigators moved closer.
Julian lowered his voice.
"He was alive when I left."
"Then why did you lie to police?"
His eyes dropped.
That was when I knew there was more.
Vivian said sharply, "Julian, stop talking."
I looked at her.
"You knew he was there."
"Claire."
"You knew."
She said nothing.
Julian's attorney arrived fifteen minutes later and ended the conversation.
But the damage was done.
The federal investigators took him for voluntary questioning.
My mother followed.
Before leaving, she turned to me.
"You think you're finding the truth."
"I am."
"No."
Her eyes looked tired for the first time.
"You're finding the pieces Peter wanted you to find."
"What does that mean?"
She stepped close enough that no one else could hear.
"Your father was afraid of Samuel Reid for a reason."
Then she left.
I hated that she could still put doubt inside me with one sentence.
Sarah insisted we return to her office.
Margaret came too.
We analyzed the photograph.
Dad on the floor.
Julian reflected in the glass.
But something bothered me.
"Who took it?"
Sarah nodded.
"Exactly."
The angle came from outside Dad's study doorway.
Meaning a third person had been present.
The timestamp suggested Julian was there.
But the photographer might have been there too.
Margaret examined the image.
"Zoom near the bookcase."
I did.
A portion of a black sleeve appeared at the left edge.
Someone else.
Sarah called the investigator and sent the original file metadata.
Then we checked the number that sent it.
Untraceable.
Margaret remained quiet.
"You know something," I said.
"I'm thinking."
"About what?"
"Samuel."
Sarah closed her laptop.
"Then talk."
Margaret inhaled.
"Samuel had a habit. If he thought someone was lying, he documented everything."
"Pictures?"
"Pictures. Recordings. Copies."
"Could he have taken this?"
"If he was there."
I stared at her.
"Twenty-one years after disappearing?"
"I don't know."
Sarah asked the question I was avoiding.
"Could Samuel have killed Peter?"
Margaret stood.
"No."
"You can't know that."
"I knew Samuel."
"Twenty-one years ago."
Margaret looked toward the window.
"People change."
Exactly.
Dad changed.
Vivian changed.
Julian changed.
Maybe Margaret had too.
That afternoon, Sarah received permission to review Dad's police file.
Official cause of death: cardiac arrest.
No autopsy beyond routine examination because his medical history included arrhythmia.
The responding officer noted no signs of forced entry.
But there was an odd detail.
Dad's desk chair was overturned.
A glass had shattered.
And one desk drawer stood open.
The photographs showed everything.
I enlarged the drawer.
Empty.
"What's normally there?" Sarah asked.
"I don't know."
Margaret answered.
"Peter kept his personal recorder there."
We both looked at her.
"What recorder?"
"A little digital recorder. He used it for job-site notes."
Police had not listed one among the recovered property.
So either Dad moved it.
Or someone took it.
At 4:20 p.m., Julian called me from his attorney's office.
I put him on speaker.
"Claire."
"I'm listening."
"I need to see you."
"No."
"Please."
Julian had never said please to me like that.
Sarah shook her head.
I asked, "Why?"
"Because if I tell investigators everything, Mom goes to prison."
My entire body stiffened.
"For what?"
"I won't say this over the phone."
"Then tell them."
"You don't understand."
"I keep hearing that."
He exhaled.
"Dad didn't die because of Harbor Point."
"What does that mean?"
"He already knew about the loans."
"Then what were you arguing about?"
Silence.
"Julian?"
"Samuel."
Margaret stood abruptly.
"What about him?" I asked.
"Dad told me Samuel was alive."
Margaret covered her mouth.
"Where?"
"He wouldn't say."
"What else?"
"He said Samuel had contacted him."
"When?"
"Two weeks before he died."
My pulse raced.
"Why?"
"To warn him."
"About what?"
Julian paused.
Then said, "You."
Sarah and I exchanged a look.
"Me?"
"Dad said someone was going to challenge the trust."
"Who?"
"I don't know."
"Julian—"
"He wouldn't tell me. He just kept saying he'd made a mistake twenty-one years ago."
"What mistake?"
"I don't know."
I could hear frustration in his voice.
"I swear to God, Claire, he wouldn't tell me."
"Why did you lie about being at the house?"
Another silence.
"Because Mom came after me."
My stomach tightened.
"What time?"
"Ten fifty-something."
"Was Dad alive?"
"When I left, yes."
"When Mom arrived?"
"I don't know."
"Did you see her?"
"No. She called me the next morning and told me Dad was dead."
"So how do you know she came after you?"
"Because I saw her car."
That directly contradicted Vivian's statement to police.
She claimed she'd been home all evening.
I asked Julian why he had protected her.
His voice broke slightly.
"She's my mother."
The first human thing he'd said to me in months.
Then he added, "And because she told me if I talked, we'd both lose everything."
Sarah wrote something.
"What does she know about Samuel?" I asked.
"A lot more than she's saying."
"Does she know where he is?"
"I think so."
Before he could continue, someone spoke in the background.
Julian went silent.
"Who is that?"
"No one."
"Julian?"
"I have to go."
"Wait."
His voice dropped to a whisper.
"Claire, don't go back to Dad's workshop."
My skin prickled.
"Why?"
"Because the hidden compartment wasn't the only thing under the floor."
The line disconnected.
I looked at Margaret.
"What else is there?"
She looked genuinely confused.
"I don't know."
That evening, despite Sarah's objections, we returned to the workshop with two private security guards.
The hidden compartment was empty now.
Police had documented it.
We examined the floor.
One guard found a slight difference in the wood near the rear wall.
Four boards had newer screws.
We removed them.
Below was a shallow cavity.
Inside lay a waterproof plastic container.
Dad had hidden another archive.
There were notebooks.
Bank statements.
Photographs.
And a digital recorder.
My hands shook.
Sarah photographed everything before touching it.
The recorder still had battery power.
Twenty-three recordings.
Most were job notes.
Then we found one dated two weeks before Dad died.
Sarah pressed play.
Static.
Then Dad's voice.
"Samuel, if you're hearing this, I got your message."
My heart stopped.
Another man's voice answered.
Older.
Rough.
"You waited too long, Peter."
Dad said, "I thought Vivian had stopped."
"People like Vivian don't stop."
"What did she find?"
"The original transfer."
"What does she know about Claire?"
Silence.
Then Samuel said:
"Enough to know Claire isn't only your beneficiary."
The recording crackled.
Dad sounded terrified.
"Does she know about Evelyn?"
Margaret gasped.
I paused the recording.
"Evelyn was Samuel's dead daughter."
Margaret didn't answer.
"Wasn't she?"
Her face had gone pale.
I stepped closer.
"Margaret."
Tears appeared in her eyes.
"I didn't lie."
"Then what didn't you tell me?"
She looked at the recorder.
"Samuel had a daughter named Evelyn."
"Who died."
"Yes."
"When?"
Margaret closed her eyes.
"Not as a baby."
Everything inside me went still.
"How old?"
"Twenty-one."
My birth mother Vivian had been twenty-one when Julian was born.
A terrible possibility entered my mind.
"No."
Margaret began crying.
"Claire—"
"Who was Evelyn?"
Before she answered, the security guard at the front shouted.
"Someone's outside."
Headlights flashed through the workshop windows.
A car stopped.
The driver's door opened.
A man stepped into the light.
Gray hair.
Thin build.
Older face.
I recognized him from the surveillance photograph.
Samuel Reid.
Margaret stopped breathing.
He looked through the glass directly at me.
Then he raised one hand.
He was holding Dad's missing original will.
But someone stepped out of the passenger side behind him.
May you like
My mother.
And Vivian was pointing a gun at his back...
