Chapter 8 - TWO PLANNED ACCIDENTSThe aircraft Ethan was supposed to board made an emergency landing shortly after takeoff.
No one was injured.
Investigators found evidence that a fuel sensor had been deliberately disconnected.
The failure could have been far worse.
Richard had not only prepared to remove Sophie.
He had prepared to remove Ethan.
Celeste’s forged documents claimed Ethan died while traveling.
The plane incident would have made the lie real.
Detective Bennett expanded the investigation.
Airport cameras showed a man wearing a Mercer Holdings maintenance badge near the aircraft.
The man was identified as Owen Pierce, a former mechanic dismissed for theft.
Police arrested him at his apartment.
He initially denied knowing Richard.
Then investigators found one hundred thousand dollars hidden beneath his floorboards.
Pierce agreed to cooperate.
Richard paid him to create a mechanical emergency.
He insisted the plane was supposed to land safely.
Richard wanted Ethan delayed and unreachable for several hours.
Pierce knew nothing about Anna’s crash.
However, he provided a telephone number used by Richard.
The number connected to a storage facility in Stamford.
Police searched the unit.
Inside were files stolen from Anna’s bedroom.
There were copies of the trust papers, forged custody orders, and photographs of Sophie taken outside school.
A large map of Zurich covered one wall.
Three locations were circled.
The airport.
The Whitmore-Mercer trust office.
A private clinic.
Ethan stared at the clinic’s name.
“Why would they take Sophie there?”
Detective Bennett opened a folder on the desk.
The documents listed Celeste as Sophie’s biological mother.
A doctor at the clinic had agreed to provide false DNA results.
After the trust released the funds, Celeste would claim Ethan had abducted Sophie from her years earlier.
The fabricated medical evidence would make Celeste appear to be the child’s rightful mother.
Sophie would be trapped in another country while Ethan fought an international custody case.
A receipt showed a five-million-dollar advance paid to the doctor.
Ethan noticed a familiar signature approving the transfer.
Marcus Stern.
The Zurich trustee mentioned in Celeste’s messages.
Anna’s trust had not merely been targeted from outside.
Someone inside the institution was helping them.
Detective Bennett’s phone rang.
Swiss authorities had checked Stern’s office.
He had disappeared.
His assistant found a handwritten appointment in his calendar.
CELESTE VALE.
NEW VERIFICATION DATE.
NEW YORK.
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Celeste no longer needed to reach Zurich.
The corrupt trustee was coming to America.
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