Chapter 5 - THE PERFECT NEW WIFE

Richard's second wife, Celeste Sterling, had spent ten years building the image of a perfect philanthropist.

She chaired children's charities, hosted literacy luncheons, and appeared in photographs holding hands with students whose names she never remembered. She was also Max's mother and treasurer of the Oak Creek Future Fund.

When Ortiz questioned her, Celeste arrived with two attorneys and a cream-colored suit that looked untouched by ordinary life.

"Rachel Carter is unstable," she said. "She has resented our family for years."

"Why would she name you?" Ortiz asked.

Celeste smiled. "Jealous people need villains."

The police could not hold her without more evidence. Richard posted bail after being charged with tampering and obstruction. By afternoon, his public-relations team released a statement accusing me of using my office to settle a bitter divorce.

Television vans gathered outside the hospital.

My judicial ethics counsel advised me to step away from public duties until an independent review confirmed I had not misused my position. I agreed immediately.

Richard appeared on the evening news with Celeste beside him.

"Elena has always been ambitious," he said. "Sadly, that ambition has now consumed her judgment."

Maya watched from her hospital bed until I turned off the television.

"He sounds like he believes it," she said.

"Your father has always confused repeating a lie with proving it."

She looked at me. "Why did you marry him?"

It was a question I had avoided for years.

"Because he wasn't cruel at first," I said. "And because when the cruelty began, I kept waiting for the man I loved to come back."

Maya squeezed my fingers. "Did he ever?"

"No."

That night, Ms. Carter gave Ortiz the name of the person holding the photographs: Thomas Reed, Oak Creek's night custodian. He had worked at the school for twenty-six years and knew every locked room, broken camera, and secret meeting.

Officers reached his house at 9:40 p.m.

The front door was open. The rooms had been searched.

Thomas was missing.

On his kitchen wall, someone had written a message in red marker.

STOP DIGGING, JUDGE.

May you like

The housekeeper was supposed to be invisible. Instead, Sophia Hale becam...

Victoria: You will never get a single cent of this family inheritance! M...

The billionaire father was told his son had died. Then the maid smashed...

Below it hung a photograph of Maya leaving the hospital.

The picture had been taken less than an hour earlier.