Chapter 12 - WHAT ADRIAN KNEW
Adrian demanded another meeting with prosecutors.
His attorney wanted immunity.
Prosecutors refused.
So Adrian offered information instead.
Claire did not attend.
She watched the recorded interview later.
Adrian admitted he knew Eleanor intended to put something in Claire’s wine.
He claimed he believed it was merely a mild anti-anxiety medication.
His mother had told him Claire would “be easier to reason with” if she relaxed.
Detective Reed stared at him across the table.
“And you thought secretly drugging your wife was acceptable?”
Adrian covered his face.
“No.”
“But you allowed it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because everything was collapsing.”
Reed leaned forward.
“Your wife?”
“No.”
“The company.”
There it was.
The truth.
When forced to choose between Claire’s safety and the Mercer name, Adrian had chosen the name.
Again.
He admitted the dinner had been planned for weeks.
Every relative had been invited for a reason.
The older relatives were meant to create moral pressure.
The younger ones were meant to make Claire fear becoming the villain of the family.
Charles would present the condo transfer as already decided.
Eleanor would demand the monthly allowance.
Adrian’s role was to force Claire into submission if she resisted.
Claire stopped the recording.
Rebecca looked at her.
“Do you want to continue?”
“Yes.”
Adrian described the forged documents.
Charles had prepared them.
Nathan had coordinated notarization through a corrupt associate.
Eleanor managed the family pressure.
Adrian supplied Claire’s private information.
When asked about the life insurance policy, Adrian broke down.
He insisted he never wanted Claire dead.
Then Reed asked the question Claire had been waiting for.
“Why were your fingerprints on the wine bottle?”
Adrian stared at the table.
“My mother gave it to me.”
“To do what?”
Silence.
“Mr. Mercer.”
“What did she ask you to do?”
Adrian whispered.
“Pour Claire the second glass.”
Claire stopped breathing.
“What happened?” Reed asked.
“I couldn’t.”
“So Eleanor poured it herself.”
“Yes.”
“Did you know what was inside?”
“I knew there was something.”
Claire’s eyes filled with tears for the first time since the hospital.
Not because she still loved him.
Because she remembered Adrian sitting beside her that evening.
Quiet.
Calm.
Watching his mother pour the wine.
He had known.
And then he had struck Claire when she refused the family’s demands.
Rebecca shut off the video.
“That should be enough.”
“For what?”
“For prosecutors to argue he participated in the conspiracy.”
Claire wiped her eyes.
But Adrian had one more secret.
During the final ten minutes of his interview, he mentioned a storage facility in Sacramento.
Charles had rented it through a shell corporation.
Adrian believed older records were hidden there.
Police obtained a warrant.
They found thirty-seven boxes.
Company ledgers.
Tax records.
Fake identification documents.
Forged signatures belonging to several people.
Claire was not the first victim.
Inside one box were files bearing the names of three former Mercer employees.
One was deceased.
One had disappeared from public records.
And the third name made Maya nearly collapse.
Daniel Ross.
Maya’s older brother.
He had supposedly died in a single-car accident seven years earlier.
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And according to the file, Charles Mercer had paid Thomas Hale twenty thousand dollars two days before Daniel’s crash.
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