Chapter 7 - MY MOTHER’S VOICE
The cassette recorder clicked.
Static filled the hotel room.
Then I heard my mother.
“If this recording is being heard by anyone other than me, something has gone wrong.”
Twelve years disappeared.
I was nineteen again.
Sitting beside her at breakfast.
Stealing strawberries from her plate.
Listening to her laugh.
Then her recorded voice continued.
“Arthur has knowingly falsified safety certifications on maritime systems for at least nine years.”
Reed sat across from me.
Neither of us moved.
“I believe the Meridian disaster was preventable.”
My mother listed contracts.
Names.
Dates.
Board members.
Then she said something unexpected.
“The financial crimes are secondary.”
I looked at Reed.
“There is something worse.”
Her voice became quieter.
“Arthur has been paying government officials and private inspectors to conceal defective navigation systems.”
Reed’s expression hardened.
“If these components remain in service, another ship will fail.”
The recording stopped.
I stared at the machine.
“That’s it?”
Reed turned the cassette over.
There was another side.
We pressed play.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Then Arthur’s voice appeared.
“You stole from me.”
My mother answered.
“I copied evidence.”
“That evidence belongs to Ashford Maritime.”
“It belongs to the families of thirty-two dead sailors.”
My chest tightened.
Arthur’s voice rose.
“You have no idea what happens if this becomes public.”
“I know exactly what happens.”
“You destroy everything.”
“No.”
My mother sounded calm.
“You did that.”
A chair scraped.
Then another voice.
Vanessa.
“Mom?”
My heart stopped.
She had been there.
Arthur shouted.
“Go upstairs.”
Vanessa began crying.
Then came the sound of glass breaking.
My mother gasped.
Arthur said something too low to hear.
Then she responded.
“You wouldn’t.”
Silence.
A heavy crash.
Vanessa screamed.
The tape ended.
I could not move.
Reed reached toward the recorder.
I stopped him.
“Again.”
We played the final thirty seconds.
“You wouldn’t.”
Crash.
Scream.
I listened five times.
On the sixth, Reed heard it too.
A second male voice.
Barely audible.
“Arthur, stop.”
We froze.
There had been another man in the room.
Reed replayed it.
The voice was older.
Controlled.
Familiar.
I had heard it all my childhood.
David Mercer.
Arthur’s lawyer.
The man who handled my mother’s estate.
The man who prepared the documents declaring me a thief.
The man who had helped rewrite our family history.
My phone lit up with an incoming message.
Unknown sender.
I opened it.
A photograph appeared.
David Mercer sitting inside a black sedan outside our hotel.
May you like
Underneath it were four words.
HE KNOWS YOU HAVE IT.
