Chapter 11 - The Person at the Dinner Table
Victoria refused to say the name immediately.
She wanted a deal.
Protection.
Reduced charges.
A new identity.
Detective Shaw explained that negotiations took time.
Victoria smiled bitterly.
“You don’t have time.”
“Why?”
“Because Crane always has two plans.”
Mark watched from behind the glass.
He wanted to enter the room.
Shaw stopped him.
“She wants you emotional.”
“I am emotional.”
“That’s why you stay here.”
Victoria continued.
“Ask Mark who knew every time he left town.”
Shaw frowned.
“His staff.”
“Ask who scheduled his flights.”
Mark felt something cold move through him.
Julia.
His assistant.
Julia Keene had managed his calendar for nine years.
She knew every business trip.
Every late meeting.
Every night Mark would not be home.
He remembered Liam saying Victoria gave him pills when Daddy was gone.
Victoria could have learned that herself.
But Julia knew exact times.
Delays.
Cancellations.
Even private travel changes.
Mark left the observation room.
He called David.
“Where is Julia?”
“At the office.”
“Do not contact her.”
“Why?”
“Get police there.”
Twenty minutes later, Julia’s office was empty.
Her computer had been wiped.
Her phone lay in a drawer.
A security camera showed her leaving thirty minutes after Mark brought Liam upstairs the previous evening.
She carried a small suitcase.
“She knew.”
Mark whispered.
David nodded.
Julia had not been at the estate during Victoria’s escape.
But she had remotely opened the gate.
Using Mark’s credentials.
The betrayal hurt differently.
Julia had known Sarah.
She attended Liam’s christening.
She sent birthday gifts.
Mark remembered dozens of times she had hugged his son.
Now every memory felt contaminated.
Police searched Julia’s apartment.
They found cash.
Multiple passports.
And photographs of the Ashford estate.
Some showed security camera locations.
Others showed Liam entering school.
One photograph showed Elena.
A circle had been drawn around her face.
Detective Shaw looked at Mark.
“They were watching her too.”
Elena studied the photograph.
On the back was a note.
SARAH’S NURSE.
Mark turned.
“You were never Sarah’s nurse.”
“No.”
“But they thought you were.”
Elena frowned.
“Maybe Sarah told them I knew more than I did.”
“Or she wanted them to think that.”
Sarah had used Elena as a decoy.
A person Crane would watch.
While the real evidence remained hidden.
It sounded like Sarah.
Clever.
Protective.
Terrified.
Mark returned home before midnight.
Liam was awake.
He sat at the kitchen table eating cereal with Elena.
The sight felt strangely ordinary.
Mark wanted ordinary more than anything.
Liam looked up.
“Is the bad lady gone?”
“Yes.”
“Forever?”
Mark hesitated.
Elena answered gently.
“She can’t hurt you tonight.”
Liam accepted that.
Children sometimes understood honesty better than adults did.
Mark sat beside him.
“I’m sorry.”
Liam frowned.
“For what?”
“For not seeing what was happening.”
Liam put down his spoon.
“Elena saw.”
Mark looked at her.
“Yes.”
“She always comes when I call.”
Elena smiled softly.
Mark felt gratitude so intense it hurt.
After Liam went to bed, Mark asked Elena to sit with him.
“You could leave.”
She frowned.
“No one would blame you.”
“Do you want me to?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Elena noticed.
Mark corrected himself.
“I mean you’re in danger because of us.”
“I was in danger before I entered this house.”
“What does that mean?”
Elena stared at the table.
“My brother worked for the foundation.”
Mark leaned forward.
“You never told me you had a brother.”
“He died four years ago.”
“How?”
“Officially?”
She looked at him.
“Overdose.”
“And unofficially?”
“He was the accountant Sarah was supposed to meet the night she died.”
Mark went still.
Elena’s brother.
The accountant.
The person Sarah had planned to meet.
“What was his name?”
“Mateo Ruiz.”
Mark remembered the name from Sarah’s files.
A junior financial analyst.
He had died two days after Sarah’s funeral.
Police considered it accidental.
Elena’s eyes hardened.
“I never believed it.”
Mark finally understood why she had accepted the job.
“You came here to investigate.”
“At first.”
“And then?”
She looked toward the hallway where Liam slept.
“Then I met your son.”
Before Mark could answer, his phone rang.
Detective Shaw.
“We found Julia Keene.”
“Where?”
“At an airport?”
“No.”
May you like
Shaw’s tone changed.
“She was trying to get into your son’s school.”
