Chapter 6
Victoria called my phone ten minutes later.
Detective Kim recorded the conversation.
“Are you alone?” Victoria asked.
“No.”
“Then Rachel dies again.”
“What does that mean?”
“You always were slow when emotions got involved.”
“Tell me where you are.”
“You know where.”
“The cemetery?”
“Come to Rachel’s grave at midnight.”
“You said Rachel was waiting.”
“She is.”
“My wife died six years ago.”
“Did she?”
The call ended.
I stared at Kim.
Rachel’s body had been badly burned in the crash.
Identification was made through dental records provided by Dr. Hale.
Suddenly, even her death certificate meant nothing.
“Could Rachel be alive?” I asked.
Kim did not answer immediately.
“We need to verify the remains.”
“That could take days.”
“Victoria wants you desperate.”
“She succeeded.”
Laura sat silently across the room.
I turned toward her.
“What do you know?”
“Nothing.”
“You knew about Eli. You knew about the recording. You protected Victoria.”
“I protected Mercer Medical.”
“Rachel was my wife.”
“And she was about to launch a public fight over the trust. Mother had just died. The company’s stock was collapsing.”
“So you buried the truth.”
“I delayed it.”
“For six years?”
Laura’s expression finally cracked.
“Victoria told me Rachel had left Seattle.”
“After the accident?”
“She said the body belonged to someone else.”
I stood so quickly the chair fell.
“You knew?”
“I did not believe her.”
“You kept the recording anyway.”
“Because it gave me leverage.”
Laura had used my grief as a business tool.
I could hardly look at her.
“Who died in the car?” Kim asked.
Laura shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
“Where did Rachel go?”
“I don’t know that either.”
I leaned over the table.
“Then tell me where Victoria would keep someone for six years.”
Laura’s eyes shifted toward the window.
Kim noticed.
“What are you thinking?”
“There was a private treatment center our mother invested in,” Laura said. “North Sound Behavioral Residence.”
“Treatment for what?”
“Anything wealthy families wanted hidden.”
The facility had closed three years earlier.
Its owner was Dr. Hale.
Kim sent officers to the abandoned property.
Then she arranged the cemetery meeting.
I would wear a wire.
Officers would watch from unmarked vehicles.
Eli was moved to the same hospital as Emma under an assumed name.
I spoke to him by video call before leaving.
“Do not trust anyone unless Detective Kim approves them,” I said.
“What about my father?”
“He is in custody.”
“Will he go to prison?”
“Yes.”
Eli looked down.
“I thought hearing that would make me happy.”
“He failed you. You are still allowed to love the person you hoped he would become.”
“Did you love Victoria?”
The question hurt.
“I loved the person she pretended to be.”
“Do you think Rachel is alive?”
“I don’t know.”
“If she is, what happens to me?”
“You will not be alone again.”
He looked at me.
“You can’t promise that.”
“I just did.”
At eleven thirty, Kim drove me to the cemetery.
The rain had stopped, but fog covered the ground.
Emma’s open grave remained near the family plot.
Her empty coffin had been removed as evidence.
Rachel’s grave stood beneath a cedar tree.
I had visited it every year.
Now the stone felt like another lie.
Kim checked my wire.
“If Victoria appears armed, do not challenge her.”
“I’m not going there to fight.”
“You’re angry enough to make mistakes.”
“She tried to kill my daughter.”
“And she knows that anger controls you.”
At midnight, I walked alone toward Rachel’s grave.
A lantern appeared between the trees.
Victoria stepped into view.
She wore dark clothes and carried no visible weapon.
“You came,” she said.
“Where is Rachel?”
“Still impatient.”
“Where is she?”
Victoria touched the name engraved on the stone.
“You loved her so much. Even after you married me.”
“You built our marriage on her grave.”
“I gave you six years.”
“You poisoned my daughter.”
“I gave Emma medicine.”
“You put her in a coffin.”
“That was not the original plan.”
“What was?”
“To have her declared medically incapable before her birthday. You refused to sign the guardianship papers.”
“Because she was a healthy child.”
“She was an obstacle.”
The coldness in her voice stunned me.
“How could you raise her and feel nothing?”
“I felt plenty.”
“She called you Mom.”
Victoria’s jaw tightened.
“She called Rachel Mom first.”
“This was jealousy?”
“This was justice.”
“For what?”
“For being invisible while Rachel took everything.”
Victoria spoke about growing up beside Rachel.
Rachel was prettier.
Kinder.
Loved by everyone.
Victoria believed Rachel had stolen Michael, then me, then the Mercer fortune.
“You married me to punish a dead woman,” I said.
“She wasn’t dead when I married you.”
The words hung between us.
“Where is she?”
Victoria pointed toward the open grave.
“Closer than you think.”
I looked down.
Fresh dirt covered the bottom.
Something moved beneath a plastic sheet.
I jumped into the grave and pulled the sheet away.
A woman lay there with her wrists tied.
Her hair was gray at the temples.
Her face was thin.
But I recognized her.
“Rachel.”
Her eyes opened.
“Daniel?”
My heart stopped.
She was older.
Broken.
But alive.
I cut the tape from her mouth.
Rachel gasped for air.
“Emma,” she whispered. “Where is Emma?”
“She’s alive.”
Rachel began sobbing.
Victoria stood above us.
“She has spent six years waiting to hear that.”
I reached for Rachel’s wrists.
“She needs an ambulance.”
Victoria drew a gun.
“Take off the wire, Daniel.”
I froze.
She had known.
“Put the wire in the mud.”
I removed it.
“Now throw your phone up here.”
I obeyed.
Victoria crushed it beneath her heel.
Police were hidden beyond the trees, but I did not know if they had heard enough.
“Why bring Rachel here?” I asked.
“Because I need her signature.”
“For what?”
“Eli’s trust claim.”
Rachel was Eli’s legal representative under an old sealed agreement.
If she signed away his claim, Victoria could consolidate the shares through Michael and Laura.
“You won’t get away with this,” I said.
Victoria smiled.
“I already arranged for Dr. Hale to blame Michael. Michael will blame me. Laura will blame the company. By morning, no one will know whom to believe.”
“Emma will.”
“Children forget.”
“She will never forget the coffin.”
Victoria’s smile disappeared.
I saw movement behind the cedar trees.
An officer.
Victoria saw my eyes shift.
She fired toward the trees.
Police returned fire.
I pulled Rachel down.
Victoria ran between the graves.
Officers chased her.
Kim jumped into the open grave.
“Is this Rachel?”
“Yes.”
Rachel grabbed my shirt.
“Victoria has someone at the hospital.”
My fear returned instantly.
“Who?”
“A nurse named Melanie Cross. She has been giving Emma the drug for months.”
Kim called the hospital.
No one answered on Emma’s secure line.
We climbed from the grave.
An ambulance took Rachel away.
As Kim and I raced toward the hospital, her radio came alive.
A nurse had been found unconscious.
Emma’s room was empty.
Again.
This time, Eli was missing too.
Security footage showed a woman pushing Emma in a wheelchair.
Eli walked beside her.
He did not appear frightened.
He appeared to be helping her.
Then the footage zoomed in.
May you like
The woman was not Victoria.
It was Laura.
