Chapter 15
Annabelle Brooks was Samuel’s wife.
Arthur stared at the note until the letters blurred.
Samuel had offered his home.
He had protected the evidence.
He had also kept Claire’s secrets for years.
Now his wife’s initials appeared on the order that killed her.
“Where is Annabelle?” Arthur asked.
Samuel looked stunned.
“She’s visiting her sister in London.”
“Call her.”
Samuel dialed.
The call went to voicemail.
He tried again.
Nothing.
Lena asked, “When did she leave?”
“Yesterday morning.”
“Before or after Arthur found the key?”
Samuel’s face drained.
“After.”
Arthur rose.
“You told her.”
“She’s my wife.”
“You told her we had Claire’s evidence.”
“I said the past had returned. I never mentioned the key.”
“That was enough.”
Samuel shook his head.
“Annabelle loved Claire.”
“Vanessa pretended to love my children.”
“This is different.”
“Is it?”
Victoria examined the medical order.
“Annabelle Brooks worked as a registered nurse before she married Samuel.”
Samuel looked at her.
“She left nursing twenty years ago.”
“She retained her license until the year Claire died.”
Arthur’s anger became colder.
“Was Annabelle in the hospital that morning?”
Samuel did not answer.
“Was she?”
“She visited Claire.”
“Why?”
“Claire requested her.”
“And did she administer this medication?”
“No.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know my wife.”
Arthur stepped closer.
“I used to say the same thing.”
Samuel looked as if he had been struck.
Lena ordered officers to locate Annabelle’s flight.
There was no record of her boarding a plane to London.
Her passport had not been used.
Security footage showed her leaving Samuel’s house in a rental car before the fire.
“She knew the house would be attacked,” Arthur said.
Samuel sat heavily.
“No.”
“She left you there to burn.”
“No.”
“She knew.”
Samuel covered his face.
Arthur understood his denial.
It was the same desperate refusal that had blinded him to Vanessa.
Accepting the truth meant admitting love had been used as a weapon.
Ethan stood in the doorway.
“Dad?”
Arthur turned quickly.
“You should be sleeping.”
“I heard Annabelle’s name.”
Arthur approached him.
“What do you remember?”
“Mom called her Aunt Annie.”
“Yes.”
“She came to the hospital.”
Samuel looked up.
Ethan continued.
“She gave Mom a drink. Then Mom got sleepy.”
“Did you see her give any medicine?”
“I saw a little tube.”
Samuel began shaking his head.
“Children confuse memories.”
Arthur looked at him sharply.
“That is exactly what Vanessa said.”
Samuel went silent.
Ethan’s eyes filled with tears.
“I’m not confused.”
Arthur placed both hands on his shoulders.
“I believe you.”
That sentence mattered.
Claire had written it for a reason.
Believe Ethan first.
Lena found the rental car abandoned near a bus terminal.
A camera recorded Annabelle entering a private vehicle.
The driver was Dr. Nathan Hale.
He was alive.
Facial recognition found a probable match under the name Nicholas Avery.
He owned a small medical clinic two counties away.
Agents raided it before dawn.
The building was empty.
Inside, they found medication records connected to Claire, forged death certificates, and passports for Richard’s network.
They also found a photograph taken three days earlier.
It showed Annabelle, Nathan, and Vanessa sitting together in Samuel’s kitchen.
Samuel stared at it.
“My kitchen?”
The date meant Vanessa had entered his house while he was away.
Annabelle had helped her.
Samuel left the room without speaking.
Arthur found him in the corridor.
“I spent thirty-four years with her,” Samuel said.
Arthur leaned against the wall.
“I spent three with Vanessa.”
“Did you ever wonder if every memory was false?”
“Yes.”
“How do you survive that?”
“I look at the memories that were real.”
Samuel gave a bitter laugh.
“How can you tell the difference?”
“Ethan and Maya. Claire. The people who never asked me to doubt what I saw.”
Samuel wiped his eyes.
“I failed Claire.”
“So did I.”
“She trusted me.”
“She trusted us to keep going after we learned the truth.”
Samuel looked toward the interview room.
“What if Annabelle killed her?”
“Then you help us prove it.”
Samuel nodded slowly.
He provided access to Annabelle’s accounts.
Investigators found monthly payments from Vale Holdings beginning two weeks before Claire died.
The payments continued until the previous month.
Victoria traced Vale Holdings to Nathan Hale.
Nathan was Eleanor Hale’s brother.
He had introduced Vanessa to Richard’s criminal network.
“Annabelle wasn’t working for Richard directly,” Victoria said. “She was working for Nathan.”
“Why?” Arthur asked.
Samuel answered.
“Her son.”
Arthur knew Samuel and Annabelle had lost a child before he met them.
Samuel explained that Michael Brooks developed a serious addiction after a sports injury.
Nathan ran an illegal clinic supplying him with medication.
When Michael overdosed, Nathan concealed the circumstances to protect Annabelle from prosecution for obtaining prescriptions in her name.
“He owned her after that,” Samuel whispered.
Arthur did not feel sympathy yet.
Whatever pressure Annabelle faced, Claire had died.
But understanding the chain revealed where she might go.
“Michael’s grave,” Samuel said.
They found Annabelle at a small rural cemetery.
She sat beside her son’s headstone.
Nathan’s vehicle was parked nearby, but he was gone.
Lena approached with Arthur and Samuel behind her.
Annabelle did not run.
She looked at her husband.
“I knew you would find the accounts.”
Samuel’s voice broke.
“Did you kill Claire?”
Annabelle closed her eyes.
“I gave her the medication.”
Samuel staggered.
Arthur felt rage rise inside him.
“Why?”
“Nathan said it would only make her sleep.”
“The dose was six times the prescription.”
“I didn’t see the order until afterward.”
“You were a nurse.”
“I trusted my brother.”
“You watched Claire die.”
Annabelle looked at Arthur.
“I tried to stop it.”
“How?”
“I removed the second vial.”
“There was a second dose?”
“Yes. Vanessa wanted to make certain Claire never woke up. I took it before she could administer it.”
“That doesn’t make you innocent.”
“I know.”
“Then why did Claire write your name?”
“Because she saw me.”
Annabelle began to cry.
“Claire woke for a few seconds. She looked straight at me. She knew.”
Arthur imagined Claire opening her eyes and seeing a trusted friend beside her.
Not knowing whether help or death had arrived.
“Did she say anything?”
Annabelle nodded.
“She said, ‘Tell Arthur I fought.’”
Arthur turned away.
His grief came in one crushing wave.
Claire had fought.
She had fought Richard.
Vanessa.
Nathan.
Her own failing body.
She had fought for every second with her children.
And the people around her called her paranoid.
Samuel sat on the wet grass.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Nathan threatened you. He said if I confessed, he would kill you and make it look like suicide.”
“You let me defend the people who killed Claire.”
“I was trying to keep you alive.”
“You burned our entire life to protect it.”
Annabelle reached for him.
Samuel moved away.
Lena handcuffed her.
“Where is Nathan?”
“He left when he saw the police alert.”
“Where will he go?”
“To Richard.”
“Richard is in custody.”
Annabelle shook her head.
“Richard planned for that.”
Arthur stepped closer.
“What does that mean?”
“He has a release mechanism.”
Victoria asked, “Blackmail?”
“More than blackmail. He owns evidence against the federal prosecutor assigned to his case.”
Lena immediately contacted headquarters.
The prosecutor, Malcolm Reed, had already ordered Richard transferred to a private medical facility because of his gunshot wound.
The transport happened twenty minutes earlier.
The escort vehicle never reached the hospital.
Richard was gone.
Nathan had freed him.
Annabelle looked toward Maya and Ethan’s photographs on Arthur’s phone.
“He will come for the children before Arthur’s birthday.”
“Why?” Arthur demanded.
“Because if he cannot force Arthur to surrender the trust, he can trigger the death clause.”
Samuel went pale.
“What death clause?”
Annabelle looked at him.
“You never saw the final amendment.”
“What does it say?”
“If both children die before Arthur turns forty, every share returns to Richard Bennett’s original estate.”
Arthur’s blood froze.
His birthday was less than twenty-four hours away.
May you like
Richard did not need Arthur’s signature anymore.
He only needed Ethan and Maya dead before midnight.
