Chapter 4 - The Woman Who Sold a Brother's LifeThe police arrived at Madison's apartment forty minutes after we reported the photograph.
Two officers took statements, photographed the email, and examined the building's entrances.
Agent Morgan called while they were still there.
I could hear the change in her voice when I described the photograph.
“This is no longer just someone sending anonymous messages,” she said. “Someone has physically located your workplace.”
“Do you think they intend to hurt me?”
“I can't determine that from a photograph. But we're going to treat the threat seriously.”
She arranged for a Seattle-based federal agent to speak with us the following morning.
Until then, Madison and I stayed inside.
We closed the blinds.
Checked the doors.
And sat together on the couch with every light on.
At midnight, Madison finally said something I'd been afraid to admit.
“Claire, I think you need to tell Vincent.”
I shook my head.
“No.”
“He has security people. He knows this world.”
“He also knows the people threatening me.”
“Exactly.”
I looked at her.
“You don't understand. If Vincent comes to Seattle, he'll arrive with men carrying weapons and start demanding names. Then everyone will know exactly where I am.”
“Maybe.”
“And if he finds out about the baby while he's frightened and angry, I have no idea what he'll do.”
Madison's expression softened.
“Then perhaps he needs to learn how to be frightened without controlling you.”
I looked down.
That was the problem.
Vincent had spent his entire adult life believing every problem could be solved with enough money, enough influence, or enough force.
He didn't understand that sometimes love required a person to give up control.
And I wasn't willing to let my child become another possession in the Moretti family.
The following morning, Agent Morgan joined a video meeting with a local federal agent and Rebecca.
The photographer hadn't been identified.
But the investigators were able to connect the threat to a pattern.
Two other individuals associated with old Moretti financial disputes had received similar photographs.
One had withdrawn a complaint.
The other had moved.
Neither had been harmed, but the messages had achieved their purpose.
They had frightened people into silence.
“Who sends them?” I asked.
“We're investigating that,” Morgan replied. “We don't want you trying to identify the sender yourself.”
I almost smiled.
She sounded like someone who had met my former husband.
Rebecca recommended that I temporarily relocate from Madison's apartment to another address while the threat was assessed.
I protested.
“I just started my job.”
“You can keep working remotely for now,” Rebecca said. “Your employer doesn't need to know the details.”
Ellen Brooks was understanding when I explained that an old legal matter had created a personal security concern.
She approved temporary remote work.
I hated disrupting my new life.
But I hated the thought of placing Madison in danger even more.
That afternoon, I packed a small overnight bag.
I was beginning to despise suitcases.
Three years of marriage had ended with two of them.
Now it seemed every time I started feeling settled, someone forced me to move again.
As Madison helped me fold clothes, my phone rang.
Sophia Reynolds.
I stared at her name.
Madison looked over my shoulder.
“Absolutely not.”
I answered anyway.
“Hello, Sophia.”
For several seconds, there was only breathing.
Then she whispered, “I need to talk to you.”
“You already talked to Vincent.”
“There's something I didn't tell him.”
I closed my eyes.
“Then call him back.”
“I can't.”
“Why?”
“Because I think somebody is watching his house.”
I glanced toward Madison.
“Have you contacted the police?”
“No.”
“Then do that.”
“Claire, please.”
Something in her voice sounded different.
Gone was the carefully sweet tone she'd used during our meeting at the café.
She sounded frightened.
And very young.
“Do you remember Gabriel?” she asked.
“I never met him.”
“Vincent's told you about him?”
“Not enough.”
Sophia inhaled shakily.
“Gabriel hated me.”
That surprised me.
“Why?”
“Because he knew I was lying to Vincent.”
“About what?”
“Everything.”
I sat down.
Sophia began talking.
Seven years earlier, before I ever met Vincent, she had been dating him.
Their relationship had been passionate, complicated, and filled with arguments about his family.
Sophia came from money, but her family's finances had begun collapsing.
Her father owed enormous sums to people associated with the Moretti organization.
Arthur Bell had approached her.
He offered to settle the debts.
All she had to do was provide certain information about Vincent's younger brother.
At first, she refused.
Then her father received threats.
Then Bell offered her money directly.
Two million dollars, with additional expenses paid through a company controlled by his associates.
“I told myself nobody would get hurt,” Sophia whispered.
“Did you believe that?”
A long silence followed.
“No.”
The answer surprised me.
“I knew Gabriel was trying to leave the family business. I knew Salvatore wanted to stop him. I thought they would frighten him into staying quiet.”
“And the money?”
“I took it.”
I closed my eyes.
“You sold his location.”
“Yes.”
“His vehicle.”
“Yes.”
“His route to the warehouse.”
Sophia began crying.
“Yes.”
I stared at the wall.
For six years, Vincent had carried the loss of his brother like a wound that refused to heal.
And the woman he had once loved had helped arrange the circumstances of Gabriel's death.
Then she'd returned to Chicago, smiled at him, and allowed him to believe they might have a future.
“How could you look him in the eyes?” I whispered.
“I don't know.”
“You knew what Gabriel meant to him.”
“I know.”
“And you let Vincent divorce me because you wanted him back?”
Sophia's sobbing stopped.
For the first time, her voice turned defensive.
“You think I planned for that?”
“You came back six years after Gabriel died. You knew Vincent was married.”
“Salvatore told me Evelyn's death had changed things. He said Vincent was unhappy. He said you were only part of an arrangement his grandmother had made.”
My stomach tightened.
“What arrangement?”
“He told me Evelyn chose you because Vincent needed someone to keep him stable after Gabriel died.”
I felt the old wound open again.
Sophia continued.
“He said you knew the marriage was never romantic.”
I swallowed.
“And you believed him?”
“I wanted to.”
There it was.
The plainest truth I'd heard from her.
Sophia hadn't returned because she was an innocent woman reclaiming a love that fate had stolen.
She had returned because she wanted to believe she could have everything she'd lost without paying for what she'd done.
And someone had encouraged her.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because when you gave me that document, I realized Evelyn had kept proof.”
“So?”
“So Salvatore knows you have access to her records.”
My blood went cold.
“Did you tell him?”
Sophia began crying again.
“I was scared.”
I closed my eyes.
“You told him.”
“I didn't know he would threaten you.”
“You told him about the envelope?”
“Yes.”
My hand moved instinctively toward my stomach.
She didn't know.
None of them knew.
But suddenly I understood why the photographs had begun appearing.
The red envelope hadn't simply destroyed Sophia's hopes.
It had announced that Evelyn's evidence was still alive.
And I'd become the person holding it.
“Listen carefully, Sophia,” I said.
She went silent.
“I am not going to protect you from what you've done.”
“I know.”
“If you really want to help Vincent, tell the FBI everything.”
“They'll arrest me.”
“Possibly.”
“I could go to prison.”
“Gabriel went into a coffin.”
She stopped breathing for a second.
I continued.
“You still have choices. He doesn't.”
I ended the call.
Then I handed Madison my phone.
“Send the number and call details to Rebecca.”
Madison studied my face.
“What happened?”
I looked at the suitcases near the door.
“Sophia wasn't just Vincent's first love.”
“What was she?”
“She was one of the people who helped get his brother killed.”
Madison sat beside me.
For a long time, neither of us spoke.
Then she said quietly, “And Vincent left you for her.”
I nodded.
“That's going to destroy him.”
I looked at the rain outside.
“Maybe. But I don't want to be responsible for putting him back together.”
That evening, Vincent called.
This time, I answered.
“Claire.”
His voice was rough.
“Are you safe?”
My heart began to pound.
“Why are you asking?”
“Someone sent me a photograph of your office in Seattle.”
I froze.
“What?”
“A photograph. Taken yesterday. Arthur Bell brought it to me and said an associate had seen someone watching you.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
Bell.
The same man whose old security company had received nearly nine hundred thousand dollars after Gabriel's death.
The same man whose financial records now appeared suspicious.
“Where is Arthur?”
“At the office.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.”
I stood.
“Vincent, don't tell Arthur anything about me.”
Silence.
“Claire?”
“Don't tell him where I'm staying. Don't tell him what I've found. Don't ask him to arrange security.”
His voice sharpened.
“What do you know?”
I thought about Agent Morgan's instructions.
I couldn't reveal the investigation.
But I could warn him.
“I think someone close to you is not who you believe they are.”
He gave a humorless laugh.
“That describes half the people in my life right now.”
“Then start asking better questions.”
“Claire, I already know Sophia betrayed Gabriel.”
“Do you know who paid her?”
“Bell handled the transfers.”
He said it without surprise.
My stomach dropped.
“You know?”
“He claims he processed payments at Salvatore's instruction without knowing their purpose.”
“And you believe him?”
“I haven't decided.”
I closed my eyes.
“Vincent, you are the smartest man I know when it comes to protecting your business. But you're blind when someone tells you what you want to hear.”
His breath caught.
“Like Sophia?”
“Yes.”
He was silent.
Then he said, “Like when I told myself you would be happier without me.”
I didn't answer.
“Claire, I owe you an apology for more than the divorce.”
“You do.”
“I let Sophia back into my life because I believed I could return to who I was before Gabriel died. Before the family became my responsibility. Before everything turned into a fight.”
I sat down slowly.
“Vincent…”
“She reminded me of being young. Of thinking I had choices.”
“And what did I remind you of?”
His silence hurt.
I answered for him.
“Responsibility.”
“No.”
“Then what?”
He inhaled.
“Home.”
My eyes filled unexpectedly.
“That isn't fair,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“You don't get to call me home after making me leave.”
He didn't defend himself.
“I know that, too.”
A long silence settled between us.
Then I asked the question that had haunted me.
“Did you love her?”
“Yes,” he said.
I closed my eyes.
“And now?”
“I loved a memory of her. I didn't want to admit how little I understood the woman standing in front of me.”
I swallowed.
“Were you unfaithful to me?”
He took several seconds to answer.
“Yes.”
The word was almost inaudible.
My heart seemed to stop.
“How?”
“I kissed her the night before I asked you for the divorce. We'd spent several evenings together at the hotel, talking about a future I had no right to plan while I was still married to you.”
I stared at the wall.
I had suspected.
But hearing him admit it made the betrayal horribly real.
“I didn't sleep with her,” he added. “That doesn't make what I did acceptable.”
“No,” I whispered. “It doesn't.”
“I should have told you.”
“You should have been faithful.”
He said nothing.
For a moment, I hated him.
Not because I had stopped loving him.
Because part of me still wanted to believe the good things about him.
The Vincent who brought soup when I was sick.
The Vincent who once drove through a snowstorm to find a rare book I'd mentioned wanting.
The Vincent who used to fall asleep with his hand resting against my back.
All those memories were real.
And so was his betrayal.
“Please don't call me again tonight,” I said.
“Claire, there's something else.”
“What?”
“My mother wants to see you.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Your mother spent three years wishing I'd disappear.”
“She says there's something about Gabriel she needs to explain.”
“Then she can explain it to you.”
“She refuses.”
I stared at the window.
“Why?”
“I don't know.”
For the first time, Vincent sounded genuinely frightened.
“She told me if I wanted the truth, I had to ask you about a red car.”
My blood turned cold.
Before I could respond, my other phone began ringing.
Rebecca.
I told Vincent I had to go.
Then I answered.
“Claire,” Rebecca said, “Agent Morgan found something.”
“What?”
“The vehicle in Evelyn's photograph. The red sedan.”
My heart pounded.
“Whose was it?”
Rebecca paused.
“It was registered through a private family account.”
“Which account?”
“Elena Moretti's.”
I stopped breathing.
Elena.
Vincent's mother.
The woman who had despised me from the day we met.
The woman who had encouraged him to reconcile with Sophia.
And now a car registered through her account had been photographed near the place where her youngest son died.
Rebecca's voice softened.
“Claire, we don't know who was driving it.”
I could barely hear her.
Because suddenly Evelyn's warning made terrible sense.
May you like
The person who ordered Gabriel's murder is still sitting at our family table.
And I was beginning to understand just how many people had been sitting there.
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