Chapter 16 - Celeste's Last Performance
Celeste Vanderpool had spent her entire life believing consequences were things that happened to people without attorneys.
Jail changed that belief slowly.
Not enough to make her humble.
Enough to make her careful.
From a private holding facility, she gave no interviews. Her lawyers insisted she was a victim of Rafferty Cain's vendetta. Everett's lawyers suggested Celeste had acted independently. Father and daughter began quietly feeding one another to the wolves.
Then Celeste made her final mistake.
She sent Fay a letter.
It arrived at Saint Bartholomew's in a cream envelope, her handwriting still elegant despite everything.
Fay considered throwing it away unopened.
Sister Agnes advised burning it.
Silvano advised giving it to federal prosecutors.
Rafferty said nothing.
That surprised Fay.
"No opinion?"
"Many."
"And?"
"You should choose which one gets air."
Fay opened the letter.
Celeste did not apologize.
Of course she didn't.
She wrote that women like Fay misunderstood the world. That Rafferty would eventually tire of playing savior. That blood always returned to blood, and Fay's discovery of Vanderpool ancestry did not make her equal to those who had been raised to rule.
At the bottom, she added 1 sentence that made Fay's hand go cold.
Ask your mother what she took from mine.
Fay read it again.
Her mother was dead.
Celeste knew that.
Which meant the sentence was not an instruction.
It was bait.
Rafferty watched her face.
"What?"
Fay handed him the letter.
He read it once.
"She wants you to doubt Marguerite."
"Why?"
"Because you know who Celeste is. She wants to make truth feel dirty."
But that night, Fay could not sleep.
At 2 in the morning, she pulled out her mother's old metal box from beneath the bed. Inside were photographs, church cards, medical papers, and a sealed envelope Fay had never opened because grief made some objects sacred and terrifying.
On the front, in Marguerite's handwriting:
For Fay, when the past comes asking.
Fay sat on the floor for nearly 10 minutes before breaking the seal.
Inside was a letter and a faded photograph.
Amelie Vanderpool at 18, holding a newborn.
On the back:
My daughter Marguerite. Forgive me.
Fay read her mother's letter with shaking hands.
Marguerite had known the truth. Amelie had not abandoned her willingly. Everett's father had arranged the removal, and Everett later continued the lie to control inheritance. Marguerite had tried only once to enter the family record, not for money, but because Fay needed medical history after a severe childhood illness.
Everett threatened to take Fay.
So Marguerite ran.
Fay cried then.
Not prettily.
Not quietly enough.
Josie woke and climbed into her lap.
Fay held her daughter and rocked beneath the weight of generations of women who had been told to disappear.
The next morning, Fay took the letter to Rafferty.
He read it in silence.
"Celeste thought this would hurt me," Fay said.
"Did it?"
"Yes."
His jaw tightened.
"But not the way she meant."
Fay lifted her chin.
"I want the trust case reopened. Publicly."
Rafferty studied her.
"That will bring reporters."
"Let them come."
"It will bring attacks."
"They are already attacking."
"It may take years."
Fay looked toward the courtyard, where Josie was teaching Sister Agnes how to fold a paper boat.
"Then we start now."
Rafferty felt something close around his heart.
Not possession.
Not rescue.
Respect.
"I'll make the call," he said.
Fay shook her head.
"No."
May you like
She reached for the phone on his desk.
"I will."
