Chapter 8 - Charles Speaks
Daniel watched his father’s recording three times.
The first time, he barely heard the words.
The second time, he understood them.
The third time, he started to hate himself for every warning he had dismissed.
Charles described hidden transfers from the family trust. He described Eleanor pressuring him to alter beneficiary rules. He described Grant Mercer bringing papers late at night and asking him to sign while he was medicated.
Then Charles said something that made Arthur sit down.
“Eleanor has been replacing my heart medication.”
Daniel froze.
“My cardiologist says the pills in my organizer are not the prescription he issued.”
The recording ended with Charles saying he planned to confront Eleanor the next morning.
He died before breakfast.
Ortiz immediately contacted the medical examiner.
Charles had been cremated, but blood samples from his final hospital admission had been preserved.
Testing would take time.
Sarah watched Daniel pace the room.
“Sit down.”
“I can’t.”
“You haven’t slept.”
“My father may have been murdered in his own house.”
“And you nearly lost your wife and daughter in the same house.”
He stopped.
Sarah’s voice softened.
“Daniel, Eleanor wants you spinning in guilt. She wants you making decisions angry.”
He sat beside her.
“I brought you there.”
“You married me. That is not a crime.”
“I kept asking you to forgive her.”
“Yes.”
He looked at her.
Sarah did not make it easier.
“That hurt me,” she said. “But what matters now is whether you change.”
Daniel nodded slowly.
“I will.”
Then Ortiz called.
They had located Eleanor.
A toll camera captured her entering Connecticut in a stolen blue sedan.
The plate belonged to one of Grant Mercer’s clients.
“She’s heading north,” Ortiz said.
“Toward what?”
Daniel thought for a moment.
Then he knew.
“The lake house.”
The Vances owned a private property near Lake Waramaug, purchased by Charles before he married Eleanor. Almost nobody used it.
But Daniel remembered Eleanor once complaining that Charles kept “old paperwork” there.
Ortiz dispatched state police.
Three hours later, officers entered the lake house.
No Eleanor.
No Mercer.
But the fireplace was still warm.
On the kitchen table sat a half-empty coffee cup, a road map, and a photograph of Sarah taken outside her obstetrician’s office.
Someone had drawn a red X across Sarah’s face.
On the back were four handwritten words.
THE BABY CHANGES EVERYTHING.
A floorboard creaked upstairs.
Officers rushed toward the sound.
They found no person.
May you like
Only an open window.
And below it, fresh footprints leading toward the lake.
