Chương 7
Nora held the rocket between two fingers.
“This feels ridiculous.”
“Most evidence probably does.”
They placed the flash drive inside an empty box of chamomile tea in the cabinet. Then Lena photographed Nora’s wrist from several angles beside the kitchen clock.
At nine seventeen, Nora’s phone rang.
The number was blocked.
She let it stop.
Thirty seconds later, it rang again.
Lena looked at her. “Voicemail.”
The caller left one.
Nora played it on speaker.
A man’s voice said, “Ms. Bell, my name is Miles Keene. I represent Mrs. Celeste Arden. I would like to speak with you regarding an inadvertent disclosure of confidential records. This is a sensitive matter, and prompt cooperation may prevent unnecessary complications. Please return my call tonight.”
Lena reached for a notebook and wrote down the time.
“What does unnecessary complications mean?” Nora asked.
“It means he charges by the hour.”
The phone rang a third time.
This call displayed Julian’s name.
Nora stared at it until it stopped.
He left no voicemail.
A minute later, a text appeared.
I will not ask you for the photographs. Independent counsel may contact you tomorrow with options for a lawyer of your own. You are free to decline. My mother’s attorney should not be contacting you tonight. You do not need to respond to him.
Nora read it twice.
Lena read it over her shoulder.
“That is either decent,” Lena said, “or extremely advanced rich-person strategy.”
“Probably both.”
Another message arrived from Miles Keene.
Please understand that retaining or distributing the records may violate legal duties arising from your employment.
Nora’s stomach tightened.
Lena took the phone gently and placed it facedown.
“You are not answering anyone tonight.”
“I need another job.”
“Tonight?”
“I need to start looking.”
“You need to eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Then you can watch me eat badly on your behalf.”
Lena heated frozen dumplings, burned one side, and complained about a student who had written that gravity was caused by “the earth being clingy.” Nora listened without laughing. Halfway through the story, she realized Lena was talking to keep the room from filling with fear.
At ten forty, Nora remembered the chicken in the Arden refrigerator.
She stood abruptly.
“What?” Lena asked.
“I left dinner.”
“You were fired. They can discover sandwiches.”
“It was already prepared.”
“Nora.”
“I’m not worried about them eating.”
“What are you worried about?”
Nora sat again.
The answer embarrassed her. She was worried that the lemon slices would turn bitter beneath the heat. She was worried Marta might not know the chicken needed foil. She was worried the brass pan would stain if left overnight.
Her mind had returned to the kitchen because the kitchen was a place where mistakes could still be corrected.
At the mansion, Julian ate at the breakfast table with his mother.
Neither praised the food. Celeste cut the chicken into exact pieces and left most of it untouched. Julian drank water and watched the kitchen clock move four minutes ahead of the world.
At eleven twelve, Celeste’s phone vibrated.
She read the screen.
“You instructed Miles not to contact Nora?” Julian asked.
“I did not.”
“He left her a voicemail.”
Celeste looked up. “How do you know?”
“Because Rachel’s office called him.”
“Rachel?”
“Rachel Kim.”
The name carried weight. Celeste set down her fork.
“You retained a prosecutor.”
“A former prosecutor.”
“Against your own mother.”
“For facts that may implicate me.”
“That is precisely why Miles should manage this.”
“Miles represented Father when the payments began.”
Celeste’s silence confirmed more than Julian expected.
“He knew?”
“He knew there was an arrangement.”
“Did he know why?”
“He knew there was risk related to Harbor Quay.”
Julian pushed his plate away.
“Anyone else?”
“Malcolm.”
“Elliot.”
“Yes.”
“Company counsel?”
“No.”
“The board?”
“No.”
“Shaw.”
“Yes.”
“Five people maintained this for six years.”
“Six,” Celeste said.
Julian waited.
“Your father.”
He looked toward the dark window.
Six people. A dead worker. Two injured men. A widow. Children. Hearings. Settlement agreements. Safety reports. Memorial speeches. Thousands of employees who had no idea their jobs were tied to a truth buried beneath monthly transfers.
“What did Father ask Nora to burn?”
Celeste lifted her wine.
“I don’t know.”
“You reacted when she mentioned it.”
“Because Edmund should not have involved household staff in business documents.”
“What was in the boxes?”
“Old files.”
“Harbor Quay?”
“I never looked.”
He did not believe her.
She saw that.
“Your father became sentimental near the end,” she said. “He kept papers because he imagined confession would simplify his death.”
“Did he confess?”
“Not in any useful way.”
“What does that mean?”
“He wrote letters he did not send. Notes with no context. Apologies to people he had not spoken to in years.”
“Where are they?”
“I destroyed some.”
Julian’s chair moved backward.
Celeste raised one hand. “They were incoherent.”
“You decided that.”
“I was his wife. I watched him wake at three in the morning convinced that a nurse had stolen his shoes.”
“He asked Nora to return the boxes twenty minutes after asking her to burn them.”
“You are building certainty from a cook’s memory.”
“Her name is Nora.”
Celeste looked tired now. The emerald satin seemed too formal for the late hour, as if she had been trapped inside the version of herself she presented at dinner.
“Where are the boxes?” Julian asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Did you destroy them?”
“I told Elliot to remove them from the breakfast room.”
“Remove them where?”
“Storage, perhaps.”
“Which storage?”
“I don’t remember.”
Julian picked up his phone.
“Do not call Elliot tonight,” she said.
“Why?”
“He has a heart condition.”
“So does half the board.”
“He has served this family faithfully for two decades.”
“That is not reassuring.”
Julian sent Rachel the new names and a summary of what Celeste had admitted. He copied no one else.
May you like
His mother watched him type.
“You think distance makes you righteous,” she said. “It does not. You approved the culture that allowed this. You praised Malcolm. You defended the settlement. You stood on stages and called Harbor Quay an example of accountability.”
