Chương 13
“That part doesn’t make you corrupt.”
He looked at me.
“The part where you hid evidence might.”
He nodded slowly.
“I know.”
This time I believed he did.
A knock interrupted us.
Ruiz entered without waiting.
Her face was grim.
“Keene saw the attacker.”
Daniel stood.
“Beckett?”
“No.”
“Who?”
Ruiz closed the door behind her.
“A woman.”
I felt my pulse change.
“Margaret?”
“No.”
“Who?”
“Keene says she was about thirty, maybe thirty-five, dark hair, funeral-home badge, gray jacket.”
Daniel frowned.
“Employee?”
“Not according to the funeral home.”
I asked, “Did he recognize her?”
“He says he’d seen her once before.”
“Where?”
Ruiz looked at Daniel.
“At Vale Biotech.”
Daniel went still.
“What department?”
“He doesn’t know.”
“Why would a funeral director have been at Vale?”
“He arranged your father’s funeral.”
Daniel sat down again.
“Fifteen years ago.”
“Yes.”
“And he remembers her?”
“He remembers her because she argued with Frank’s hospice nurse in the lobby.”
I felt something shift.
“How old would she have been then?”
Ruiz’s eyes narrowed.
“Late teens or early twenties.”
Daniel whispered, “No.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
He stood so suddenly the chair tipped backward.
“No.”
“Daniel.”
He looked like he had seen the dead again.
Only this time he was the one being haunted.
Ruiz stepped closer.
“You recognize that description.”
He shook his head once.
Then again.
“Daniel.”
His voice barely came out.
“My father had an assistant.”
“Name?”
He closed his eyes.
“Rachel Mercer.”
The name meant nothing to me.
Ruiz pulled out her phone.
Daniel grabbed her wrist.
“Wait.”
She stared at him.
“What?”
“She died.”
“When?”
“Fourteen years ago.”
“How?”
“Car accident.”
Ruiz slowly lowered the phone.
“Who told you that?”
Daniel’s face changed.
“My mother.”
For several seconds, the room held only the hum of the building’s emergency power.
Ruiz was the first to move.
“Tell me everything you know about Rachel Mercer.”
Daniel stared at the floor.
“She started working for my father when she was nineteen.”
“In what capacity?”
“Administrative assistant at first.”
“At first?”
“She became more than that.”
I watched his face.
“More than an assistant?”
“Yes.”
Ruiz waited.
Daniel rubbed the heel of his hand against his forehead.
“My father trusted her.”
“That is still not specific.”
“She handled private schedules, travel, some personal correspondence.”
“Financial records?”
“Possibly.”
“Daniel.”
“I was away at school for most of it.”
Ruiz’s patience thinned.
“Did she have access to the notebooks?”
“I don’t know.”
I said, “Did your father ever mention her when he gave you the key?”
Daniel went quiet.
That was answer enough.
“What did he say?”
“He said if Rachel ever contacted me, I should listen before I judged her.”
Ruiz stared at him.
“You left that out.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I forgot.”
I laughed sharply.
“You forgot your dying father told you a supposedly dead woman might someday contact you.”
“I forgot it until now.”
“That sentence is ridiculous.”
“I know how it sounds.”
“It sounds like the kind of thing people remember.”
His eyes lifted to mine.
“You’d be surprised what people bury when they don’t want to understand it.”
That quieted me.
Not because it was an excuse.
Because I knew exactly what he meant.
Ruiz pulled out her phone.
“I’m checking Rachel Mercer.”
Daniel nodded.
She moved to the far side of the office and began making calls.
I sat across from Daniel.
“What happened between your father and Rachel?”
His mouth tightened.
“I don’t know.”
“Try harder.”
He stared at the framed fish on the wall.
“Margaret hated her.”
“That narrows nothing.”
“She called Rachel manipulative.”
“Margaret calls parking meters manipulative.”
Daniel almost smiled.
Then it disappeared.
“There were rumors.”
“What kind?”
“That my father was sleeping with her.”
I leaned back.
“How old was he?”
“Fifty-eight.”
“And she was?”
“Twenty-three by then.”
I did not say anything.
Daniel’s face had the look of someone waiting to be blamed for a fact that predated him.
“Was he?”
“I never knew.”
“Did Margaret think so?”
“Yes.”
“That could explain why she told you Rachel died.”
“Maybe.”
“You never checked?”
He looked ashamed.
“No.”
“Not even once?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t like Rachel.”
That surprised me.
“Why?”
“She scared me.”
“How?”
“She knew things.”
“About your father?”
“About everyone.”
He leaned back and folded his arms.
“She could sit through dinner without speaking and then say one sentence that made you feel like she’d read your mail.”
“Sounds charming.”
“She was twenty-four.”
“So?”
“So I was twenty-five and insecure enough to find that threatening.”
I studied him.
“And Margaret encouraged that.”
“Yes.”
“What did Rachel think of you?”
Daniel stared at his hands.
“She thought I was weak.”
The answer came without hesitation.
“And were you?”
“Yes.”
That was new.
No defense.
No qualification.
Just yes.
I looked toward Ruiz.
She was speaking quietly to someone on the phone, pacing beside the bookshelf.
Daniel said, “The last time I saw Rachel, she asked me to help her.”
“With what?”
“She wanted access to my father.”
“When?”
“Two weeks before he died.”
“Why couldn’t she see him?”
“Margaret had fired her.”
“Reason?”
“She said Rachel stole confidential documents.”
“Did she?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did Rachel say?”
“That Margaret was cleaning out Frank’s office before he died.”
My skin tightened.
“What kind of cleaning?”
“She said files were disappearing.”
“Financial files?”
“She didn’t specify.”
“Did you help her?”
“No.”
His voice was almost inaudible.
I waited.
“She begged me.”
“And you refused.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because my mother told me Rachel was trying to blackmail us.”
“Did you believe Margaret?”
“I wanted to.”
That answer hurt more than the others.
Not me.
Something older.
The version of Daniel who had spent half his life accepting explanations because the alternative would require choosing sides.
“What happened after you refused?”
“Rachel said something.”
“What?”
He swallowed.
“She said one day I would learn what loyalty to my mother cost other people.”
Neither of us spoke.
Ruiz ended her call.
May you like
“She never died.”
Daniel looked up.
