Chương 4
“When?”
“Please listen to me.”
“When did David tell you he was going to steal from me?”
“He didn’t.”
“Then how did you know?”
“Because two weeks ago he asked if you’d changed the safe code.”
Rachel closed her eyes.
“He knew the old one.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Your father.”
“Our father.”
Vanessa said nothing.
Rachel leaned against the wall.
The safe code had once been their mother’s birthday. After their father died, Rachel changed it to Abby’s.
David could not have opened it unless he had learned the new number.
Then she remembered a Saturday in March.
David standing in the hall with Abby while Rachel carried groceries from the garage.
Abby giggling.
Uncle David, it’s my birthday twice.
Rachel’s eyes opened.
She felt sick.
“What was wrong with your finances?”
Vanessa took too long.
“Vanessa.”
“The business has been struggling.”
“How badly?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re married to him.”
“That doesn’t mean I know everything.”
“No. Apparently it means you lie when necessary.”
“That’s not fair.”
Rachel almost shouted.
Instead she lowered her voice.
“My daughter is in the ground.”
Vanessa stopped.
Rachel continued.
“You don’t get to tell me what’s fair today.”
The next morning Detective Ortiz arrived with another detective and a paper cup of coffee she forgot on Rachel’s entry table.
Ortiz was fortyish, compact, with dark hair pulled into a low knot and the habit of listening without filling silence. Rachel had disliked her the first night because Ortiz had not said what Rachel needed her to say.
We’ll find out what happened.
Instead she had said, We’re going to document everything we can.
At the time it sounded cold.
Now Rachel understood the difference.
The second detective photographed the open safe.
Ortiz wore gloves while inspecting the keypad and shelves.
“You touched this last night?”
“Yes.”
“Anyone else since Abby died?”
“Vanessa. Maybe neighbors. People have been in and out.”
“The safe?”
“No. The house.”
Ortiz nodded.
“You’re sure the coin case was there recently?”
Rachel sat on the stairs.
“I saw it the week before.”
“What were you doing?”
“Getting Abby’s birth certificate for school registration.”
“Anybody with you?”
“Abby.”
“Anyone you told about the coins?”
Rachel gave a tired laugh.
“They weren’t a secret. My father talked about them constantly. He thought owning a 1916 dime made him J.P. Morgan.”
Ortiz almost smiled.
Almost.
“David upset about the inheritance?”
“He was upset about everything my father did.”
“Specifics help.”
Rachel rubbed the back of her neck.
“My dad left David his flooring company. He left me the coins and some savings. David thought the company was a burden and the coins were liquid. Dad thought the company was worth more.”
“Was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You ever discuss selling the collection?”
“I told Vanessa I was thinking about it.”
“When?”
“A month ago.”
“Why?”
Rachel looked toward the living room.
Abby’s school backpack still hung from a hook.
“For Abby.”
Ortiz waited.
“She wanted to do this summer program next year. Science camp. I told her it was too expensive, and she made a chart showing me how many birthdays she’d have to save for it.”
Rachel picked at the edge of her thumbnail.
“I was going to sell some coins.”
Ortiz nodded once.
“Vanessa knew.”
“Yes.”
“And likely told David.”
“Yes.”
The second detective stepped out to make a call.
Ortiz sat on the stair below Rachel.
“Tell me exactly what Vanessa said last night.”
Rachel did.
Every word she could remember.
When she finished, Ortiz stared at the floor for a moment.
“You recorded the call?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Rachel looked at her.
“Good?”
“You’re not running an investigation.”
“I’m beginning to notice.”
Ortiz ignored that.
“If Vanessa contacts you again, let me know before you respond.”
“She’s my sister-in-law.”
“She may also be a witness who lied publicly about David’s location.”
“She panicked.”
“Maybe.”
Rachel watched her.
“You think she helped him?”
“I think I don’t know.”
It irritated Rachel.
The carefulness.
The refusal to provide emotional certainty.
Then Ortiz added, “And neither do you.”
That irritated her more because it was true.
The house went quiet after the detectives left.
Rachel made coffee.
She forgot to put grounds in the machine and produced a full pot of hot beige water because yesterday’s filter was still inside.
She stared at it for several seconds.
Then she laughed.
The sound felt obscene.
She poured it out.
At noon, she found one of Abby’s socks under the couch.
Pink.
Tiny gray stars.
Rachel sat on the floor holding it until sunlight moved across the rug.
Grief did not arrive in waves the way people said.
Waves had rhythm.
Grief was more like living in a house where someone kept moving the floor.
Sometimes Rachel could answer questions about timestamps and security cameras with frightening clarity.
Then a sock could make breathing complicated.
At three, her phone rang.
David.
Rachel watched his name appear.
BIG BROTHER DAVE.
She had entered the contact name when she was nineteen.
She had never changed it.
She let it ring.
He called again.
Then a text arrived.
You need to stop telling people I killed Abby.
Rachel read it twice.
She had not told anyone that.
Not exactly.
Another message.
I know you’re hurting but what you did yesterday was insane.
Rachel’s thumbs moved before she could stop them.
Where are Dad’s coins?
She stared at the sentence.
Ortiz had told her not to engage.
Rachel deleted it.
David sent another message.
Call me before you destroy this family.
Rachel put the phone facedown.
Five minutes later she picked it up again.
She took screenshots and forwarded them to Ortiz.
Then she blocked David’s number.
For nearly an hour she felt proud of herself.
At four twenty she drove to Vanessa’s house.
Ortiz would have been furious.
Rachel knew that before she started the car.
May you like
She went anyway.
Vanessa lived twelve minutes away in a neighborhood of large houses built close enough together that neighbors could identify each other’s arguments through open windows.
