Chương 11
“Was he?”
“Partly.”
Margaret looked at him.
“What is the other part?”
Richard hesitated.
“Martin has spent years using Redstone to control me.”
The admission came flatly.
“How?”
“He kept copies of correspondence that implicated me. Each time I tried to remove him, he reminded me how much damage a full disclosure could do.”
“So you promoted him.”
“I kept him close.”
“You promoted him.”
“Yes.”
“That sounds like something people say before history books become unkind.”
Richard rubbed his face.
“I am not asking history for kindness.”
Margaret was too tired to decide whether she believed him.
Deputies boarded.
They spoke with Noah first only after a child-services liaison was arranged by phone and Margaret remained nearby. The questioning was brief. Nobody asked him to repeat more than necessary.
That mattered to Margaret.
She had spent enough time around powerful adults to expect everyone to exploit children while insisting they were protecting them.
These deputies did not.
Richard gave his statement in the dining compartment.
Margaret could not hear it.
For forty minutes, she sat with Ellie asleep across her lap and Noah curled at the opposite end of the sofa watching an old Christmas movie without sound on a tablet Helen found in a cabinet.
The movie featured a dog wearing antlers.
Noah disliked it immediately.
“That dog would bite those off.”
“Probably.”
“And the family has too many decorations.”
Margaret looked around the observation car.
There were garlands on every brass railing.
A seven-foot Christmas tree occupied an entire corner.
Silver bells hung from the ceiling.
“Careful,” she said.
Noah glanced around.
“Oh.”
Helen turned away to hide a smile.
At eleven fifty-two on Christmas Eve, Ava called from a different number.
Maya had been found safe.
The gray Tahoe had followed her to a parking garage in Vail. She noticed it, drove to a police station instead of to the friend’s house, and was now speaking with officers.
Margaret let out a breath.
Noah sagged into the sofa.
“Can I talk to Mom?”
“In a little while,” Ava said. “She asked for you. Police are arranging it.”
“And Dad?”
“He’s being taken to the hospital.”
“Is he mad?”
“At you?”
“Yeah.”
“Noah,” Ava said, “your father has been asking every person near him whether you and Ellie have warm shoes.”
The boy looked down at his snow-damaged boots.
“He’s weird.”
“Yes.”
Margaret smiled.
Ava added, “He also asked whether the rabbit made it.”
Ellie, half awake, lifted Mr. Weatherby triumphantly.
“He made it.”
Ava laughed.
Richard returned while the call was ending.
He had aged another decade.
“What did the deputy say?” Margaret asked.
“That Mercer denies forcing Daniel off the road.”
“Of course.”
“The younger man says they were instructed to recover stolen data, not harm Daniel.”
“By whom?”
Richard looked at her.
“Martin.”
“Not you?”
“No.”
“Will he say that under oath?”
“I imagine lawyers will have opinions about what he says and where.”
It was the most realistic answer Richard had given all night.
Margaret nodded.
The train was cleared to continue.
Mercer remained at Aspen Ridge for further questioning because local officers had separate reports connecting his vehicle to Daniel’s abandoned truck. Richard was allowed to continue after providing contact information.
Nothing was resolved.
No one had been arrested.
No confession had redeemed the evening.
Margaret found the lack of neatness reassuring.
Real life had finally entered the Whitmore family.
At midnight, somewhere east of Aspen Ridge, Helen opened a small bottle of sparkling water.
“Merry Christmas,” she said.
No one answered.
Then Noah said, “This is the worst Christmas I’ve ever had.”
Helen lifted the bottle.
“Strong competition?”
“My sister threw up last Christmas.”
Ellie opened one eye.
“No I didn’t.”
“You did.”
“No.”
“You threw up on Dad’s shoe.”
Ellie thought.
“Oh.”
Margaret laughed so hard she had to set down her glass.
Even Richard smiled.
For perhaps fifteen seconds, they were only five tired people on a train.
Then Margaret remembered Daniel was alive.
The joy hurt again.
At one fifteen in the morning, Maya called.
Noah spoke first.
He tried to sound brave for approximately twelve seconds.
Then he cried.
Margaret turned away, giving him privacy without leaving him.
Ellie demanded the phone next and immediately began describing the train’s Christmas tree, which seemed less relevant than nearly freezing on a mountain platform but apparently mattered more to a four-year-old.
“Big,” she told her mother.
A pause.
“Really big.”
Another pause.
“No, Bunny didn’t freeze.”
Margaret pressed her fingers to her lips.
Maya finally came on for her.
“Mrs. Whitmore?”
The voice was older than Margaret remembered.
Of course it was.
Eleven years had happened to everyone.
“Maya.”
A long silence.
“I’m sorry.”
Margaret looked at Richard.
“No.”
“Daniel should have called you.”
“Yes.”
“I told him that.”
“Frequently?”
Maya gave a small, exhausted laugh.
“For about a decade.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because I was angry at you.”
Margaret had not expected that.
“At me?”
“I thought you chose Richard.”
“I didn’t know there was a choice.”
“I know that now.”
Margaret absorbed the sentence.
Maya continued.
“When I met Daniel at Cedar Ridge, he was terrified. He thought your foundation was going to be investigated and that you’d be charged. Richard showed him documents. I believed it too.”
“And later?”
“Later I wanted him to contact you. He kept saying he would when it was safe.”
Maya paused.
“Then Noah came. Life got… normal.”
Normal.
The most dangerous word.
They rented a house.
Daniel worked in network security for a regional health-care company under his legal Bennett identity.
Maya taught middle-school science.
They had neighbors.
Dental appointments.
Leaky faucets.
Soccer practice.
Ellie developed an allergy to strawberries.
The longer they lived, the more impossible it felt to explode everything.
Margaret listened with resentment she knew was not fair and could not dismiss.
“You had my son,” she said.
The silence afterward was enormous.
“I know.”
“You had birthdays with him.”
May you like
“Yes.”
“You had Christmas.”
