Chương 7
Ethan had been taken to the station voluntarily for a longer interview.
Before leaving the garage, he tried to speak to her.
“Claire.”
She kept walking.
“Claire, please.”
She stopped.
He stood ten feet away beside Detective Ortiz.
“What?”
“I’m sorry.”
Claire looked at him for a long moment.
Then said, “You’re going to need to be more specific.”
She left.
At the hotel, she removed her wet jeans and hung them over the shower rod.
Her blouse smelled faintly of concrete and rain.
She ordered a grilled cheese from room service because it was the only thing on the menu she could imagine chewing.
When it arrived, she ate half.
Then she sat on the edge of the bed and opened the photograph she had taken of the ring in her kitchen.
The red box looked harmless.
Cheap, almost.
She zoomed in until the diamond blurred.
At 1:18 a.m., Daniel texted.
You awake?
Claire replied.
Yes.
A minute later:
I keep thinking she gave him the ring.
Claire stared at the message.
She wrote:
I know.
Daniel:
Why him?
Claire typed several responses.
Deleted all of them.
Finally:
We may never like the answer.
Daniel did not reply.
Claire slept for forty-three minutes.
At 7:05, Detective Ortiz called.
“We found the SUV.”
Claire sat up.
“Where?”
“Abandoned six blocks from the garage.”
“Registered to who?”
“Stolen.”
“Of course.”
“We’re checking traffic cameras.”
“Did you talk to Ethan?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“I can’t discuss everything he said.”
Claire gripped the phone.
“I’m his wife.”
“That does not give you access to an active investigation.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“Right.”
Ortiz paused.
“He told us about the money.”
“And the woman?”
“Yes.”
“Do you believe him?”
“We found a withdrawal from a company account linked to Mr. Morgan approximately three days after Natalie disappeared.”
Claire frowned.
“Company account?”
“His business account.”
“He said Natalie gave him cash.”
“That is not what he told us last night.”
Claire went still.
“What did he tell you?”
Ortiz did not answer immediately.
“Mrs. Morgan, I suggest you speak to an attorney before you speak to your husband again.”
Claire’s throat tightened.
“What did he tell you?”
“He said Natalie instructed him to move twenty thousand dollars through his own account so the source could not be traced directly to her.”
Claire stared at the hotel wall.
“That’s money laundering.”
“It may be.”
“Am I exposed?”
“Were you an owner of his company at that time?”
Claire felt sick.
“Yes.”
“Did you have access to the account?”
“Yes.”
“Did you authorize the transfer?”
“I don’t know.”
Ortiz’s voice changed slightly.
“You don’t know?”
“Ethan handled operating expenses. I signed things sometimes.”
“What kind of things?”
“I’d have to look.”
“Do that with counsel.”
After the call, Claire sat without moving.
Then she began to laugh.
Quietly.
Not because anything was funny.
Because three hundred thousand dollars in suspicious vendor payments, a dead woman’s ring, a secret kiss, a stolen SUV, and possible money laundering had somehow produced the most Claire-specific disaster imaginable.
Paperwork.
She had spent twelve years professionally telling other people not to sign what they had not read.
At eight thirty, she called a lawyer.
By noon, she was sitting in the office of Miriam Shaw, a compact woman with silver-framed glasses and a habit of pausing before speaking.
Claire told the story.
Miriam listened.
When Claire finished, Miriam said, “You have two problems.”
“Only two?”
Miriam almost smiled.
“Criminal exposure and husband exposure.”
“Which is worse?”
“Depends on your husband.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
Miriam asked for access to Claire’s financial records.
Together they found the transfer.
Twenty thousand dollars had entered Ethan’s business account from Reed Property Management on a Thursday morning.
Two hours later, it moved into a personal joint checking account held by Claire and Ethan.
The next day, Ethan purchased a cashier’s check for nineteen thousand eight hundred dollars.
Payee: cash.
Claire stared at the screen.
“I signed the transfer.”
Miriam looked at her.
“Where?”
“Electronic authorization. Joint account.”
“Do you remember doing it?”
“No.”
“Could Ethan access your banking login?”
Claire said nothing.
Miriam’s eyebrows rose.
“Yes.”
“That needs to stop today.”
Claire changed every password she could think of.
Banking.
Email.
Cloud storage.
Insurance.
Phone carrier.
Then she froze.
“Cloud storage.”
“What?”
“Our photos back up automatically.”
“So?”
“Ethan screenshots everything.”
Miriam leaned forward.
Claire opened their shared photo archive.
Thousands of images.
Receipts.
Jobsites.
Dogs belonging to friends.
Meals Ethan had cooked.
Screenshots of directions.
A plumbing fixture he wanted to buy.
A joke about drywall.
Claire searched by date.
Three days after Natalie disappeared.
There.
A photograph of a handwritten note.
Not a screenshot.
A photograph taken on Ethan’s phone.
The note read:
E—Thursday. Same place. Blue rooms make bad offices. Give her 20. Do not use Reed account directly. N.
Claire stared.
Miriam said, “Send that to me.”
Claire did.
Then she looked at the metadata.
The image had been taken Tuesday at 8:41 p.m.
Claire felt the room tilt.
“What?”
Miriam leaned over.
Claire pointed.
“If Natalie gave him this note at ten twelve…”
“She couldn’t have photographed it on his phone at eight forty-one.”
“No.”
“Could Ethan have photographed it?”
“Yes.”
“Where was he at eight forty-one?”
Claire searched the location data.
Franklin garage.
Miriam sat back.
Claire whispered, “He met someone before Natalie.”
They called Detective Ortiz.
Ortiz arrived at Miriam’s office at 2:20.
Claire showed her the photograph.
Ortiz studied it.
“Did you alter this?”
“No.”
“Could the device time have been wrong?”
“No. It syncs automatically.”
“Could the location metadata be inaccurate?”
“Possibly by some distance, but not the timestamp unless he deliberately changed the phone settings.”
Ortiz photographed the screen and requested a forensic copy through proper process.
Claire asked, “Who wrote the note?”
Ortiz looked at her.
“That’s a useful question.”
“You have samples of Natalie’s handwriting.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
Ortiz did not answer.
Claire understood.
Not a match.
May you like
“Who wrote it?”
“We don’t know yet.”
