Chapter 5 - What His Mother Already Knew
"Claire Bennett."
Richard's recorded voice crackled through the phone.
"If you're hearing this, Evelyn finally found the courage I never had."
Megan stopped breathing beside me.
The recording had been made years earlier.
Richard sounded older than he did in the photographs.
Tired.
Afraid.
He said Rebecca's death had not been an accident.
But he also claimed he hadn't killed her.
According to Richard, Rebecca had discovered financial fraud involving his company and threatened to expose it.
Someone else had been involved.
Someone Richard refused to name.
"I protected that person," he said. "And Rebecca paid for it."
The recording ended abruptly.
No confession.
No explanation.
Just another door opening into darkness.
The next morning, my mother arrived.
She hugged me for a long time.
Then she saw the photograph of Rebecca.
"She looked like you," I said.
"No," Mom whispered. "You look like her."
She told me the rest.
Rebecca had been eleven years older.
Brilliant with numbers.
Stubborn.
Protective.
After their parents died, Rebecca practically raised Mom.
When Rebecca began seeing Richard, she believed he was separated.
By the time she discovered the truth, she was emotionally trapped.
"Why did you hide all of this?"
"Because after Rebecca died, somebody followed us."
My skin prickled.
"Who?"
"I never knew."
Mom found threatening notes.
One appeared inside our locked apartment.
Another beneath my pillow.
STOP ASKING QUESTIONS.
She moved us three states away.
Changed jobs.
Cut contact with everyone connected to Rebecca.
Years later, when she recognized Evelyn at my wedding, she nearly stopped the ceremony.
"Why didn't you?"
"Because I looked at Daniel and convinced myself sons weren't their fathers."
The irony was unbearable.
At noon, Evelyn called.
She wanted to meet.
Megan insisted on coming.
We chose a public café.
Evelyn arrived carrying another envelope.
"I should have given you this yesterday."
Inside was a bank document.
Nine thousand dollars had been transferred three days earlier from our joint account to a company called RH Consulting.
The same amount I had confronted Daniel about.
"What is RH?" I asked.
Evelyn swallowed.
"Rebecca Hale."
My heart hammered.
"The company was created after her death."
"By whom?"
"Richard."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
But Daniel did.
The credit-card charges weren't random spending.
He had been moving money.
I remembered his panic when I asked.
Evelyn slid another document toward me.
A recent transfer.
Daniel had paid RH Consulting repeatedly over the previous eighteen months.
Nearly eighty thousand dollars.
"Who owns it now?"
Evelyn looked at me.
"That's what I came to tell you."
She had contacted the family accountant.
RH Consulting belonged to a trust.
The beneficiary wasn't Richard.
It wasn't Evelyn.
It wasn't Daniel.
It was me.
I laughed because the alternative was screaming.
"That's impossible."
"Apparently Richard created it after Rebecca died."
"Why would he leave money to me?"
"I don't know."
"Daniel knew?"
"Yes."
That explained everything.
Not the violence.
Nothing explained or excused that.
But it explained his obsession with my finances.
His insistence that we combine accounts.
His sudden interest in property inherited from my father.
Maybe he had known long before I did.
"Did Daniel marry me because of this?"
Evelyn looked devastated.
"I don't know."
That answer hurt more than yes.
I remembered our first date.
Our proposal.
The way Daniel had appeared so accidentally in my life.
Had it been accidental?
My phone rang.
Officer Ruiz.
"Mrs. Mercer, we need you to come to the station."
"Why?"
"We've examined the materials recovered from your husband's office."
My stomach tightened.
"And?"
"There was another device hidden inside the leather folder."
"What kind?"
"A flash drive."
I looked at Megan.
"What was on it?"
Officer Ruiz paused.
"Several videos."
"Of what?"
"Your home."
My blood went cold.
"What do you mean?"
"Interior surveillance footage."
I couldn't speak.
"Claire, were you aware your husband had cameras inside your bedroom?"
The café disappeared around me.
I remembered Daniel always knowing when I called Megan.
Knowing when I moved things.
Knowing when I searched his desk.
"No."
Officer Ruiz continued.
"There's something else on one of the recordings."
"What?"
"A conversation between your husband and another person."
"Who?"
"We haven't identified the second speaker yet."
I gripped the phone.
"What were they talking about?"
There was a pause.
"You."
I closed my eyes.
May you like
Officer Ruiz lowered her voice.
"Specifically, what Daniel planned to do if you ever discovered the trust."
