Chapter 4 - THE FIANCÉE WHO KNEW EMILY WAS ALIVE
By nine that morning, nobody was pretending the situation was about a music box anymore.
Emily was alive.
My father had seen her six days after she disappeared.
Dominic Caruso had visited my father.
Camille had visited him too.
And according to Dad, Friday wasn’t a meeting.
It was a deadline.
Someone planned to move Emily.
Vincent called Dominic from the rehabilitation center parking lot.
This time Dominic answered.
“Where are you?” Vincent asked.
“Office.”
“Stay there.”
A pause.
“What happened?”
“Stay there.”
Vincent ended the call.
Dominic’s office occupied the top floor of a restored warehouse near the Boston waterfront.
When we entered, he was waiting beside a conference table.
He looked exactly as he had at dinner.
Calm.
Gray at the temples.
Perfectly dressed.
Only his eyes changed when he saw me.
“Nora Bennett.”
It wasn’t a question.
Vincent noticed.
“How do you know her last name?”
Dominic smiled faintly.
“You employ her.”
“I never told you her last name.”
Silence.
Dominic’s smile disappeared.
Paul closed the door.
Vincent placed the music box on the conference table.
“Start talking.”
Dominic looked at it.
“So Camille finally gave it to you.”
My pulse jumped.
Vincent’s voice became colder.
“You knew she had it.”
“I arranged the purchase.”
“From whom?”
“A dealer in Montreal.”
“Name.”
Dominic gave one.
Paul immediately began checking it.
Then Vincent put the pink bead beside the box.
Dominic stared at it.
Just a second too long.
Vincent saw that too.
“Do you know what this is?”
“No.”
“You’re lying.”
Dominic’s jaw tightened.
“Careful.”
Vincent almost smiled.
It was the least friendly smile I had ever seen.
“You came to my daughter’s funeral service when we stopped searching the river. Don’t tell me to be careful.”
Dominic looked away.
That was when I noticed a blue leather notebook on a bookshelf behind him.
Same color as Dad’s ledger.
I walked toward it.
Dominic stepped sideways.
“Don’t.”
Everyone froze.
I pointed.
“That’s my father’s.”
Dominic closed his eyes briefly.
Vincent asked, “Why do you have it?”
Dominic’s answer stunned me.
“Because Camille told me to take it.”
Vincent didn’t react.
I did.
“What?”
Dominic removed the ledger and placed it on the table.
“She called me three nights ago. Said Bennett had something that could connect her to an old transaction.”
Paul looked up from his phone.
“The Montreal dealer doesn’t exist.”
Dominic said nothing.
Vincent’s patience ended.
“Where is Emily?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wrong answer.”
“It’s the truth.”
Vincent stepped closer.
Dominic did something unexpected.
He looked afraid.
Not of Vincent.
Of something else.
“You think this started with Camille?” he asked.
“No,” Vincent said. “I think it started with you.”
Dominic shook his head.
“Then you’re already behind.”
He opened Dad’s ledger.
One page had been marked.
There was an entry dated six days after Emily disappeared.
REBUILT SECOND MOVEMENT.
CUSTOMER REQUESTED ALTERED TIMING.
6-4-3 PATTERN.
DELIVERED TO C.M.
Vincent looked up.
“Camille Mercer.”
Dominic nodded.
That appeared to settle everything.
Until I looked closer.
Dad wrote all his customer names in full.
Always.
I knew because I had entered hundreds of them for him when I was young.
He never used initials.
“This isn’t my father’s handwriting.”
Dominic stared at me.
I pointed to the entry.
“Somebody added this.”
Vincent looked toward Dominic.
Dominic whispered something under his breath.
“What?” Vincent asked.
He turned the ledger around.
Several pages had been cut cleanly from the back.
“They were there when I took it.”
“Who told you where he kept it?”
Dominic hesitated.
“Camille.”
That afternoon, Vincent confronted her.
Not in the dining room.
Not in front of guests.
In the library.
Camille sat on the sofa with her hands folded.
For the first time since I met her, she didn’t insult me.
Vincent placed Dad’s ledger in front of her.
“You visited Edward Bennett.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Camille looked at me.
Then she said, “Because I knew Emily was alive.”
Vincent didn’t move.
Nobody did.
“How long?” he asked.
Camille’s voice broke slightly.
“Eleven months.”
Vincent stared at the woman he planned to marry.
For eleven months she had watched him search.
Watched him wake on Emily’s birthday without his daughter.
Watched him keep her room untouched.
“You knew.”
“I knew she might be alive.”
“Don’t change the sentence.”
Camille looked down.
“I received a photograph.”
She reached into her handbag.
Paul tensed.
But she only removed an envelope.
Inside was a picture of Emily sitting on a porch.
A handwritten note accompanied it.
TELL VINCENT AND THE GIRL DISAPPEARS FOR GOOD.
Camille whispered, “I thought I was protecting her.”
Vincent’s face showed no sympathy.
“You were protecting yourself.”
She began to cry.
Not theatrically.
Quietly.
“My mother owed money to people Dominic knew. He told me whoever had Emily also had records tying my family to them. He said if I went to you, my mother would be arrested and Emily would vanish.”
Dominic.
Again.
Vincent turned toward Paul.
“Bring him back.”
Paul called.
No answer.
Dominic’s office was empty.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone looked at me.
I answered.
“Hello?”
Emily’s voice came through immediately.
“Nora?”
“Yes. Emily, listen to me—”
“No time.”
I put the call on speaker.
Vincent stepped closer.
“Emily.”
There was a sharp inhale on the other end.
“Daddy?”
Vincent’s eyes closed.
“I’m here.”
Emily began crying.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I believed him.”
Vincent gripped the table.
“Believed who?”
A noise sounded behind her.
Emily lowered her voice.
“Nora, is she there?”
“Who?”
“The woman from dinner.”
Camille went rigid.
Emily whispered:
“The woman in gold.”
Vincent slowly looked at Camille.
Camille’s face drained of color.
Then Emily said—
“She knows where they’re taking me.”
May you like
The call cut off.
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