I slowly sat back down.
“What did she know?”
Harrison opened the final envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
Derek.
Standing beside the blonde woman.
But that wasn’t what frightened me.
Behind them was a building.
A sign was visible above the entrance.
OCEAN PEARL RESORT.
The same resort from the credit-card notification.
The photo was dated three months earlier.
Three months before Derek’s supposed business trip.
Three months before the night Margaret died.
I turned the photograph over.
There was handwriting on the back.
Her name is Vanessa Cole.
She knows about the money.
My hands went numb.
“Who is Vanessa?”
Harrison sighed.
“Derek’s business partner’s wife.”
“What?”
“She has been connected to him for almost two years.”
I stared at the photograph.
“Does Chloe know?”
“She suspects.”
“And the business trip?”
“There is no business trip.”
My chest tightened.
“So where is he?”
“Key West.”
“With her.”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
For twenty years, I had defended Derek.
When friends questioned why he never came to Margaret’s appointments, I made excuses.
When relatives wondered why I was always alone at family gatherings, I said he was busy.
When Margaret whispered, “Elena, are you happy?” I smiled and said yes.
I had spent twenty years protecting a man who had never protected me.
Then my phone rang.
Derek.
I stared at the screen.
Harrison watched me.
“Answer it.”
“Why?”
“Because now you know something he doesn’t know.”
I answered.
“Hello?”
“Elena?”
His voice sounded irritated.
“Where are you?”
“At home.”
There was a pause.
“Good.”
“Derek?”
“What?”
“Your mother is dead.”
Silence.
For several seconds, there was only static.
Then he whispered, “What?”
“You heard me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She died yesterday.”
Another pause.
“You’re lying.”
The words came out so quickly that I almost laughed.
“I wish I were.”
“I spoke to the hospital.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I told them I was out of town.”
“Exactly.”
His breathing changed.
“Who told you that?”
“The doctor.”
“You shouldn’t have made any decisions without me.”
“I had to.”
“You’re not family.”
The sentence cut through me.
After twenty years, he said it as though I had been a stranger.
I looked at Margaret’s letter on Harrison’s desk.
Then I said quietly,
“You’re right.”
“What?”
“You’re right, Derek.”
I took off my wedding ring.
“I’m not your family anymore.”
He laughed nervously.
“Elena, what the hell are you talking about?”
“I signed the divorce papers.”
Silence.
Then his voice exploded.
“You did WHAT?”
“I signed them.”
“You can’t do that!”
“I already did.”
“Where are you?”
I smiled.
“That isn’t your concern anymore.”
He began shouting.
I let him.
For the first time, his anger didn’t frighten me.
Then he said something that made my blood run cold.
“You don’t understand what you’ve done.”
I looked at Harrison.
“What do you mean?”
Derek’s voice dropped.
“You should have stayed out of my mother’s affairs.”
My heart stopped.
“How do you know I’m involved in her affairs?”
Silence.
Then he hung up.
I slowly lowered the phone.
Harrison’s expression had changed.
“He knows.”
“He knows what?”
“That Margaret left something for you.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
My phone buzzed again.
A message.
Unknown number.
I opened it.
A photograph appeared.
It was me.
Walking out of Harrison’s office.
Taken from across the street.
Underneath it were six words.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LISTENED TO MARGARET.
I stared at the screen.
Harrison stood immediately.
“Call the police.”
But before I could move, another message arrived.
This one contained only a photograph.
Margaret.
In her hospital bed.
Taken on the night she died.
And beside her bed stood Derek.
My husband had told me he was in Chicago.
He had lied.
He had been in the hospital.
He had seen his mother.
And if that photograph was real, then he had been there moments before she died.
I zoomed in.
Derek’s hand was holding something.
A small plastic medication bottle.
My breath caught.
Because the label was visible.
It was the same medication Harrison had mentioned.
And beneath the photograph was one final message.
ASK HIM WHY HE NEEDED HER TO DIE.
PART 4
For several seconds, I couldn’t move.
I stared at the photograph until the pixels blurred together.
Derek.
Standing beside his mother’s hospital bed.
His hand wrapped around a small medication bottle.
The same medication Harrison had just told me could have accelerated Margaret’s heart failure.
My husband had told me he was in Chicago.
He had yelled at me for calling him too many times.
He had complained that I was ruining his business trip.
And all along, he had been in the same hospital where his mother was dying.
I looked at Harrison.
“That’s him.”
“I know.”
“He was there.”
“Yes.”
“He was there when she died.”
Harrison didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
I zoomed in on the photograph again.
Derek’s face was partially turned away, but there was no mistaking him.
Then I noticed something else.
The photograph had been taken from inside the hospital room.
Someone had been standing near the doorway.
Whoever took it had wanted us to see exactly what Derek was holding.
My phone buzzed.
Another message.
You don’t know the whole story.
I stared at it.
Then another message appeared.
Margaret left something else. Check the blue ribbon.
I looked at the wooden box.
The faded blue ribbon.
I untied it.
Several envelopes fell apart in my hands.
One of them contained a small memory card.
Harrison inserted it into his computer.
A video appeared.
The image was dark and grainy.
Then Margaret’s face appeared.
She was sitting in a chair in her bedroom.
She looked tired, but her eyes were clear.
“Hello, Elena.”
I covered my mouth.
Hearing her voice nearly broke me.
Margaret smiled faintly.
“If you’re watching this, then I’m gone.”
Tears filled my eyes.
“I wish I could have told you everything in person. But I knew Derek would be watching me.”
She paused.
“Perhaps he already is.”
I looked at Harrison.
The video continued.
“I need you to understand something. My son is not the man I raised.”
Margaret lowered her eyes.
“Somewhere along the way, money became more important to him than people. Then control became more important than money.”
She took a breath.
“I discovered three years ago that Derek had been moving money from the company without authorization.”
Harrison leaned closer to the screen.
“He wasn’t stealing millions at first. Small amounts. Ten thousand here. Twenty thousand there. He believed nobody would notice.”
Margaret shook her head.
“I noticed.”
She looked directly into the camera.
“I confronted him.”
The video became silent for a moment.
Then she continued.
“He told me he needed the money to save the company.”
“He lied.”
“He had gambling debts.”
My heart sank.
“Then he became involved with Vanessa.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
Everything suddenly made sense.
The secret trips.
The strange charges.
The late-night phone calls.
The sudden anger whenever I asked where he had been.
Margaret continued.
“I threatened to remove him from the company.”
“He threatened me.”
Harrison paused the video.
“What did she mean by that?”
“I don’t know.”
“Play it.”
He did.
Margaret’s voice trembled.
“Derek told me that if I removed him, he would make sure I regretted it.”
