Chapter 4 - The Gift That Was Never Opened
Three years earlier, I had received two hundred and seventeen wedding gifts.
I knew the number because for months after Evelyn disappeared, unopened boxes haunted the east receiving room like monuments to a future that no longer existed.
Eventually Bianca convinced me to donate most of them.
I signed the authorization without looking at the list.
Now, sitting beside Evelyn's hospital bed, I realized I may have signed away the one object people had kept her alive to find.
"What gift?"
She swallowed.
"The one I bought for you."
"I never opened it."
"I know."
"Where was it?"
"In the bridal suite at first."
My mind raced back.
"There were dozens of boxes."
"Mine was different.
Long wooden case.
Dark walnut.
Silver ribbon."
I remembered it.
Barely.
The morning of the wedding, Anna had carried several gifts upstairs.
One had been a polished wooden case.
"What was supposed to be inside?"
"A restored ship compass."
Despite everything, I almost smiled.
Two years before the wedding, Evelyn and I had gotten lost sailing near Martha's Vineyard because I insisted I didn't need the navigation system.
She teased me for months.
"You bought me a compass."
"You needed one."
The ghost of her old smile appeared.
Then vanished.
"When I heard Marcus outside your father's study, I took the ledger.
Before Bianca came in, I hid it under my dress."
"You carried it through the tunnel?"
"No."
She shook her head.
"When Bianca distracted Marcus, I slipped out for maybe two minutes.
I ran back to the bridal suite and put the ledger underneath the false bottom of the compass case."
My stomach tightened.
"Then Bianca took you underground."
"Yes."
"And nobody knew you'd hidden it there."
"I thought nobody did."
"Who donated the gifts?"
Evelyn stared at me.
"Bianca?"
I stood.
Detective Chen was outside.
I opened the door.
"I need my sister."
Chen studied my face.
"She's at the station."
"Then I need whoever handled the wedding gifts after Evelyn disappeared."
Chen took out her notebook.
"Why?"
I told her.
Within an hour, Blackwood House staff records were pulled.
Anna remembered the walnut case.
So did the former estate manager.
The gifts had not all been donated at once.
Bianca had personally separated several boxes marked "private family items."
The walnut compass case was one of them.
No record showed where it went afterward.
At noon, Chen allowed me into the interview room at the police station.
Bianca sat behind a steel table.
No handcuffs.
Yet.
Her attorney had not arrived.
Chen warned me not to threaten or touch her.
I did not plan to.
When Bianca saw me, she looked exhausted.
"How is Evelyn?"
"Alive."
"I know that."
"That's more than I knew yesterday."
Pain moved through her expression.
"I deserve that."
"You deserve much worse."
She looked down.
I sat across from her.
"Where is the compass?"
Her head lifted.
"What?"
"Evelyn's wedding gift."
Her eyes changed.
That was answer enough.
"You opened it."
"Daniel—"
"You found the ledger."
Bianca closed her eyes.
I leaned forward.
"You kept Evelyn beneath my bedroom floor for three years because of that ledger."
"No."
"Then explain it."
"You won't understand unless you know what Dad built."
"Then tell me."
She looked toward the camera in the corner.
"Not here."
I laughed bitterly.
"You're worried about privacy now?"
"Marcus has people everywhere."
"Marcus is missing."
"Exactly."
Something in her tone stopped me.
"What does that mean?"
"It means he knows Evelyn is out."
"How?"
"Because whoever sent you those messages probably told him too."
"How do you know about the messages?"
Bianca froze.
I had not told her.
Detective Chen, watching through the glass, would have noticed too.
"Who contacted you?" I asked.
"No one."
"You just said—"
"I assumed."
"You assumed someone texted me about the tunnel?"
Silence.
I stood.
Bianca reached across the table.
"Daniel, sit down."
"No."
"Please."
It was the first time she had sounded like my sister rather than a suspect.
I sat again.
She whispered, "I kept Evelyn alive."
I stared at her.
"You imprisoned her."
"I protected her."
"Those words are not interchangeable."
"I know."
"Then stop using the wrong one."
Tears filled her eyes.
"Marcus wanted her dead."
"And your solution was to bury her alive for three years?"
"I thought it would be weeks."
"You always say that.
Weeks became months.
Months became years."
"Because things changed."
"What changed?"
"Dad's network didn't disappear when Dad died."
"What network?"
Bianca rubbed both hands over her face.
"Mercer Capital wasn't only an investment company."
"I run Mercer Capital."
"You run what was left after Dad cleaned it."
"Cleaned what?"
She looked at me.
"Money."
I felt a pressure behind my ribs.
"For who?"
"Politicians.
Contractors.
Judges.
Private security companies.
Foreign accounts.
People who paid for problems to disappear."
I stared at her.
"Our father laundered money."
"Among other things."
"How do you know?"
"Because he made me help him."
The statement struck harder than I expected.
"You were fourteen when Mom died."
"I started when I was seventeen."
"Why?"
"Because Dad knew I had found Mom."
I stopped breathing.
"What?"
Bianca looked at me.
"Mom didn't die in that car."
The room went silent.
I thought of the anonymous message.
ASK YOUR SISTER WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR MOTHER.
"Where is she?"
Bianca's eyes filled.
"I don't know anymore."
"Bianca."
"I swear."
"You've lied to me for twenty-two years."
"I was a child when it started."
"Where was Mom?"
"The gatehouse."
Evelyn's photograph.
My mother beside Marcus.
Two days after her supposed death.
"Why?"
"She discovered what Dad was doing.
She threatened to take us and go to the police."
"What did he do to her?"
Bianca swallowed hard.
"He staged the accident."
My hands began trembling beneath the table.
"Then?"
"He kept her on the property for six months."
I nearly stood.
"Six months?"
"In an underground room near the east tunnel."
The same tunnels.
The same family.
The same method.
"No."
"Daniel—"
"No."
"I found her."
"When?"
"A month after the funeral."
I stared at the sister I had spent my life protecting.
"You knew our mother was alive?"
"I was fourteen."
"You knew."
"She begged me not to tell you."
"Why?"
"Because Dad was watching you."
My chest hurt.
"He told her if she contacted either of us, he'd kill you."
I wanted to reject it.
I wanted to call Bianca a liar.
But Evelyn had independently found the photograph.
The tunnel existed.
The chamber existed.
Everything impossible was becoming evidence.
"What happened after six months?"
"Mom escaped."
"Where?"
"I don't know."
"Did Dad find her?"
"I don't know."
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I helped her reach the east tunnel.
She promised she'd contact me when it was safe.
She never did."
Bianca's voice broke.
"Three years later, Dad found out I had helped her.
That's when he started forcing me into the business."
I sat in silence.
Eventually I remembered why I had come.
"The compass."
Bianca wiped her face.
"I found it two days after the wedding."
"The ledger was inside."
"Yes."
"Where is it?"
"I moved it."
"Where?"
"Somewhere Marcus couldn't find."
"Evelyn said someone started visiting the steel door six months ago."
Bianca's face drained of color.
"What?"
"You didn't know?"
"No."
"Who could access the east side?"
She looked genuinely terrified.
"Only three keys existed."
"Who had them?"
"Dad.
Marcus."
"And?"
Bianca whispered, "Mom."
A knock came at the interview-room door.
Detective Chen entered.
Her expression was grim.
"We need to stop."
"Why?"
She looked at me.
"They found Marcus Vale."
"Where?"
"In his car near Concord."
"Alive?"
Chen paused.
"No."
Bianca shut her eyes.
But Detective Chen had not finished.
"There was something on the passenger seat."
"What?"
"A photograph."
My mouth went dry.
Chen placed an evidence photo on the table.
The original had already been bagged.
The image showed a woman standing outside the Blackwood gatehouse.
Older.
Gray streaking dark hair.
But unmistakable.
My mother.
May you like
On the back, someone had written a date.
Three days ago.
