Chapter 4 - The Name on Angela's Lips
Vincent did not react the way an innocent man usually reacted when his name was spoken by a wounded witness.
He did not curse.
He did not demand to know what Angela had said.
He simply handed his weapon to Dominic.
"Take it."
Dominic looked at the gun, then at the man who had protected him for seventeen years.
"Why?"
"Because if you are going to question whether I belong beside you, I would rather remove the question before someone else uses it."
Dominic took the weapon.
Mercer stared at Vincent as if he had just watched a wall move.
"You think that helps you?"
Vincent's eyes never left Dominic.
"I am not trying to help myself."
"Then who are you helping?"
"Him."
Dominic tucked the weapon into the back of his waistband.
"We go upstairs together."
The east service stairwell smelled of wet concrete and bleach.
Angela Pierce sat on the floor with her wrists cut red from plastic restraints.
One side of her face was swollen.
Her scrub jacket had been torn at the shoulder.
A guard crouched beside her while another stood at the stairwell door.
The moment Angela saw Vincent, panic tightened her whole body.
"No."
Vincent stopped.
"Angela."
"Do not let him near me."
Dominic stepped between them.
"Look at me."
Angela's eyes moved to Dominic.
"Who tied you up?"
Her breathing became shallow.
"He did."
She pointed at Vincent.
Nobody spoke.
Vincent's face remained still.
Dominic crouched carefully despite the pain in his knee.
"Did you see his face?"
Angela blinked.
"Yes."
"Clearly?"
"Yes."
"Did he speak?"
"Yes."
Dominic glanced at Vincent.
"What did he say?"
Angela swallowed.
"He told me I should have minded my own business."
"Anything else?"
"He said the next dose would end the problem."
Mercer looked sick.
Dominic continued.
"What problem?"
Angela looked at his injured leg.
"You."
Dominic studied her face.
"And you are certain the man was Vincent?"
Tears gathered in her eyes.
"I know what I saw."
Vincent finally spoke.
"What was I wearing?"
Angela flinched at his voice.
"A black coat."
"I have six black coats."
"You had your security badge."
Vincent nodded once.
"Which side?"
Angela stared at him.
"What?"
"Which side of my jacket was the badge clipped to?"
She hesitated.
"Your right."
Vincent looked at Dominic.
"I wear it on the left."
Angela's face changed.
"You moved it."
"Maybe."
Vincent crouched at a distance from her.
"What color was the clip?"
"Black."
"Mine is steel."
Angela shook her head violently.
"I know your face."
"I am not saying you do not."
"Then stop trying to confuse me."
Dominic raised one hand.
Both fell silent.
"Angela, what happened before you were attacked?"
Her breathing slowed enough for words.
She explained that she had returned to the estate after noticing an inconsistency in the treatment inventory.
A sealed vial had appeared in Dominic's tray even though the clinic's electronic system showed no delivery.
She planned to photograph the label and send it to Mercer.
Before she reached medical storage, someone called her name from the service corridor.
She turned.
Vincent was standing there.
Or someone who looked exactly like him.
"Did he touch you immediately?"
"No."
"Then what?"
"He asked whether I had spoken to Dr. Mercer."
"What did you say?"
"I lied."
"You said no?"
Angela nodded.
"Then he smiled."
Her voice cracked.
"Vincent does not smile at me."
That sentence made everyone look at the real Vincent.
He almost smiled at the absurdity, but stopped himself.
Angela continued.
"He came closer, and something felt wrong."
Dominic leaned forward.
"What?"
"His eyes."
Vincent frowned.
"My eyes?"
"They looked lighter."
Mercer spoke carefully.
"Different lighting can do that."
Angela shook her head.
"It was more than that."
"What?"
She touched the swollen side of her face.
"He smelled like cedar cologne."
Vincent looked at Dominic.
"I do not wear cologne."
Dominic knew that was true.
Vincent hated scented products because his work depended on noticing who had recently occupied a room.
Arthur Voss, however, wore the same expensive cedar fragrance for years.
That fact was too obvious.
Dominic distrusted obvious facts tonight.
"Angela, did this man have anything unusual on his hands?"
She thought.
"A ring."
"Which hand?"
"Right."
"What kind?"
"A dark stone."
Vincent removed both hands from his pockets.
No ring.
Dominic's thoughts moved faster than his face revealed.
Arthur wore a signet ring with black onyx, but always on his left hand.
Again, close enough to point toward him and wrong enough to be deliberate.
Somebody was building evidence that looked like Arthur while wearing Vincent's face.
Or somebody was building evidence that looked like Vincent while borrowing Arthur's habits.
Either way, the confusion itself had value.
Dominic stood.
"Get Angela upstairs and put her in the guest medical room."
Mercer stepped forward.
"I will examine her."
Dominic looked at him.
"You will do it with two guards in the room."
Mercer did not argue.
Vincent remained near the stairwell.
"What happens to me?"
Dominic handed Vincent his weapon back.
"You keep working."
"That is not what the others are going to want."
"The others do not decide who I trust."
"Maybe they should tonight."
Dominic's gaze sharpened.
"Do not become noble when I need you useful."
Vincent holstered the gun.
"Useful I can do."
They returned to the great room.
Arthur was waiting outside the conference room now, and the six council members stood behind him.
He looked at Angela being carried past on a stretcher.
"I assume we are finally being told what is happening."
Dominic continued walking.
"No."
Arthur followed.
"A member of your staff has been assaulted inside the estate."
"Correct."
"Your own head of security has been named."
Dominic stopped.
"How do you know that?"
Arthur's expression froze for half a beat.
The council members looked at one another.
Arthur recovered quickly.
"One of the guards said it."
Vincent stepped closer.
"Which guard?"
Arthur looked annoyed.
"Do you interrogate every sentence now?"
"Tonight, yes."
Arthur smiled faintly.
"Perhaps you should interrogate yourself first."
Dominic saw what Arthur wanted.
He wanted Vincent angry.
He wanted a public fracture.
He wanted the council to see Dominic defending a man accused by a wounded woman.
Dominic refused to give him the picture.
"Arthur, return to the conference room."
"Or what?"
The challenge landed in front of six witnesses.
Dominic walked until only a few inches separated them.
"Or you will discover whether my knee was ever the reason people listened to me."
Arthur's eyes hardened.
For the first time that night, he stepped back without a smile.
The council returned to the room.
Clare and Ellie were waiting in the library with Mrs. Bell.
When Clare saw Dominic, she stood immediately.
"Is the woman alive?"
"Yes."
Ellie was sitting on the carpet beside her latch board.
One of the wooden pieces was missing.
Clare noticed Dominic looking.
"She says the blue gear fell off."
Dominic knelt beside Ellie.
"When?"
Ellie shrugged.
"Before."
"Before what?"
"Before the lights got red."
Clare frowned.
"It was there earlier."
Dominic remembered Ellie using the blue gear to describe the color she had seen on the intruder's cuff.
"Where did you last have the toy?"
Ellie pointed toward the security room.
Vincent moved immediately.
They searched the corridor, the floor beneath the monitors, and the route back to the library.
No blue gear.
Then Mrs. Bell spoke from behind them.
"Mr. Vale."
She held something between two fingers.
A tiny black disc no larger than a shirt button.
"This was stuck beneath the child's toy."
Vincent took it and turned it over.
His expression changed.
"Microphone."
Clare's face went white.
Dominic stared at the toy.
Somebody had been listening to Ellie.
Somebody had known exactly what she told them.
Vincent looked toward the conference room.
"The blue gear did not fall off."
Dominic understood.
"Someone removed it because it mattered."
Clare pulled Ellie into her arms.
"Who would put a microphone on a child's toy?"
Dominic looked at the tiny device.
"Someone who was afraid of what she might remember next."
Ellie looked up at him.
"I remember his shoe."
Every adult in the library stopped moving.
Dominic crouched again.
"What about his shoe?"
Ellie pointed at the rain-dark window.
"It had mud with little white rocks."
Vincent's eyes narrowed.
There was only one place on the Vale property where white crushed limestone had been laid recently.
The private construction road behind the old greenhouse.
That road had been closed for six weeks.
Dominic stood.
"Open the greenhouse."
Vincent looked at him.
"That building is empty."
Dominic stared toward the dark gardens.
May you like
"Then somebody went to a great deal of trouble to make sure it was."
