CHAPTER 6: THE WOMAN IN THE PRIVATE CLINIC
Evelyn turned toward Investigator Torres.
Torres had not heard the call.
“What did Naomi say?”
Evelyn forced herself to remain calm.
“She said Adrian has Vance.”
It was the first lie she had told a police investigator.
Torres immediately began making calls.
Roman pulled Evelyn into the kitchen.
“What did Naomi really say?”
Evelyn told him.
Roman looked through the doorway at Torres.
“If Naomi is right, we can’t trust anyone.”
They left the apartment through a service exit and used the location data from Naomi’s last call. Her phone had connected to a tower near an abandoned warehouse district.
They found her vehicle inside a parking structure.
The driver’s door was open.
Naomi was gone, but the ledger had been hidden beneath the passenger seat.
Beside it was a flash drive and a handwritten note.
YOUR MOTHER DIDN’T DIE IN THE ACCIDENT.
Evelyn stopped breathing.
Her mother, Cecilia Hart, had supposedly died when Evelyn was fourteen. Her car had plunged from a mountain road during a winter storm.
Roman inserted the flash drive into an offline laptop.
It contained payment records from Adrian to a private medical facility called Briarwood Recovery Center.
One patient was identified only as C.H.
“This has to be a trick,” Evelyn said.
Roman looked shaken.
“I saw Mom’s coffin.”
“It was closed.”
They drove to Briarwood, a secluded clinic outside the city. The facility’s director initially refused them access.
Then Roman showed him a photograph from the gala and quietly promised that every reporter in the state would arrive within an hour.
The director changed his mind.
They found Cecilia in a locked room on the building’s third floor.
Her hair had turned silver. Her body was frail. But when Evelyn entered, Cecilia slowly lifted her head.
Her eyes filled with recognition.
“Evie?”
Evelyn crossed the room and dropped beside her bed.
“Mom.”
Cecilia touched her face with trembling fingers.
“I tried to come back.”
“Who did this to you?”
“Your father’s business partner arranged the accident. He kept me here because I knew what he was stealing.”
“Adrian?”
Cecilia looked confused.
“No. Adrian was only a young assistant then.”
Roman leaned closer.
“Who was the partner?”
Before Cecilia could answer, the clinic’s alarms began screaming.
The lights switched off.
Through the window, Evelyn saw black vehicles surrounding the building.
Cecilia gripped her hand.
“Listen to me. The man who started this is still inside Hart International.”
“Who?”
Cecilia’s lips formed a name.
May you like
But an explosion in the hallway drowned out her voice.
The door handle began turning.
