Chapter 5 - The Woman Who Should Have Been In Custody
Christopher moved Emma's bed away from the hospital room door before he did anything else.
Naomi called hospital security and told them to lock the pediatric floor.
Detective Ortiz was already on her way back.
The image from the parking garage remained frozen on Christopher's phone.
Juliette's face was unmistakable.
She was supposed to be in custody.
Instead, she had been watching the hospital entrance while someone else used her name at the estate.
Emma woke fully when two security officers entered the hallway.
"Daddy, what happened?"
Christopher forced his expression to soften.
"Nothing you need to worry about."
Emma looked at the officers through the glass.
"Is Juliette here?"
Christopher hated how quickly she guessed.
"Maybe."
Emma pulled the blanket over her knees.
"She always finds me."
The sentence cut through him.
"Not this time."
Naomi stepped into the room and closed the door behind her.
"The garage exits are being sealed."
Christopher looked at his phone.
"If she came here to reach Emma, she will not use a public elevator."
Naomi nodded.
"Service stairs?"
"Or she has access."
Christopher called Owen Briggs.
"Find out whether Juliette ever received a Pierce medical security credential."
Briggs called back four minutes later.
"She did."
Christopher closed his eyes.
"Who authorized it?"
"Your mother."
Of course she had.
The credential had been issued nine months earlier and included after-hours access to St. Catherine because Pierce Consolidated funded a private executive medical suite in another wing.
Juliette could move through several employee corridors without passing the main desk.
Naomi looked toward the ceiling camera.
"We need her credential disabled now."
Christopher relayed the order.
A second later, his phone vibrated.
Unknown Number.
There was one message.
I am not here for Emma.
Christopher showed Naomi.
Another message appeared.
I am here because your mother is going to kill me next.
Naomi's face hardened.
"Do not answer."
Christopher typed anyway.
Where are you?
The reply came almost immediately.
You do not get to bring police.
Christopher stared at the screen.
You almost killed my daughter.
The typing bubble appeared.
Then disappeared.
Then returned.
I know.
Christopher's fingers stopped.
For the first time, Juliette had not denied it.
A final message appeared.
And if you want to know why Emma turns seven in six weeks, you will listen before you hate me.
Christopher read the line twice.
Naomi took the phone from his hand.
"She is manipulating you."
"Probably."
"That does not mean she knows nothing."
"I know."
Detective Ortiz arrived minutes later with two officers.
She read the messages, then asked the hospital to trace any device connected to the internal wireless network.
No useful location appeared.
Juliette was using cellular service.
Ortiz handed Christopher his phone back.
"Tell her you will meet."
Naomi looked at her.
"Absolutely not."
"We choose the location and control it."
"She said no police."
Ortiz's expression did not change.
"People hiding from police often say that."
Christopher looked through the glass at Emma.
"I am not leaving this floor."
Ortiz nodded.
"Then we make her come to us."
Christopher sent one sentence.
Come to the chapel on the fourth floor in ten minutes, or I send every message to the press.
Juliette answered with one word.
Fine.
The hospital chapel was two floors below pediatrics and empty at that hour.
Ortiz placed officers behind a maintenance door and in the stairwell.
Naomi stayed with Emma.
Christopher entered the chapel alone.
He stood near the front pew and stared at a simple wooden cross mounted on the wall.
He had never been a religious man.
Tonight he found himself wondering how many people had sat in that room asking why someone they loved had been allowed to suffer.
The side door opened.
Juliette stepped inside.
She looked different from the polished woman who had stood beside the pool.
Her hair was damp with sweat.
A bruise darkened one side of her cheek.
Her expensive dress had been covered by a stolen hospital coat.
Christopher did not move toward her.
"Stay there."
Juliette stopped.
"I did not come to hurt Emma."
"You already did."
Her face twisted.
"I know."
"Say exactly what you did."
Juliette looked toward the door.
"Not here."
"You chose here."
"You chose here."
Christopher's voice went cold.
"Say it."
Juliette swallowed.
"I told Emma Rachel's bracelet was near the pool filter box."
Christopher felt his hands curl.
"Why?"
"Because Estelle told me to get her close to the deep end."
"And then?"
Juliette's eyes filled.
"I was supposed to make it look like she slipped."
"Did you push her?"
Juliette looked down.
Christopher took one step closer.
"Did you push my daughter?"
"Yes."
The word was barely audible.
Christopher's entire body went rigid.
For one violent second, he wanted to forget the officers behind the wall and everything he had ever been taught about restraint.
Instead, he forced himself to breathe.
"Then why are you still standing here?"
Juliette wiped her face.
"Because I panicked."
"You panicked after pushing a six-year-old into deep water."
"I thought she would come back up."
Christopher stared at her in disbelief.
"She cannot swim."
"Estelle told me she could."
"You lived with her."
"I did not know."
"Because you never cared enough to know."
Juliette flinched.
Christopher felt no sympathy.
"Why did you scream for help?"
"Because she did not come back up."
"So your conscience arrived after the plan failed."
Juliette began crying.
"I am not asking you to forgive me."
"Good."
"I am telling you Estelle never planned to protect me."
Christopher laughed bitterly.
"That is the first intelligent thing you have said."
Juliette reached slowly into the hospital coat.
Christopher tensed.
She pulled out a folded envelope.
"This is why she helped me escape."
"She helped you?"
"She arranged the woman who switched places with me."
"Claire Benson."
Juliette nodded.
"One of her former assistants."
"Why would Estelle help you escape if she wanted you dead?"
"Because she needed me outside long enough to retrieve this."
Juliette held up the envelope.
"Then I was supposed to disappear."
"What is it?"
"A copy of the agreement she made me sign."
Christopher did not reach for it.
"What agreement?"
"If Emma died before her seventh birthday, I would receive the lake property after you and I married."
Christopher stared at her.
"There was no marriage."
"There would have been."
"Not after today."
"She told me the trust had a forfeiture clause."
"What trust?"
Juliette looked at him as if he should already know.
"William Pierce's private trust for Emma."
Christopher felt the room tilt.
"How much?"
Juliette's mouth trembled.
"Not just money."
"How much?"
"Thirty-one percent of Pierce Consolidated."
Christopher stopped breathing.
His own direct stake was twenty-eight percent.
Estelle controlled another nineteen through trusts and voting agreements.
If Emma received thirty-one percent at age seven, she would become the largest single beneficial shareholder in the company.
Even as a minor, whoever legally controlled her trust could effectively control Pierce Consolidated.
Christopher suddenly understood the guardianship document.
Estelle did not merely want Emma gone.
She wanted legal authority over Emma until the trust vested.
If Emma survived, Estelle wanted to control her shares.
If Emma died, the trust likely reverted somewhere else.
"Where do the shares go if Emma dies?"
Juliette looked toward the side door again.
"That is the part Estelle never told me."
"Then how did you know the house would be yours?"
"She promised it."
"You tried to kill a child for a promise."
Juliette closed her eyes.
"Yes."
No excuse followed.
Christopher hated her more for the simplicity of the admission.
"Give me the envelope."
Juliette held it tighter.
"First you protect me."
"No."
"Christopher."
"You confess to the police and give them everything."
"Estelle will destroy me."
"You pushed my daughter into a pool."
"She will destroy Emma too."
That stopped him.
Juliette reached into the envelope and removed a photograph.
It showed Rachel standing beside William Pierce in the old music room.
Rachel was holding the silver bracelet.
William was holding a blue folder.
On the back, someone had written a date.
Two weeks before Rachel died.
Beneath it were four words.
The key is hers.
Christopher stared at the photograph.
"What key?"
Juliette shook her head.
"The bracelet."
"What about it?"
"The blue stone is not a stone."
Christopher remembered Emma begging to retrieve it.
"What is it?"
Juliette leaned closer.
"A lock insert."
"For what?"
Before she could answer, the chapel lights went out.
A sharp metallic sound came from the side corridor.
Juliette's face drained of color.
"She found me."
Christopher heard a door open behind the wall.
Detective Ortiz shouted.
Then the building alarm began to scream.
Juliette shoved the envelope into Christopher's hands.
"Get the bracelet before Estelle does."
The emergency lights came on.
Juliette was already running toward the opposite door.
Ortiz burst into the chapel.
"Stop!"
Christopher pointed.
"She went that way."
Ortiz ran after her.
Christopher opened the envelope.
Inside was a photocopy of the agreement, the photograph, and a handwritten note in Estelle's unmistakable script.
It contained one line.
After seven, the girl owns what should have been mine.
Christopher stared at the words.
Then his phone rang.
It was an officer at the mansion.
"Mr. Pierce, we just lost power to the east wing."
Christopher felt dread rise instantly.
"The red room?"
"Yes."
"Get to the wall behind the horse painting."
The officer went silent.
"Sir, there is no painting."
"There was."
"The wall is bare."
Christopher gripped the phone.
"Then open it."
A few seconds passed.
He heard pounding.
Then a shout.
The officer came back breathing hard.
"There is a safe behind the paneling."
Christopher closed his eyes.
"Is it open?"
"No."
"Do not touch anything until Detective Ortiz gets there."
"Understood."
The officer hesitated.
"There is something else."
"What?"
"The safe has a key slot shaped like a small oval stone."
Christopher looked at the photograph of Rachel's bracelet.
May you like
For six years, the only key capable of opening his father's hidden safe had been disguised as a keepsake belonging to a dead woman.
And Emma had been asking for it all night.
