Chapter 9 - The Sister Who Knew
I had met Rebecca Mercer twice.
Both times, she had been charming.
The first was at a fundraiser where she spent most of the evening mocking Elias’s inability to dance.
The second was Christmas dinner at his house.
She brought Sophie a telescope and me a bottle of wine I later learned cost more than my first car payment.
She had hugged me goodbye and whispered, “He is happier with you.”
Three weeks later, Elias left me.
Now Marina’s recorded voice was telling us Rebecca had helped her copy evidence.
Elias began pacing.
“That makes no sense.”
“Why?” Ortiz asked.
“Rebecca hated Graham.”
“That sounds like a reason she might help Marina.”
“No.”
He stopped.
“I mean, she hated him because she thought he controlled too much of the company.”
“Again, that supports Marina’s statement.”
Elias looked at the frozen image of his late wife.
“Rebecca never told me.”
“Maybe she was scared.”
“She tells me everything.”
I almost spoke.
Then I decided the sentence condemned itself.
Ortiz noticed too.
“People tell you less than you think, Mr. Mercer.”
He did not argue.
“Where is your sister now?”
“In Napa.”
“Call her.”
He did.
Straight to voicemail.
He called again.
Nothing.
He tried her assistant.
No answer.
Then he called the vineyard where Rebecca was supposed to be attending a board retreat.
The receptionist said she had checked out early that morning.
No forwarding location.
Elias stared at his phone.
“She never leaves a retreat early without telling me.”
Ortiz was already typing.
“When was the last time you spoke?”
“Yesterday afternoon.”
“What did you discuss?”
“Sophie’s accident.”
“Did you mention Adelaide?”
He looked at me.
“Yes.”
“What did you say?”
“That Adelaide was the doctor.”
“Did you mention the pregnancy?”
“No.”
“Did Rebecca know you two had been together?”
“Yes.”
“Did she know why you separated?”
“No.”
I raised an eyebrow.
Elias ignored me.
Ortiz asked, “Could she have known about the threats?”
“I don’t know.”
“Could Marina have trusted her with evidence?”
“Yes.”
“Could Rebecca have hidden that from you for three years?”
His answer took longer.
“Yes.”
Price entered the room holding a printed report.
“We found a vehicle.”
Ortiz looked up.
“Rebecca’s?”
“Registered to her company.”
“Where?”
“San Francisco International parking garage.”
“When entered?”
“Five twenty this morning.”
“Flight records?”
“No ticket under her name.”
Elias went pale.
“She hates commercial flights.”
“Private aircraft?”
“We’re checking.”
His phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
He looked at Ortiz.
She nodded.
He answered on speaker.
“Hello?”
For several seconds, there was only static.
Then a woman whispered.
“Elias?”
He gripped the phone.
“Rebecca?”
“Don’t say my name.”
“Where are you?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“Are you safe?”
“No.”
The word changed everyone’s posture.
Ortiz gestured for Price to begin a trace.
Elias kept his voice steady.
“What happened?”
“I saw Graham yesterday.”
“Where?”
“At the vineyard.”
“What did he want?”
“He wanted to know if Marina ever gave me anything.”
Elias looked at the laptop.
“What did you tell him?”
“That she didn’t.”
“Was that true?”
Silence.
“Rebecca.”
“No.”
Elias closed his eyes.
“What did she give you?”
“A ledger.”
Ortiz leaned forward.
“Where is it?” Elias asked.
“I moved it.”
“To where?”
“I’m not telling you over the phone.”
“Rebecca, the police are here.”
“I don’t know which police to trust.”
Ortiz’s face did not change, but her eyes sharpened.
Rebecca continued.
“Marina said Graham had someone inside law enforcement.”
“We know,” Elias said.
“No, you don’t.”
Her breathing became ragged.
“You think it was some detective.”
“It wasn’t.”
Elias stared at the phone.
“Who?”
“I only have a last name.”
“Tell me.”
“Price.”
No one moved.
Detective Owen Price stood three feet from the table.
His face emptied.
The call disconnected.
Ortiz turned slowly toward her partner.
Price raised both hands.
“Lena, I swear to God.”
“Put your weapon on the table.”
“What?”
“Now.”
“Lena.”
“Weapon.”
He unclipped his holster and placed it down.
I watched his hands.
They were trembling.
Elias stepped in front of me.
This time, I did not argue.
Ortiz took Price’s gun.
“Phone too.”
He handed it over.
“You know me.”
“I know what I can prove.”
“I have never met Graham Voss.”
“Then you should be very interested in why a frightened witness knows your name.”
Price looked at Elias.
“You think I killed your wife?”
“I don’t know what to think.”
“That makes two of us.”
Ortiz called internal affairs.
For the next hour, everything fractured.
Price was removed from the case.
His access was suspended.
His phone was seized.
He submitted voluntarily to questioning.
I expected him to look angry.
Instead, he looked scared.
Before they took him out, he stopped near Ortiz.
“Check my father.”
She frowned.
“What?”
“My father was a detective here twenty years.”
“What was his name?”
“Daniel Price.”
Elias went still.
“Daniel Price investigated Marina’s death.”
Owen Price looked at him as if he had been struck.
“My father handled the accident scene?”
“Yes.”
Price turned toward Ortiz.
Owen Price’s removal from the case changed the atmosphere immediately.
He had been the quieter detective.
The one who asked procedural questions and remembered details.
Seeing suspicion turn toward him reminded me how little any of us actually knew about the people beside us.
Before internal affairs arrived, he sat alone in the interview room with his hands visible on the table.
Ortiz stood outside the glass.
“You believe him?” I asked.
“I believe evidence.”
“That was not what I asked.”
She glanced at me.
“I have worked with him seven years.”
“That sounds like a yes.”
“It sounds like seven years.”
I respected the answer.
Elias stood farther down the hall making calls about Rebecca.
His voice was low but urgent.
I watched him and wondered how many relationships were being reinterpreted in a single night.
Marina.
Rebecca.
Graham.
Dale.
Now a detective whose father had closed Marina’s case.
Ortiz crossed her arms.
“People think investigations are about finding the liar.”
“What are they actually about?”
“Finding the parts everyone tells differently.”
“That sounds philosophical.”
“It is mostly paperwork.”
I smiled faintly.
Then Price looked through the glass at her.
His expression was not defensive.
It was devastated.
“If his father took money,” I said, “does that compromise him automatically?”
“No.”
“But it compromises the case.”
“Yes.”
“And if Graham knew Owen was assigned?”
“Then he may have expected us to discover the connection.”
I understood.
Another layer of distrust.
Another person positioned so that even innocence became suspicious.
“Graham doesn’t just hide things,” I said.
Ortiz looked at me.
“He arranges what people will think when they find them.”
She nodded slowly.
“That is becoming my working theory.”
It was the first moment I understood the scale of his real skill.
Money was only one instrument.
His true weapon was interpretation.
He made people discover evidence in the order that hurt them most.
“He never told me.”
Ortiz’s expression changed.
“Where is he now?”
Internal affairs later confirmed Owen Price had no unexplained money, no contact with Graham, and no role in Marina’s original investigation.
But removing him had still been necessary.
Ortiz told him that herself.
“I know,” he said.
He looked at his father’s name in the file.
“I just wish I had known what I was walking into.”
I understood the sentence too well.
Everyone in the case seemed to be discovering that someone older had left a secret beneath their feet.
“Retired.”
“Where does he live?”
Price’s father refused to speak when detectives first arrived.
He asked for an attorney before answering a single question.
That was his right.
It was also revealing in a case where almost everyone had spent years talking around the truth.
Silence could be wisdom.
Silence could be fear.
Silence could also be strategy.
Context was everything.
“Coronado.”
Price swallowed.
May you like
“And he plays golf every Thursday with Graham Voss.”
