CHAPTER 11 — THE FAMILY DINNER
Richard forced us into the dining room.
The long table had been set for five.
Margaret.
Laura.
Vanessa.
Me.
And Richard.
Candles burned between silver serving dishes, as though he had planned a reunion rather than an execution.
“Sit,” he ordered.
Detective Hale and the officers had entered the estate through the west side.
Richard did not know they were inside.
At least, I hoped he didn’t.
Margaret looked thinner than she had at the funeral photograph.
A healing cut crossed her forehead.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered to me.
Richard placed the gun beside his plate.
“Margaret has apologized for many things. She has never learned that apologies are meaningless without obedience.”
Laura glared at him.
“You kept me in a room for thirty-four years.”
“You were unstable.”
“I was nineteen.”
“You tried to steal my child.”
I felt his eyes move toward me.
“I was never yours,” I said.
His smile hardened.
“I gave you life.”
“You gave me fear.”
Vanessa reached beneath the table and found my hand.
It was the first time I had allowed her to touch me since the funeral.
Margaret explained what happened at the cottage.
Richard’s associate arrived while she was preparing to leave.
She fought him on the stairs and escaped through the back window.
But Richard was waiting outside.
He brought her to Cumberland Island and forced her to record messages designed to turn us against one another.
“The warning about Mr. Whitaker was real,” Margaret said. “The message about Vanessa was not.”
Richard had altered the recording.
He wanted us divided.
Just as he had always divided us.
Richard poured wine into five glasses.
“I have arranged a solution,” he said. “Margaret will sign back the company. Emily will sign away her inheritance. Laura will confirm she remained at the center voluntarily.”
“And Vanessa?” I asked.
His eyes settled on her.
“Vanessa has always understood loyalty.”
Vanessa’s fingers tightened around mine.
“No,” she said.
Richard slowly set down the bottle.
“What did you say?”
“I said no.”
He lifted the gun.
Before he could aim it, the lights went out.
Detective Hale shouted from the hallway.
“Police! Drop your weapon!”
Gunfire erupted.
Margaret pulled Laura beneath the table.
Vanessa dragged me toward the floor.
When the emergency lights flashed on, Richard was gone.
The rear doors stood open.
A trail of blood led toward the dock.
Detective Hale followed it.
Seconds later, we heard a boat engine roar.
Richard was escaping through the marsh.
Then one of the officers found something beneath Richard’s chair.
A timer.
May you like
Thirty seconds remained.
The entire mansion had been wired to explode.
