Chapter 3 - THE KEY I NEVER GAVE HIM
My first impulse was to rush home.
My second was to remember that whoever wanted me frightened might be counting on that reaction.
I called Helen from the private room.
She answered on the second ring.
"Happy Mother's Day, Margaret."
Her warm voice almost undid me.
"Helen, where are you?"
"At home with my sister. Is something wrong?"
"Someone is using an imitation of your work email to request transfers."
Silence answered me.
Then I heard her set down a cup.
"I'm opening my laptop."
I told her about the attempted study entry and asked her to alert the security company.
She had helped manage that house since before Thomas became ill.
She knew where every key belonged, and she knew the locked study held our original corporate records.
"Adam still has his old code?" she asked.
"It was disabled last winter."
"Then a failed attempt is good news."
I looked across the table.
Adam had gone unusually still.
"Who is at my house?" I asked him.
"How would I know?"
"You used your former entry code six minutes ago."
"That doesn't mean I was there. I'm standing here."
"Exactly."
Daniel understood first.
"Someone working with him."
Vanessa folded her arms.
"This is becoming absurd."
I remembered Thomas warning me, years before, that some people only discovered their conscience when the evidence became undeniable.
I had hoped our son would be different.
Helen confirmed the estate's security staff were checking the grounds.
She offered to meet me there, but I asked her to come to Bellavita instead.
"Bring the sealed blue ledger from the archive," I said.
She drew a sharp breath.
"You think it's related?"
"I think someone thinks it is."
I ended the call and turned back to my son.
"I loved you through scraped knees, terrible report cards, and the year you stopped speaking to me because I wouldn't fund a risky development."
Adam's jaw tightened.
"Don't start giving a speech."
"I am not giving a speech."
"Then what are you doing?"
"Giving you one chance to tell the truth before I stop protecting you from it."
He looked past me, toward the window.
"I thought you wanted me to be successful."
I had heard that argument since he was twenty-three.
Success, in Adam's vocabulary, always meant that someone else provided the money.
"I wanted you to be honest," I said.
Graham scoffed.
"Honesty doesn't pay a payroll."
"Neither does fraud once the bank notices it."
His face went pale for an instant.
Sofia entered with a tray of water, placed it on the table, and remained by the door.
She had worked at Bellavita for eight years and had never once asked for a favor from me.
She had just risked her job to reject a powerful guest's demand.
I made a note to remember that when the evening ended.
"The building's security footage is being preserved," she said.
"And there is one other thing."
She handed Daniel a thin envelope left at reception two hours earlier.
My name was written on the front.
Inside was a photograph of Thomas's gravestone, taken that morning.
On the back, someone had written in black ink:
May you like
YOUR HUSBAND KNEW WHAT ADAM DID.
