Chapter 2 - THE MAN WHO KNEW HER FATHER
Thursday morning arrived beneath heavy rain.
Marcus left at eight for a meeting in Richmond. Helena had a luncheon at the country club. Evelyn waited until both cars disappeared beyond the gates before retrieving the keys to an old sedan kept in the rear garage.
She did not take her regular vehicle.
Marcus could track it.
The Blackwood Café stood forty miles away in a town called Ashford, where red brick buildings lined a narrow river. Evelyn arrived ten minutes early and chose a table near the back.
Daniel entered precisely at two.
He carried no umbrella.
Rain darkened the shoulders of his coat.
“You came,” he said.
“You wrote that my father didn’t die.”
Daniel sat across from her.
“I wrote that he didn’t die in the boat.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.”
“Then tell me what happened.”
Daniel looked toward the windows.
Twelve years of questions pressed against Evelyn’s chest.
She remembered the official story.
Her father had left the marina before dawn. His boat had been discovered drifting near the Maryland coast. Blood was found on the deck, along with his broken watch.
Investigators concluded he had fallen overboard after striking his head.
No body was ever found.
“You were supposed to be on that boat,” Daniel said.
Evelyn frowned.
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Your father planned to take you with him.”
“I was at college.”
“He called you the night before.”
“I don’t remember any call.”
“You answered.”
Evelyn sat back.
“That’s impossible.”
Daniel removed an envelope from inside his coat.
It contained a photocopy of an old telephone record.
A call had been placed from Nathaniel Hart’s home office to Evelyn’s dormitory at 10:43 p.m. It lasted eleven minutes.
“I would remember speaking to him the night before he disappeared.”
“Unless someone made sure you didn’t.”
A waitress approached.
Daniel ordered coffee. Evelyn ordered nothing.
When they were alone again, Daniel continued.
“Your father had discovered unauthorized payments moving through Cross Meridian. Millions of dollars passed through shell companies connected to three board members and an outside consultant.”
“Marcus?”
“Marcus had just begun advising the company.”
“He told me he met my father only twice.”
“He lied.”
Daniel placed a photograph on the table.
Nathaniel stood outside a courthouse beside several men. One of them was unmistakably Marcus, younger but already wearing the same controlled smile.
The date printed in the corner was two years before Nathaniel vanished.
Evelyn felt the room tilt.
“Where did you get this?”
“Your father gave it to me.”
“When?”
“Three days before the boat was found.”
“Why haven’t you shown me before?”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“Because I was a coward.”
The admission came without defense.
“Marcus approached me after the investigation. He knew details about my daughter’s medical records, my wife’s debts, and an accounting mistake I had made years earlier. He said that if I questioned the accident, my family would lose everything.”
“So you disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“And now?”
“My wife received a package last month.”
Daniel slid a small brass key across the table.
“There was no return address. Inside was this key and a note written in your father’s handwriting.”
Evelyn stared at it.
“What did the note say?”
Daniel hesitated.
“Protect Evelyn from the house.”
Evelyn almost laughed.
“The house?”
“I don’t know what it means.”
“You expect me to believe my father sent you a note twelve years after disappearing?”
“I don’t know when it was written.”
“Do you think he’s alive?”
Daniel looked at her carefully.
“I think someone wants us to ask that question.”
A car pulled up outside.
A black sedan.
Evelyn recognized it immediately.
Marcus’s driver stepped onto the sidewalk.
Daniel saw the fear in her face.
“You were followed.”
“No. I changed cars.”
“Then he didn’t follow the car.”
Evelyn reached for her handbag.
Her phone lay inside.
It had been powered off since she left the estate.
Daniel picked it up, removed the case, and found a tracking chip glued beneath the lining.
“You need to leave through the kitchen,” he said.
“What about you?”
“I’ll delay them.”
“Marcus cannot know I met you.”
“He already knows.”
The café door opened.
The driver entered with another man.
Neither wore a coat despite the rain.
Daniel stood.
“Go.”
Evelyn moved toward the kitchen as the men crossed the café.
The cook shouted when she pushed through the rear door. She ran into an alley, rain soaking her hair and dress.
At the far end, a delivery truck blocked the street.
She heard footsteps behind her.
“Mrs. Cross!”
Evelyn turned left, climbed a rusted fire staircase, and reached the roof of a low warehouse.
Her hands slipped against the wet railings.
Below, Marcus’s men entered the alley.
One looked up.
“There!”
Evelyn ran across the roof.
A six-foot gap separated the warehouse from the neighboring building.
She stopped at the edge.
Behind her, the metal staircase rattled.
She had nowhere else to go.
Then a woman appeared on the opposite roof.
She wore a gray raincoat and held out one hand.
“Jump, Evelyn.”
Evelyn stared at her.
The woman looked to be in her late fifties. A pale scar ran from her temple to her jaw.
“Who are you?”
“There’s no time.”
The men reached the roof.
Evelyn stepped back, ran, and jumped.
Her feet struck the opposite ledge.
She slipped.
The woman caught her wrist and pulled her to safety.
A gunshot cracked through the rain.
They dropped behind a ventilation unit.
The woman dragged Evelyn toward another staircase.
“Move.”
They descended into an abandoned printing office and escaped through a loading bay where a blue van waited.
Evelyn climbed inside.
The woman locked the doors and drove away.
Only when they had crossed the river did Evelyn speak.
“Who are you?”
The woman kept her eyes on the road.
“My name is Miriam Vale.”
“That means nothing to me.”
“It should.”
Miriam reached into her coat and removed a silver locket.
Inside was a photograph of two young women standing beside Nathaniel Hart.
One was Evelyn’s mother.
The other was Miriam.
“Your father trusted me,” she said.
“Then tell me whether he’s alive.”
Miriam looked at her through the rearview mirror.
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both.”
The van entered a tunnel.
For several seconds, darkness swallowed them.
May you like
Miriam’s next words came quietly.
“Your father built a secret beneath your house, Evelyn. Marcus has been searching for it since the day he married you.”
