Chapter 13 - THE IMPOSTOR’S CONFESSION
Helen Ward had lived as Eleanor Shaw for sixteen years.
She had assumed the surgeon’s identity after Eleanor discovered that Edmund Vale was receiving secret medical treatment. According to Helen, the real Eleanor tried to warn Margaret.
She disappeared before she could deliver the evidence.
Helen was originally a nurse employed by Charles Crowe. Her task was to maintain the deception, destroy medical records, and report anyone who asked questions.
“Why help Grace?” Lucas asked.
They questioned Helen in the cemetery office while two independent officers stood guard.
“Because Edmund ordered my husband killed.”
“You said Eleanor’s husband was the surgeon.”
“He was. He believed I was Eleanor. Edmund kept us isolated. My husband died before learning the truth.”
Grace looked disgusted.
“You continued working for them.”
“I was afraid.”
“For sixteen years?”
“I had a son.”
“Where is he?”
Helen looked toward Lucas.
“You know him.”
Lucas felt cold.
“Who?”
“Samuel Reed.”
The room went silent.
“Reed is your son?” Adrian asked.
“He was taken from me when he was a child. Edmund paid for his education, his police career, everything. Samuel believed Edmund saved him from an unstable mother.”
“And you never told him?”
“I tried. He called me a liar.”
Grace paced near the window.
“This family tree is exactly how Edmund protected the network. Everyone was tied by blood, debt, or shame.”
Lucas looked at the hard drive recovered from the memorial.
“What is on this?”
“Margaret’s archive,” Helen said. “Or part of it.”
“You knew it was in the grave?”
“I knew Eleanor had planned to hide evidence inside an empty coffin. I did not know Grace’s memorial would be used.”
“Who placed Eleanor’s body there?”
“Edmund.”
“Years before Grace disappeared?”
“Yes. The coffin was moved from a private mausoleum on the night before Grace’s memorial. Reed supervised the transfer.”
Grace’s face hardened.
“He used my grave to hide a murder victim.”
“And to send a message,” Helen said. “The dead protect the dead.”
Adrian examined the hard drive.
“It’s encrypted.”
Helen nodded toward the signet ring, then remembered Charles had taken it.
“The ring contained the key.”
Lucas thought of the exchange at the farmhouse.
Charles had wanted the ring badly enough to trade Lily for it.
“What will Charles do with the data?”
“Destroy everyone not loyal to him.”
“Can we stop him?”
“Only if Margaret retained a second key.”
Lucas called Vale House again.
No answer.
Then Lily’s borrowed phone rang.
A video call.
Lucas accepted.
Margaret appeared on-screen.
She was seated in the bridal room, tied to a chair.
Vanessa stood behind her holding a knife.
Vanessa’s face was bruised. Her hands trembled.
“Lucas,” she said, “bring Grace to Vale House.”
“Let my mother go.”
“I can’t.”
“You can.”
“No, you don’t understand. My father has men everywhere.”
“Where is Charles?”
Vanessa looked toward someone outside the camera’s view.
“In the east tower.”
Grace stepped beside Lucas.
“What does he want?”
Vanessa’s eyes filled with fear.
“The original ledger.”
“It isn’t there.”
“He believes Margaret knows where it is.”
Margaret spoke calmly.
“Lucas, do not come back.”
Vanessa pressed the knife closer to her throat.
“Stop talking.”
Margaret ignored her.
“The house is wired. Charles intends to destroy it after he gets the ledger.”
Lucas thought of Lily’s room, Grace’s cameras, his father’s study, generations of family records.
“How long?”
Margaret said, “Less than an hour.”
Vanessa suddenly looked toward the bridal wardrobe.
A voice came from inside it.
Not Grace’s recorded voice.
A man’s live voice.
“Vanessa, open the door.”
Vanessa stepped back.
Margaret went pale.
Lucas heard the hidden panel opening.
A man entered the bridal room through the passage.
The camera showed only his polished shoes and the lower edge of a dark coat.
He walked toward Margaret.
Vanessa whispered, “Mr. Vale.”
Lucas stared at the screen.
The man removed the phone from Vanessa’s hand.
For one brief moment, his face appeared.
It was Edmund Vale.
Older, burned, but unmistakable.
Lucas’s dead father looked directly into the camera.
May you like
“Bring me my wife,” Edmund said.
Then he ended the call.
