Chapter 6 - The Widow and the Mistress
Dominic had never considered himself a cruel man.
That was the story he repeated to himself as he stood before the mirror in his hotel suite, adjusting the black tie he would wear to his wife’s funeral.
Cruel men acted without reason.
Dominic had reasons.
Vivienne had made him feel secondary. She had chosen missions over anniversaries, soldiers over dinners, command calls over vacations. Every room changed when she entered, while he remained the person introduced after her name.
This is Colonel Vivienne Cross, and this is her husband.
Not Dominic Cross, strategist and consultant.
Her husband.
Chloe understood the humiliation.
She had met Dominic at a charity gala two years earlier. Unlike Vivienne, Chloe asked about his ambitions. She praised his ideas. She told him that behind every decorated officer was someone who made the victories possible.
Their affair began with compliments and became a plan.
At first, they discussed divorce.
Then Dominic discovered the insurance policy contained a double indemnity provision for death during qualifying service activity.
Five million dollars could become ten.
Chloe calculated what they could do with that money. Dominic would launch an international security company. Chloe would expand her charity. They would purchase the mountain property through a holding corporation and sell it later.
The funeral cost one hundred thousand dollars because Chloe insisted that wealth and grief had to appear together.
“No one suspects a man who spends that much burying his wife,” she told him.
Now, standing near the hotel window, she looked at Dominic with growing impatience.
“You need to stop shaking.”
“I’m not shaking.”
“You are.”
“The investigators asked questions yesterday.”
“They always ask questions.”
“They wanted to know why the coffin was ordered early.”
Chloe turned away.
“What did you say?”
“That the funeral home required advance notice.”
“Good.”
“They also asked about the route change.”
Her face tightened.
Dominic noticed.
“You said the account could not be traced to us.”
“It cannot.”
“You said the jammer would be destroyed.”
“It is buried under four feet of snow.”
Dominic walked closer.
“Did you destroy it?”
Chloe did not answer.
His fear sharpened.
“You left it there?”
“The storm was moving in. I could not carry everything.”
“You told me it was handled.”
“And you told me she would never escape that room.”
“She didn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
Dominic stared at her.
For the first time since Vivienne disappeared, neither of them spoke with certainty.
A phone vibrated on the table.
Chloe picked it up.
The message came from an unknown number.
Beautiful dress. Red always suited you.
Her hand went cold.
Dominic read over her shoulder.
“Who sent that?”
“I don’t know.”
Another message arrived.
Tell Dominic the compass worked.
Chloe dropped the phone.
Dominic backed away as though the device had become dangerous.
“No,” he whispered.
Chloe reached for the curtains and pulled them shut.
“It could be an investigator.”
“Only Vivienne knew about the compass.”
“You gave it to her in front of the restaurant staff. Anyone could know.”
“No one knew the engraving.”
The third message contained a photograph.
It showed the broken padlock resting on a metal examination table.
Dominic sat down hard.
Chloe grabbed her handbag.
“We need to leave.”
“The funeral starts in forty minutes.”
“Then miss it.”
“If we run now, we confess.”
“If she is alive, the funeral does not matter.”
Dominic looked toward the black suit prepared for the service.
For weeks, he had controlled the story.
Now the story was moving without him.
He picked up the phone and deleted the messages.
“We go to the cathedral,” he said. “We act normal.”
Chloe stared at him.
“And if she walks in?”
May you like
Dominic forced a smile that did not reach his eyes.
“She won’t.”
