Chapter 3 - Bellwood)
Detective Sofia Alvarez arrived forty-three minutes later.
She was younger than Claire expected.
Early forties, perhaps.
Dark suit.
Hair pulled back.
No dramatic entrance.
No raised voice.
She simply walked into the bridal suite with a crime-scene technician and began asking questions.
The black phone disappeared into an evidence bag.
So did the loose diamond earring.
Claire photographed the evidence numbers before they were taken.
Diane did not return.
Daniel refused to answer further questions without an attorney.
That surprised no one.
What surprised Claire was how quickly the wedding venue transformed.
Staff moved quietly through hallways that had been full of music less than twelve hours earlier.
Florists dismantled arrangements.
Empty champagne glasses vanished.
Guests who had stayed overnight gathered in the lobby and whispered.
Claire changed out of her wedding gown.
She chose jeans, a sweater, and flat shoes from her overnight bag.
When she saw herself in the mirror, she looked like a woman who had aged several years between midnight and breakfast.
The bruises on her shoulders were darker now.
Detective Alvarez photographed them.
"Do you want to make a domestic assault report?"
Claire looked at Daniel through the open doorway.
He sat at the far end of the suite beside an attorney who had appeared with astonishing speed.
"Yes."
Daniel looked up.
Claire didn't look away.
Alvarez nodded.
"We'll take your full statement."
Daniel's attorney whispered something to him.
His face tightened.
For the first time in five years, Claire did not care what Daniel thought about her.
The freedom of that realization almost made her dizzy.
Later, Claire and Erin followed Alvarez to the Bellwood police annex where the cold-case unit had offices.
Marcus Reed met them there.
He was tall, gray-haired, and carried a battered leather folder.
"You must be Claire."
They shook hands.
"Thank you for helping my sister."
Marcus looked at Erin.
"She rarely made it easy."
Erin almost smiled.
Alvarez took them into a conference room.
A large screen displayed a timeline.
July 14, nine years earlier.
7:40 p.m. Erin left the county administration building.
8:12 p.m. She met a coworker at a restaurant.
9:35 p.m. Erin left alone.
10:03 p.m. Her phone connected to a cell tower south of Bellwood.
10:41 p.m. A convenience-store camera recorded her car.
11:16 p.m. A witness heard an argument near County Route 8.
11:52 p.m. A truck driver discovered Erin's vehicle.
Claire knew parts of it.
Not all.
Marcus opened his folder.
"Here's what changed."
He placed corporate documents on the table.
Northstar Property Logistics.
Subsidiary of Bennett Holdings.
Diane Bennett had been chairwoman at the time.
Daniel's father, Robert Bennett, had been chief executive.
Daniel had been twenty-six and working as a junior finance manager.
Claire's heart sank.
"He worked there already."
Marcus nodded.
Alvarez added, "That does not mean he knew about the attack."
"But he knew Bellwood."
"Apparently."
Marcus placed another document down.
An internal project memo.
Erin leaned forward.
Her name appeared on page two.
ERIN CARTER, COUNTY REVIEWER, REQUESTED INDEPENDENT HYDROLOGICAL STUDY.
Below it:
DELAY MAY IMPACT CLOSING DEADLINE.
Claire looked at the distribution list.
Robert Bennett.
Diane Bennett.
Three executives.
One legal counsel.
And Daniel Bennett.
Her stomach turned.
"He knew who Erin was."
Marcus nodded.
"Before you ever met him."
Claire felt sick.
She and Daniel had met five years after the attack at a corporate charity event.
He had introduced himself beside a dessert table.
He claimed he had never heard of her family.
He asked about her work.
Asked about her parents.
Asked whether she had siblings.
Claire had told him about Erin on their third date.
She remembered Daniel squeezing her hand.
That must have been terrible.
All the sympathy.
All the tenderness.
Had it been acting?
Alvarez seemed to read her expression.
"Knowing her name from an old distribution list isn't proof he remembered her four years later."
Claire shook her head.
"You didn't see him this morning."
"No. But we have witness statements."
Marcus removed another sheet.
"The payment to Raymond Vale was authorized by Robert Bennett."
Erin frowned.
"Not Diane?"
"Officially, no."
"Robert died six years ago," Claire said.
"Yes."
Daniel's father had died of pancreatic cancer.
Claire met Daniel the year after his death.
Diane spoke of Robert constantly as a brilliant businessman and devoted husband.
"What do we know about Vale?" Claire asked.
Alvarez answered.
"He had gambling debt. He had worked subcontracting jobs for Northstar. He denied knowing Erin."
"But he lied."
"Possibly."
"Twenty-five thousand dollars says more than possibly."
Marcus looked at Erin.
"There was another payment."
Erin's hands tightened.
"To Vale?"
"No."
Marcus slid over a bank record.
$75,000.
Recipient: Lewis Hart Consulting.
Claire frowned.
"Who is Lewis Hart?"
Alvarez answered.
"A former Bellwood police lieutenant."
Erin went pale.
Claire looked between them.
"You think a police officer was paid?"
"We think his private consulting company received seventy-five thousand dollars from a Bennett subsidiary two months after Erin's case went cold."
"Was he investigating the case?"
Alvarez nodded.
"He supervised it."
No one spoke.
Claire suddenly understood why the case had always felt wrong.
Evidence misplaced.
Witnesses dismissed.
The earring never traced properly.
Raymond Vale released.
A timeline left full of holes.
Erin whispered, "They bought the investigation."
"We don't know that yet," Alvarez said.
Marcus leaned back.
"But someone paid the man supervising it."
Claire stared at the old photograph of the diamond earring.
"Where is Hart now?"
"Retired. Lives in North Carolina."
"Can you question him?"
"We will."
Erin looked at Alvarez.
"What about Diane?"
"Officers are locating her."
"She ran from the venue."
"We know."
"And Daniel?"
"He has counsel. We can hold him on the domestic assault complaint if prosecutors approve, but the Bellwood case requires more."
Claire felt frustrated.
"He had a phone with a message telling him to delete files."
"We're getting a warrant for the device."
"How long?"
"Not long."
Marcus's phone vibrated.
He looked at it.
Then at Alvarez.
"Something happened."
"What?"
"The Bennett corporate server."
Claire's pulse jumped.
"What about it?"
Marcus turned the screen around.
A contact he had inside the company had sent him a message.
Emergency system purge underway.
Legacy Northstar archives being deleted.
Claire stood.
"Daniel said his mother left."
Alvarez reached for her phone.
Marcus shook his head.
"Daniel's here. Diane can't access the secure archive remotely unless someone gives her credentials."
Erin looked at Claire.
Claire understood instantly.
May you like
Someone else at Bennett Holdings was helping them.
And whoever it was had begun destroying evidence the moment police took Daniel's secret phone.
