Chapter 13 - Northbridge)
The black binder was exactly where Margaret said it would be.
Behind a removable stone beside the fireplace.
Inside were thirty-seven names.
Judges.
Attorneys.
Trust officers.
Private investigators.
Two doctors.
Three county officials.
A passport-services contractor.
A former state prosecutor.
And Thomas Vale.
Malcolm Reeves appeared seven times.
Bell's name did not appear.
Claire looked at him.
He did not react.
"Does that make you feel better?" he asked.
"No."
"Good."
"Why good?"
"Because absence from a criminal's notebook is not proof of innocence."
Claire almost smiled.
It was the first thing he had said in two days that made her trust him more.
The federal case expanded immediately.
Accounts were frozen across six states.
Search warrants were prepared.
Northbridge Fiduciary Holdings existed only on paper, but money moved through it like blood through an artery.
Robert's cooperation became valuable.
Margaret's became more valuable.
Both wanted deals.
Claire cared about only three things.
Sophie.
Max.
Daniel.
By the end of the week, Sophie's trust had been placed under emergency independent administration.
Preliminary review showed nearly 1.3 million dollars had been diverted.
Most could be traced.
Some had already been recovered.
Claire sat with Sophie in the temporary rental home provided through a victim-support program.
Max slept at their feet.
"Are Grandma and Grandpa going to jail?" Sophie asked.
"Maybe."
"For a long time?"
"Maybe."
"Do you hate them?"
Claire thought before answering.
"I hate what they did."
"That's not what I asked."
Claire looked at her daughter.
"I don't know what I feel about them."
Sophie accepted that.
Children sometimes handled complicated answers better than adults.
"Do you think Dad is alive?"
Claire had delayed this conversation.
She could delay it no longer.
"We found something that makes us think he might have been alive after the accident."
Sophie stared.
"After we thought he died?"
"Yes."
"Why wouldn't he come home?"
"I don't know."
Sophie looked down at Max.
"Did he not want us?"
Claire moved closer.
"No."
"You don't know."
The words hurt because they were true.
Claire took Sophie's hands.
"I know your dad loved you."
"Then why?"
"I think he was scared."
"Adults always say they're protecting kids when they don't tell them things."
Claire had no answer.
Sophie looked toward the window.
"Grandma said the same thing."
Claire felt that sentence deeply.
"You're right."
Sophie looked back.
"So if you find Dad, don't lie to me."
"I won't."
"Even if it's bad?"
"Even if it's bad."
Sophie nodded.
That evening Bell called.
Thomas Vale had vanished.
His house was empty.
Bank accounts dormant.
No known travel.
But investigators recovered security footage from a private airfield in Pennsylvania.
Vale had been there six months earlier.
So had another man.
Daniel.
Claire watched the footage.
Daniel crossed the hangar carrying a backpack.
He looked thinner.
Older.
But alive.
The timestamp was undeniable.
Eight months after his funeral.
Sophie stood beside Claire.
"That's Dad."
"Yes."
Daniel approached a small aircraft.
Vale followed.
Before boarding, Daniel turned toward the security camera.
He looked almost directly into the lens.
Then he raised three fingers.
Sophie gasped.
Claire looked at her.
"What?"
"Orion."
"What does three fingers mean?"
"Our game."
"What does it mean?"
Sophie stared at the frozen image.
"Go back."
"Back where?"
"To the last clue."
Claire immediately thought of the storage unit.
Then the collar.
Then the station locker.
Bell thought differently.
"The last place Daniel was before he disappeared."
Claire looked at him.
"The crash."
They returned to the accident site the next morning.
The highway curved through a wooded section outside Stafford County.
A concrete barrier marked the place Daniel's vehicle had left the road.
Claire had not been there since the memorial.
Sophie remained with an agent at a nearby visitor center.
Bell and Claire walked along the shoulder.
"What are we looking for?"
"I don't know."
"That's becoming our family motto."
They searched for an hour.
Nothing.
Then Claire noticed three small scratches carved into the concrete barrier.
Three stars.
Orion.
Bell photographed them.
Below the stars, almost hidden beneath moss, was an arrow.
It pointed downhill.
They followed it into the trees.
Thirty yards from the road stood an abandoned drainage structure.
Inside was a weatherproof plastic container.
Bell opened it.
Empty.
Almost.
A single Polaroid photograph remained.
Daniel and Thomas Vale.
Standing beside the burned vehicle.
The date printed beneath the image was the day after Daniel's reported death.
On the back Daniel had written:
THE BODY WAS NEVER MINE.
May you like
And beneath it:
ASK BELL WHOSE IT WAS.
