Chapter 3
Vivienne denied everything.
Predictable.
“She’s lying because she hates me.”
Mrs. Keller stood across the room shaking.
I looked at her.
“Why would she hate you?”
Vivienne hesitated.
Damian answered.
“Because Natalie trusted her.”
There.
Another unnecessary truth.
I turned toward him.
“You knew Natalie was in that room.”
He leaned back.
“I knew she used it.”
“Used?”
He shrugged.
“As a hiding place.”
I almost smiled.
“For four days?”
No answer.
Mrs. Keller spoke.
“She was locked in.”
Vivienne snapped:
“You never saw the lock.”
“No.”
Keller looked at me.
“But I heard Mrs. Moretti crying behind that wall.”
My jaw tightened.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Her face broke.
“Because they told me you knew.”
Silence.
Old weapon.
Always effective.
Borrow the authority of the person everyone fears.
“They said you wanted Natalie contained because she was unstable.”
I looked at Damian.
He did not deny saying it.
My chest went cold.
I remembered those days.
Natalie had disappeared after a brutal argument between us.
Vivienne—then only a family adviser—told me Natalie had packed a bag.
Damian showed me a note.
I read it until the paper tore at the fold.
I need distance. Don’t follow me.
Natalie’s handwriting.
Or something close enough.
I looked at Vivienne.
“The note.”
Her face changed.
Tiny.
Enough.
“Who wrote it?”
“No one.”
“Wrong answer.”
Damian laughed.
“She did.”
“Under what condition?”
Silence.
Mrs. Keller whispered:
“They brought Audrey downstairs once.”
I turned.
Audrey had been an infant.
“She was used to make Natalie write something.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
Vivienne said quickly:
“Nobody hurt the baby.”
That sentence condemned her more than confession.
Nobody had asked whether they hurt Audrey.
May you like
I stared at her.
“You used my daughter to make my wife disappear.”
