Chapter 9 - The Lie Marcus Couldn’t Bury
Federal investigators took over part of the case the next morning.
Forged passports changed everything.
So did attempted child removal across international borders.
Marcus’s lawyer advised him to stop cooperating.
Marcus ignored him.
He demanded to speak with me alone.
Rebecca objected.
I agreed anyway.
We sat across from each other in my office.
My brother looked ten years older than he had three days earlier.
“Bell called you,” Marcus said.
“How do you know?”
“Because that’s what he does.”
“What?”
“He turns people against each other.”
I laughed bitterly.
“You didn’t need his help.”
Marcus flinched.
“I deserve that.”
“Yes.”
“But Daniel, Bell wants you focused on me.”
“Why?”
“Because he needs time.”
“To do what?”
Marcus looked toward the window.
“Destroy proof that Emily survived the crash.”
I stopped breathing.
“What did you say?”
“I think Emily survived.”
The words landed like an explosion.
“Do not do this to me.”
“I’m not.”
“You watched me bury her.”
“I know.”
“You let Noah grow up without his mother.”
“I didn’t know then.”
“When did you start suspecting?”
“Six months after.”
I stood and grabbed him by the jacket.
“You knew for two and a half years?”
“I suspected.”
I shoved him backward.
“Based on what?”
Marcus reached into his pocket slowly.
He placed an old photograph on the desk.
A woman stood outside a train station in Montreal.
The image was grainy.
Her face was partly turned.
But I knew that posture.
I knew that coat.
I knew the way she held her left hand when she was nervous.
Emily.
The photograph was dated seven months after her funeral.
My knees nearly gave out.
“Where did you get this?”
“Bell sent it to me.”
“Why?”
“To control me.”
Marcus swallowed.
“He told me if I stopped helping Victoria, Emily would die for real.”
I stared at the photograph.
“You believed him?”
“He sent another picture every few months.”
“Why didn’t you tell police?”
“Because I had already committed financial crimes.”
“You chose yourself.”
Marcus lowered his head.
“Yes.”
The honesty hurt almost more than another lie.
“You let her stay wherever she was because you were afraid of prison.”
“Yes.”
I wanted to hit him.
Instead, I stepped away.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know.”
“Give me every photograph.”
Marcus removed a small encrypted drive.
“There are eleven.”
I opened it.
Emily in Montreal.
Emily near a clinic in Vermont.
Emily stepping into a vehicle in Maine.
The newest photograph was only six weeks old.
Emily sat near a window.
Behind her was a newspaper.
The date was visible.
She had been alive six weeks ago.
Grace entered as I reached the final image.
She stopped.
“Oh my God.”
I couldn’t speak.
For three years, I had visited a grave.
Noah had kissed a stone on Mother’s Day.
And somewhere, somehow, Emily might still be breathing.
Then Rebecca called from downstairs.
“Daniel, federal agents found Bell’s secondary residence.”
“Did they find him?”
“No.”
“What did they find?”
Her voice shook.
“A room.”
“What kind of room?”
“A medical room.”
“And on the wall were photographs of Emily.”
I closed my eyes.
May you like
Rebecca continued.
“There was one photograph taken yesterday.”
