Chapter 6 - Vanessa Stops Pretending
Daniel moved between them.
“What did you take from Margaret’s study?”
Vanessa removed her coat.
“Nothing.”
“We watched you leave.”
“You watched a car leave.”
“Your car.”
Vanessa smiled faintly.
“Then perhaps I needed some air.”
Emily stepped forward.
“My mother recorded your father threatening her.”
For the first time, Vanessa’s confidence cracked.
Only slightly.
Then it returned.
“My father is dead.”
“That does not make him innocent.”
Vanessa’s eyes sharpened.
“And a twenty-year-old cassette does not make your mother innocent.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You planted stolen jewelry in Emily’s bag.”
Vanessa looked at him.
“I was protecting this family.”
“From what?”
“Her.”
Emily almost laughed.
“Me?”
Vanessa pointed toward the metal box.
“She came here looking for that.”
“I didn’t even know it existed.”
“You expect us to believe that?”
Daniel answered.
“I do.”
Vanessa’s eyes flashed with anger.
“You have known her for six weeks.”
“And I’ve known you for fifteen years.”
The sentence hurt Vanessa more than Daniel seemed to realize.
She turned toward Margaret.
“Tell him.”
Margaret looked frightened.
“Tell me what?”
Daniel demanded.
Vanessa folded her arms.
“Tell your precious son why Laura Parker was really hired.”
Margaret whispered.
“Vanessa.”
“No.”
Vanessa looked at Emily.
“If we are digging up the dead, let’s dig up all of them.”
Emily’s heart pounded.
“What are you talking about?”
Vanessa smiled.
“Your mother was sleeping with Richard Hawthorne.”
The room went silent.
Daniel’s expression changed.
Margaret closed her eyes.
Emily stared at Vanessa.
“That’s a lie.”
“Is it?”
Vanessa walked toward a cabinet.
She removed an old photograph.
Richard stood beside Laura at a charity event.
They were smiling.
Vanessa placed it on the table.
“My father knew.”
“That was why he hated her.”
Emily looked at Margaret.
“Tell me she’s lying.”
Margaret did not speak.
Emily felt the floor disappear beneath her.
Daniel whispered.
“Mom?”
Margaret sat down.
“Laura and Richard were close.”
Emily’s throat tightened.
“How close?”
Margaret looked directly at her.
“I never knew.”
Vanessa’s smile returned.
“But there was one thing Margaret did know.”
She stepped closer to Emily.
May you like
“Your mother wasn’t protecting only you.”
“She was protecting the identity of your father.”
