Chapter 5 - THE SECOND SET OF KEYS
Elena met Clara at the hospital before dawn. She brought clean clothes, a phone charger, and a fact that made Clara sit upright.
“When your dad was alive, a groundskeeper named Silas Reed maintained the old wiring. He said the mansion had two security systems. One belonged to the people who lived there. The other belonged to your father.”
“Where is Silas?”
“Beatrice fired him three weeks after the funeral.”
Nora found a forwarding address outside Fort Worth. Silas answered the door holding pruning shears, his silver hair standing in every direction. He saw Clara and set the shears down.
“You look like Everett when you're worried,” he said.
“Did my father keep a second camera system?”
Silas glanced at the street. “He kept a second record of everything that mattered.”
“Why?”
“Because he stopped trusting his wife.”
Inside, Silas produced an old photograph of Everett Mercer, a younger Daniel, and Silas standing beside the pool house. On the back, Everett had written: NOTHING WORTH PROTECTING SHOULD HAVE ONLY ONE LOCK.
Silas explained that the original equipment cabinet could be opened with a brass key that Everett had hidden after discovering Beatrice's unexplained withdrawals. Daniel knew where the key was, but refused to say until he could prove what she had done.
“Then Daniel died,” Clara said.
Silas stared at the wedding ring on her chain. “Your husband came here two nights before that crash. He said he'd found a way to preserve the evidence.”
Clara lifted the ring. “He never told me.”
“He was scared telling you would put Rosie in danger.”
Silas turned the photograph over again. A penciled number had been added below Everett's message: 317.
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“The key isn't in the mansion,” Silas said. “It's in the place your husband went the day before he died.”
