Chapter 15 - The Lake
Evelyn had lied again.
She had told police she was home.
Instead, she drove two hours to Lake Mercer.
Ruiz called her.
No answer.
Mark looked at me.
"I'm going."
"No."
"My mother is in there."
"And Vanessa already tried to kill our daughter."
"I know."
That was why I knew he would not stay.
Police allowed him to travel only as far as the command point down the road.
At the lake, officers approached the second cabin.
Inside, Evelyn was crying.
Vanessa was shouting.
A body camera later captured most of it.
"You ruined everything!" Vanessa screamed.
"I helped you for years," Evelyn said.
"You helped Mark. You always helped Mark."
"I paid your debts. I signed your papers. I lied to your brother."
"And now you brought police into it."
"No. You brought police into it when you put your hands on Chloe."
Silence.
Then Vanessa said, "She had the drive."
Evelyn's voice broke.
"She is seven."
"She was going to give it to Mark."
"So you pushed her into traffic?"
Another silence.
This one lasted long enough to become an answer.
Outside, Ruiz signaled officers forward.
Then came the smell of smoke.
Vanessa had poured gasoline across the back porch and set a pile of records on fire.
She ran through the side door.
Officers chased her into the woods.
Evelyn stumbled out coughing.
Mark broke past the command tape and caught her before she fell.
"Where is she?"
Evelyn clutched his jacket.
"She has your father's ledger."
"What ledger?"
"The real one."
The document Vanessa and Mercer had been searching for was not the blue drive.
The drive was only a copy.
The original handwritten ledger recorded every unauthorized transfer, every fake approval, and every person who helped hide it.
And according to Evelyn, it contained something else.
A page Mark's father wrote on the night he died.
"He named who was with him," Evelyn said.
Mark froze.
May you like
"Who?"
A gunshot cracked through the trees.
