Chapter 11 - THE CALL
Marcus reached for my phone, but I shook my head and put it on speaker.
“Where are you, Victor?”
He laughed softly. “Still direct. I always liked that about you.”
My father stepped closer. “You stole from me.”
“Douglas, you stole from yourself. I simply learned how easy you were to distract.”
Dad went rigid.
I said, “Did you start the fire?”
Silence.
Then Victor answered, “I started a small one.”
Grant swore.
Victor continued as though explaining an accounting error. “The plan was to destroy records in the east office. You were not supposed to be there.”
“But I was.”
“Yes.”
“And the chained door?”
Another pause.
“That was Peter.”
Dad grabbed the phone from my hand. “You left my daughter to die.”
“No, Douglas. Your other daughter did that when she told firefighters Caroline was already outside.”
Victor knew exactly where to cut.
I took the phone back.
“You manipulated Juliette.”
“I educated her. Your sister understood something you never did. Families like yours survive because someone makes ugly decisions.”
“Where is Peter?” Marcus asked.
Victor laughed again. “Probably deciding whether loyalty is worth prison.”
A click.
The call ended.
Marcus immediately sent the number to police.
Grant looked at the letter in my hand. “If Juliette was being manipulated before the fire, maybe she didn’t know about the theft.”
“Maybe,” I said.
Dad stared toward the ruined estate. “But she knew Caroline was alive later.”
That was the line none of us could cross for her.
Whatever Victor had done, whatever fear he had fed her, Juliette had eventually sat alone with a report saying her sister was probably alive.
And she had chosen the money.
A car engine roared beyond the hedge.
Marcus ran outside.
We followed.
A black sedan shot away from the service road.
On the greenhouse steps lay a man in a torn suit, bleeding from the forehead but conscious.
Peter Cole.
He grabbed my wrist.
May you like
“Victor has Juliette,” he gasped.
And suddenly my sister was no longer the only person on trial.
