Chapter 14 - One More Lie
Amanda denied helping Raymond.
Then detectives played the jail call.
Raymond's voice was faint but clear.
"I need the ledger."
Amanda whispered, "I don't have it."
"The boy does. Daniel gave it to him."
"He only has the recorder."
"No. Daniel kept a paper ledger. Find it before Bennett does."
The call ended.
Amanda had made it from her attorney's office before her arrest.
Mara looked at Ethan.
"Did your father ever mention a ledger?"
Ethan shook his head.
Lily did not.
She frowned.
"Daddy had a green book."
Everyone turned toward her.
"Where?"
"He used to put it inside the piano bench when Mom came in."
The piano still sat in Amanda's house, sealed under police control.
Inside the bench, under old sheet music, they found a narrow green accounting book.
It listed dates, shell companies, passwords, and handwritten notes connecting Raymond to each illegal transfer.
But the final pages weren't about money.
Daniel had written down meetings with a private investigator.
One line stood out.
R.V. THREATENED CLAIRE BEFORE HER ACCIDENT. NEED TO REOPEN.
Ethan stopped breathing.
"Claire was my mom."
Mara's face changed.
Claire Reed had died four years earlier when a delivery truck hit her car at an intersection.
It had been ruled accidental.
Ethan whispered, "Dad thought Raymond hurt Mom too?"
Detective Cole closed the ledger.
"We don't know."
Then he looked at the final notation.
PI HAS PHOTO. STORAGE LOCKER B-19.
A second storage facility.
May you like
Another hidden file.
And perhaps a crime that started long before Amanda ever told Lily that Ethan wasn't family.
