Chapter 6
Evan’s first reaction was not fear.
It was anger.
When Detective Ortiz told him Caleb Moss had identified his voice, Evan laughed once and stood so abruptly that the officer beside him reached for his arm.
“This is insane.”
Ryan remained across the room.
“Sit down.”
Evan looked at him.
“You believe a bartender who ran from the police?”
“I believe he heard something.”
“He heard a voice over a burner phone and decided it sounded like mine after seeing me tonight. That’s not evidence.”
Ortiz said, “It is evidence. Whether it is reliable evidence is a different question.”
Evan pointed toward the blue ledger on the desk.
“And now my initials happen to be in a notebook nobody has seen for two years? How convenient.”
Caroline folded her arms.
“You were at the house the night Dad died.”
“I came after he collapsed.”
“Why were you nearby?” Ryan asked.
“I already told you back then. I had a business meeting.”
“With whom?”
Evan paused.
Grant, who had returned with his attorney, looked toward him.
Evan’s jaw tightened.
“With Grant.”
The room erupted.
Grant’s attorney immediately said, “My client will not respond to that without—”
Grant cut him off.
“No. Let him talk.”
Evan looked at Ryan.
“Your father thought money was disappearing from the company. He asked me to review system access. Grant found out and wanted to know what Thomas had discovered.”
Grant stared at him.
“That is a complete fabrication.”
“I met you at the Riverside Club at eight that night.”
“You did not.”
“I can prove it.”
Ortiz asked, “How?”
“Parking receipt. Expense report. I charged dinner to the company.”
Grant laughed sharply. “Anyone can submit an expense.”
Evan’s face reddened.
“You ordered bourbon. Two glasses. We sat in the rear booth. You told me Thomas had become paranoid.”
Ryan looked at his uncle.
Grant shook his head.
“I was here that evening. Nora saw me.”
Nora frowned.
“You arrived shortly before dinner.”
“What time?” Ortiz asked.
“Maybe nine.”
Grant looked annoyed. “I had been at the office.”
“You told me you came directly from there.”
“I may have stopped somewhere first.”
His attorney closed his eyes as if in pain.
Evan spread his hands.
“There. You want secrets? He met me. He wanted to know what Thomas had on him.”
“On him?” Ryan asked.
“Grant had administrative access to every financial system.”
“So did you.”
“Emergency access. Not routine payment authority.”
“You knew how the controls worked.”
“So did half the executive floor.”
Ryan stepped closer.
“And my father wrote that he didn’t believe you.”
Evan’s anger faded for the first time.
He looked genuinely hurt.
“Ryan, I don’t know why.”
“You were with me for fifteen years.”
“I still am.”
“My champagne was poisoned.”
“And I helped stop it.”
Ryan stared at him.
“You hid the vial.”
“Because Megan handed it to me ten minutes before your wedding.”
“You could have taken it to police.”
“I should have.”
“You could have told me.”
“I should have.”
“You could have done a hundred things other than tape it under the cake.”
“I know.”
Evan’s voice broke slightly.
For a moment Ryan saw the college kid who had slept on a hospital floor after Ryan broke his leg skiing. The friend who had been present at birthdays, funerals, divorces, promotions, failures.
That was the terrible part.
A stranger could lie and remain a stranger.
When a friend lied, every memory became evidence.
Detective Ortiz’s phone buzzed.
She checked a message.
“We have preliminary location data from several devices.”
Everyone became quiet.
“Megan says she was attacked around four fourteen this afternoon. Wedding photography confirms that window. Mr. Cole’s phone was in the ballroom from four oh-eight until four twenty-one.”
Evan exhaled.
Ryan frowned.
“Phones can be left behind.”
Ortiz nodded. “Correct. But three separate videos taken by guests show Mr. Cole in the ballroom during that period.”
Evan looked at Ryan.
“I didn’t attack her.”
Ortiz continued. “Mr. Grant Mercer was also visible in the ballroom for most of that period.”
Elaine asked, “Then who locked Megan in the closet?”
“No conclusion yet.”
“What about me?”
Ortiz looked at her notes.
“Your location is less clear. You appear in a photograph at four ten and another at four twenty-three. There is a gap.”
Elaine went pale.
Abigail stared at her mother.
“I didn’t touch Megan.”
“Where were you?” Ortiz asked.
“In my room.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“That doesn’t help you.”
Elaine folded her arms. “I am aware.”
Ryan glanced at Abigail.
She looked exhausted by suspicion.
Every answer seemed to create another person who could have done something terrible.
Then Oliver appeared in the doorway.
His hair stuck up on one side from sleep. He wore dinosaur pajamas someone had found in a guest room and carried a blanket behind him.
Caroline stood.
“What are you doing awake?”
“I heard people.”
“You’re supposed to be upstairs.”
“I had a bad dream.”
Her expression softened immediately.
She crossed the room and lifted him into her arms even though he was getting too big for it.
Oliver rested his head on her shoulder.
His eyes landed on Grant.
More specifically, Grant’s ring.
“I remembered something,” Oliver said sleepily.
Ortiz looked at him. “About earlier?”
He nodded.
Ryan crouched nearby.
“What?”
“The black ring.”
Grant sighed. “Again?”
His attorney touched his sleeve, warning him to be quiet.
Oliver pointed.
“That one is on your right hand.”
Grant looked down.
“Yes.”
“The person at the glass had it on the other hand.”
Ryan felt a small shock.
“Are you sure?”
Oliver held up his left hand.
“They picked up the glass like this. The ring was here.”
He touched his left ring finger.
Grant stared at him.
Detective Ortiz wrote it down.
Caroline said, “Could they have moved the ring?”
“Of course,” Ortiz replied. “But the distinction matters.”
Oliver frowned harder.
“And it wasn’t exactly the same.”
Grant slowly removed his signet ring and held it out.
Oliver leaned forward.
“The other one was smooth.”
“This has the family crest carved into it,” Ryan said.
Oliver nodded.
“And the other person had a cut.”
“Where?”
“On their thumb.”
Evan tucked his left hand into his pocket.
It was a tiny movement.
Ryan saw it.
Detective Ortiz saw it too.
“Mr. Cole,” she said.
Evan looked annoyed. “What?”
“Show me your hands.”
He stared at her.
“Seriously?”
“Both hands.”
Slowly, Evan pulled them from his pockets.
There was a healing cut across his left thumb.
Abigail inhaled.
Evan looked at Ryan.
“I cut it opening a wine bottle yesterday.”
“Do you own a black ring?” Ortiz asked.
“No.”
“Have you ever?”
“No.”
Oliver studied his hand.
“I don’t know if it was him.”
Caroline kissed the boy’s hair.
“That’s okay. You don’t have to know.”
Ryan appreciated her saying it before anyone could turn an eight-year-old into a witness box.
Ortiz asked an officer to take Oliver and Caroline upstairs again.
When they left, Evan looked at Ryan.
“You are not seriously going to decide I tried to kill you because I cut my thumb.”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I’m going to decide nothing until I know why my father wrote your initials in a ledger tracking stolen money.”
Evan’s face hardened again.
Before he could answer, an investigator entered carrying a sealed electronics bag.
“We finished the quick extraction on Mr. Cole’s phone.”
Evan turned.
Ortiz held out her hand.
The investigator passed her several printed pages.
“There are deleted images recovered from the device.”
Evan’s expression changed.
Ryan noticed immediately.
“What images?” Ortiz asked.
The investigator placed the first printout on the desk.
It was a photograph of Thomas Mercer’s blue ledger.
The same notebook sitting six feet away.
The photograph showed the page with NORTH VALE and the initials EC.
Ryan looked at the timestamp.
Six days earlier.
Evan stared at it.
Ortiz placed another photograph beside it.
The torn page was still in the ledger when that photo had been taken.
Whatever had once been written there was visible in the image.
Ryan leaned closer.
At the top, his father had written:
E.C. HAS ACCESS THROUGH RYAN. IF I’M RIGHT, HE KNOWS I KNOW.
Beneath it was a list of dates and amounts.
And at the bottom, one final sentence.
MEET EVAN FRIDAY. NO MORE WARNINGS.
Ryan lifted his eyes.
Evan looked as though the floor had disappeared beneath him.
Detective Ortiz spoke quietly.
“You told us you had never seen this ledger.”
Evan swallowed.
“I hadn’t.”
“It was photographed on your phone.”
“Someone sent it to me.”
“Who?”
Evan looked toward Grant.
“Grant.”
Grant laughed in disbelief.
Ortiz checked the forensic note.
“No.”
Evan’s face went blank.
“The image wasn’t received by message, email, or cloud transfer. According to the metadata, it was taken with your phone’s camera.”
Ryan stared at his best friend.
May you like
Six days before the wedding, Evan had been close enough to his dead father’s hidden ledger to photograph it.
And one page had disappeared afterward.
