Chapter 6 - THE MAN IN THE FAMILY PORTRAIT
Harris swung his gun toward Ethan.
Ethan fired first.
The shot struck the wall beside Harris's head.
Everyone froze.
“Next one won't miss,” Ethan said.
I barely recognized him.
The charming husband who carried my bags, remembered my coffee order and kissed my forehead every morning had vanished.
This Ethan looked exhausted.
Cornered.
Dangerous.
But also betrayed.
“You knew Charles was going to frame me,” he said to Vanessa's absent husband as though Gregory were somehow in the room.
My father gave him a thin smile.
“You were always disposable.”
Ethan looked at me.
“So was Claire.”
I hated that part of me still reacted when he said my name.
“Who is my biological father?” I asked.
No one answered.
I grabbed the bourbon glass from the table and threw it against the wall.
“WHO?”
Charles finally spoke.
“Jonathan Whitmore.”
I knew the name.
Everyone did.
My grandfather's younger brother.
Jonathan had disappeared when I was a baby.
Family stories said he was unstable, addicted to gambling and ashamed of living in his brother's shadow.
There was one photograph of him in our Connecticut estate.
He had my eyes.
I had never noticed before.
“My mother had an affair with my great-uncle?”
Charles laughed without humor.
“Laura was never my wife in any meaningful sense by then.”
“You raised me knowing?”
“Yes.”
“Did Jonathan know?”
“No.”
“Where is he?”
Charles's silence answered before his mouth did.
Ethan looked toward me.
“Your father killed him.”
Charles's face changed.
“Be careful.”
“You dumped Jonathan's car into Lake Winthrop in 1997,” Ethan said. “Gregory helped you.”
Mia stared at my father.
“That was Nathan's first secret, wasn't it?”
Charles looked at her sharply.
Mia understood.
“My biological father discovered the murder.”
The pieces slammed together.
Jonathan disappeared.
Nathan discovered what happened.
Gregory helped Charles silence him.
Mia found the evidence.
Laura learned the truth.
One crime had created another for almost thirty years.
Ethan laughed bitterly.
“Our families aren't rich, Claire. They're just very good at burying bodies under money.”
A radio on Harris's belt crackled.
Vanessa's voice.
“Charles?”
He reached for it.
Ethan fired into the ceiling.
“Don't.”
The yacht rocked violently.
Thunder shook the windows.
My phone showed 11:23 P.M.
Twenty-four minutes until my scheduled death.
Then the yacht's engines suddenly powered down.
Everything went dark.
Emergency lights flickered.
Mia whispered, “Someone killed the main power.”
My phone buzzed.
UNKNOWN NUMBER:
DECK SIX. COME NOW IF YOU WANT THE ORIGINAL RECORDING.
Another message followed.
COME WITHOUT CHARLES.
I looked around the room.
“Mom?”
Charles heard me.
“Laura isn't sending those messages.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Laura doesn't know the security system.”
Mia's face changed.
“But Vanessa does.”
Ethan stared at her.
“My mother?”
Then another message appeared.
ASK ETHAN WHAT HAPPENED TO VANESSA'S FIRST HUSBAND.
Ethan went pale.
Mia turned slowly toward him.
“First husband?”
He looked away.
That was the moment I realized there was another secret.
One even Mia didn't know.
Ethan whispered:
“Gregory wasn't Mom's first husband.”
“Who was?”
A deep crash sounded above us.
Someone screamed.
Ethan looked at me.
May you like
Then he said the name that made Charles Whitmore finally lose his composure.
“Nathan Cole.”
