Chapter 4 - THE AUNT WHO RAISED A LIE
Caroline Marsh answered Adeline’s call on the third ring.
“Addie?”
Adeline forced herself to breathe normally.
“Aunt Caroline.”
“You sound strange. Are you all right?”
Across Elias’s office, Marco monitored the trace.
Elias stood beside Adeline.
“I’m fine.”
“That thing at the hotel is all over the news. They’re saying you’re engaged to Elias Ferrante.”
Adeline looked at him.
“That’s complicated.”
“It shouldn’t be complicated. Stay away from that family.”
The sharpness in Caroline’s voice made Adeline’s stomach tighten.
“Why?”
Silence.
Then Caroline answered more softly.
“Because people like them destroy everything they touch.”
“You said you’d never met any Ferrantes.”
“I haven’t.”
Adeline looked at Marco.
He shook his head.
The trace was moving.
Caroline was traveling.
“Where are you?”
“Home.”
Another lie.
Marco typed a location onto the screen.
Newark Liberty International Airport.
Adeline closed her eyes.
“You’re at the airport.”
Silence.
“How do you know that?”
“Because Elias has your phone location.”
Caroline inhaled sharply.
“Adeline, listen to me. Get away from him.”
“Did you know Vincent Aldridge?”
The call went dead.
Adeline stared at the phone.
Elias picked up his jacket.
“Marco.”
“Already moving.”
They reached the airport in fourteen minutes.
Caroline’s flight to Montreal had begun boarding.
Security intercepted her near the gate.
She did not resist.
When Adeline saw her aunt in a private lounge, twenty-three years of gratitude collided with one terrible question.
“Why did you lie to me?”
Caroline looked exhausted.
Gray hair framed a face Adeline had trusted since childhood.
“I was protecting you.”
“From what?”
“Your mother.”
Adeline recoiled.
“My mother?”
Caroline lowered her eyes.
“Claire was involved with dangerous people.”
“She was an accountant.”
“For Roberto Ferrante.”
“So?”
“So she discovered things she wasn’t supposed to know.”
Elias stepped forward.
“What did she discover?”
Caroline looked at him.
“You have your father’s eyes.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
She sighed.
“Vincent was stealing money.”
“We know.”
“No. You know a fraction.”
She looked at Adeline.
“Vincent wasn’t stealing for himself.”
“Then for whom?”
Caroline hesitated.
“For the person who wanted Roberto Ferrante dead.”
Elias became still.
“My father died from a heart attack.”
Caroline laughed bitterly.
“That’s what the doctor wrote.”
Adeline stared at her.
“You knew all this?”
“I knew enough to be afraid.”
“Why were you at Roberto’s grave?”
Caroline’s face changed.
“Vincent told me Claire had left something there.”
“And you helped him?”
“He threatened you.”
Adeline’s anger vanished.
“What?”
“He sent me pictures of your apartment. Your office. You walking to work.”
Caroline’s hands trembled.
“He said if I didn’t help him find the ledger, you would die.”
Elias’s expression darkened.
“What did you find at the grave?”
“A metal box.”
“Where is it?”
“Vincent took it.”
Elias looked at Marco.
“Find him.”
Caroline grabbed Adeline’s hand.
“There’s something else.”
Adeline looked down.
“What?”
“Your mother didn’t die in that hospice.”
Adeline froze.
“But there’s a death certificate.”
“Fake.”
Elias stepped closer.
“Then where is Claire Marsh?”
Caroline’s eyes filled with tears.
“I don’t know.”
Adeline’s heartbeat thundered.
“You told me she died.”
“I believed she would.”
“Why?”
Caroline whispered:
“Because the night of the car accident, Claire disappeared with Roberto Ferrante’s youngest child.”
Elias went completely still.
“My father only had one child.”
Caroline looked directly at him.
May you like
“No, Elias.”
“He had two.”
