Chapter 8 - FIRE
We left the mansion under police protection.
Adrian and Vanessa were taken separately.
Dad insisted I ride with him.
On the way downtown, I finally asked the question that had been burning inside me.
“Why didn't you tell me Uncle David hated you?”
Dad looked out the window.
“Because families are complicated.”
“That isn't an answer.”
“No.”
He turned toward me.
“I believed I could manage him.”
I almost laughed.
“That sounds familiar.”
Dad understood immediately.
“You mean you believed you could manage Adrian.”
“Yes.”
For a moment, we sat in painful silence.
Then Dad said, “We both confused protecting people with controlling the consequences of their choices.”
That was the closest thing to an apology Thomas Sterling gave easily.
It mattered.
A call came through the car speakers.
Daniel.
“Thomas, we've got a fire alarm at the archive building.”
Dad sat upright.
“Actual fire?”
“Smoke detected in records storage.”
My stomach tightened.
“David?”
“Unknown.”
Dad told the driver, “Go.”
The archive occupied an old renovated bank building owned by Sterling Global.
When we arrived, firefighters were already outside.
Smoke curled from a rear window.
Dad tried to get out.
Security stopped him.
“Sir, no.”
“My records—”
“Can be replaced,” I said.
He looked at me.
“Some originals can't.”
Fire crews contained the flames quickly.
The damage was limited to one records room.
Too limited.
Almost precise.
A fire investigator approached us.
“Mr. Sterling?”
“Yes.”
“We found signs of accelerant.”
Dad's expression hardened.
“Arson.”
“Likely.”
Then a security officer came running toward us with a tablet.
“Sir, you need to see this.”
He played camera footage.
At 10:42 p.m., a man in a baseball cap entered the archive using an executive access card.
He kept his face down.
But when he passed the second camera, I recognized the way he walked.
Dad did too.
David.
My uncle.
He carried a black bag into records storage.
Seven minutes later, he left without it.
Dad closed his eyes.
“He actually did it.”
I touched his arm.
Before I could say anything, the officer continued.
“There's more.”
He switched camera angles.
At 10:35 p.m., seven minutes before David entered, someone else walked into the building.
A woman.
Tall.
Dark coat.
Her face turned briefly toward the camera.
I stopped breathing.
“No.”
Dad stared at the screen.
May you like
The woman was my mother.
The woman who had supposedly died twelve years ago.
