Chapter 8 - ROSA’S ENVELOPE
Ethan drove while Elena called her neighbor back. No answer.
A police car followed them through the city. Noah remained at the estate with an officer Ethan knew by name; Elena watched him wave from the upstairs window until the driveway curved out of sight.
Her apartment door had been forced open.
Her neighbor, Mrs. Bell, stood across the hall holding her small dog. “I called as soon as I heard them,” she said. “They ran when the squad car came.”
Elena hurried to her bedroom. Drawers had been emptied onto the floor. Her mother’s sewing box lay open on the bed, its thread and needles scattered.
The envelope was gone.
Ethan put a hand against the doorframe. “I’m sorry.”
“Help me look.”
“They found it.”
“They found the box.”
Elena picked up the wooden tray that held Rosa’s spools. Her mother had once shown her how to lift it out to clean beneath it. Elena pressed a finger against the bottom.
The tray popped loose.
A thin envelope was taped underneath.
Inside were three photographs and one folded page torn from a notebook. The first photograph showed Ethan’s father walking into the estate garage on the night he died. His coat was torn. In the second, he stood beside Julian and Vivian. The third had been taken minutes later.
He was holding the estate office safe open.
Ethan read the notebook page aloud. “The figures in the children’s trust don’t match the bank statements. I’ve asked Julian to explain. If he won’t, I’ll call the auditors in the morning.”
“It’s your father’s writing?” Elena asked.
“Yes.”
Julian had been managing the trust while studying business under his father. Ethan had been seventeen; the money was meant for both brothers and, eventually, their children.
A tap came from Mrs. Bell’s door. A police officer brought Elena a sealed plastic bag found in the stairwell. Inside was one gold cufflink.
It matched the one from the ballroom. Its back was smooth, without Ethan’s portrait.
“The other half of the pair,” Ethan said.
Elena turned it over. A scratch ran across the clasp.
Her phone buzzed with an unknown number.
A photograph appeared: Vivian in the passenger seat of the black sedan, looking straight at the camera. Beneath it was a message.
BRING THE ENVELOPE TO THE OLD GARAGE. ETHAN COMES ALONE.
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Before Elena could show the officer, a second message arrived.
ASK HIM WHY HE LET ROSA TAKE THE BLAME.
