Chapter 10 - What Happened to Thomas
The phone contained months of messages.
Payments.
Instructions.
Threats.
One conversation mattered more than the rest.
Richard had ordered a private investigator named Martin Shaw to follow Thomas.
The messages from the night Thomas died were short.
RICHARD: Stop him before he gets to Mercer.
SHAW: I’m at his house.
RICHARD: Get the files.
Twenty-three minutes later:
SHAW: He collapsed.
RICHARD: What did you do?
SHAW: Nothing. We argued. He went down.
RICHARD: Leave.
Claire read the messages without speaking.
Daniel stood beside her.
Rachel was across the table.
“So my father really did have a heart attack.”
Rachel nodded carefully.
“It appears so.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“But Richard sent a man to threaten him.”
“Yes.”
“And when Dad collapsed…”
Daniel finished quietly.
“He left him there.”
Claire opened her eyes.
The next message was worse.
SHAW: Should I call an ambulance?
RICHARD: No.
Claire stopped reading.
She pushed the phone away.
For eleven months, she had imagined her father dying alone.
Now she knew he hadn’t been alone.
Someone had watched him collapse.
Someone could have helped.
And Richard had told him not to.
Claire stood.
Daniel reached toward her.
She shook her head.
“I need a minute.”
She walked into the hallway.
For several minutes, she simply stood there.
Then Vanessa appeared.
Claire looked at her.
“Did you know?”
“No.”
“Did your mother?”
Vanessa started crying.
“I don’t know.”
Claire’s voice remained quiet.
“Your father let mine die.”
Vanessa covered her mouth.
Claire walked away.
She didn’t scream.
She didn’t threaten.
She didn’t need revenge.
May you like
She wanted the truth.
And now they finally had enough to prove it.
