Chapter 5
I moved everyone to the old dining room.
Not because it was comfortable.
Because it had one door.
No windows low enough to reach.
And no convenient freezer for anyone to call an accident.
Grace sat at one end of the table.
Celeste opposite her.
Preston stood under guard.
I remained standing.
“Alessia escaped with Lily.”
“Yes,” Celeste said.
“What happened next?”
“She reached the east courtyard.”
“How do you know?”
“I followed her.”
“Why?”
Celeste looked at Grace.
“Because Mom told me to.”
Grace said nothing.
I turned back.
“Who else was there?”
Celeste swallowed.
“Two men.”
“Whose?”
Preston interrupted.
“Vale.”
I stared.
The enemy had been inside my estate.
That night.
Eleven months ago.
While I was thirty miles away meeting capos Preston himself had insisted needed me.
I remembered.
He had changed the meeting time twice.
I looked at him.
“You sent me away.”
He smiled.
“Finally.”
My bodyguard took one step forward.
I raised my hand.
Not yet.
“What were Vale men doing here?”
Preston leaned against the wall.
“They were supposed to collect information.”
“What information?”
“Alessia.”
Silence.
I thought I had misheard.
“They wanted my wife?”
“They wanted what she knew.”
“Which was?”
Grace suddenly said:
“Not about us.”
I looked at her.
“What?”
Grace pressed both hands together.
“Alessia had discovered the Vale crew wasn't simply buying Preston.”
Preston's face tightened.
Grace continued.
“They were preparing to remove you.”
“That's not surprising.”
“No.”
She looked at Celeste.
“They already had your replacement.”
My eyes moved slowly toward my fiancée.
Celeste whispered, “I didn't know at first.”
There it was.
A new layer.
“What replacement?”
Grace answered for her.
“Someone close enough to you that nobody would see her coming.”
I laughed once.
No humor in it.
“Celeste.”
My fiancée began crying again.
“It wasn't supposed to happen like this.”
“Like what?”
She stood.
“Alessia wasn't supposed to die.”
I felt cold.
“You were supposed to replace her.”
Celeste shook her head.
“Not kill her.”
“But marry me.”
Silence.
That was yes.
I remembered every coincidence.
Celeste checking on Lily after the funeral.
Celeste bringing food.
Celeste never pushing too quickly.
Celeste waiting nine months before I touched her hand.
Perfect patience.
Manufactured patience.
“How long?”
She closed her eyes.
“How long had you been prepared to enter my life?”
“Before Alessia died.”
“How long?”
“Six months.”
Preston laughed softly.
His sister turned on him.
“Shut up.”
He smiled.
“She wants you to believe she was innocent.”
Celeste's face twisted.
“I didn't agree to murder anyone.”
“But you agreed to him.”
She looked at me.
That hurt more than I wanted it to.
Not because I loved her the way I loved Alessia.
I didn't.
But I had let her near Lily.
That was unforgivable.
“What happened in the courtyard?”
Celeste sat again.
“The Vale men grabbed Alessia.”
“And Lily?”
“She screamed.”
My hands tightened.
“Who took her?”
“Grace.”
I looked at Grace.
She whispered:
“I brought Lily back inside.”
“Why?”
“I wasn't going to let Vale take a child.”
I almost hit the table.
“You're telling me that as if it redeems you.”
“No.”
For once, she had the intelligence to look ashamed.
“And Alessia?”
Grace looked at Preston.
He looked away.
Celeste answered.
“They took her.”
My chest tightened.
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
Everything stopped.
I heard the clock.
The air vent.
Someone breathing near the wall.
“What did you say?”
Celeste looked directly at me.
“Alessia was alive when they drove away.”
I leaned both hands on the table.
Eleven months.
Closed coffin.
Burned car.
No body I had been allowed to see.
I had accepted it because grief had made questions feel obscene.
“What happened to the car?”
Preston smiled.
“Vale arranged it.”
“And the body?”
Grace closed her eyes.
I already knew.
“It wasn't hers.”
Nobody said anything.
May you like
My wife had not died that night.
Someone had simply needed me to believe she had.
