Chapter 9 - The Garden Room.
Daniel agreed to meet the next morning, but he refused to come to the mansion.
He suggested Charles Mercer’s office in Hartford instead.
Ethan declined.
“For once, everyone is coming to me.”
Daniel arrived at nine with his own attorney.
Margaret did not come.
Her attorney said she was unavailable.
That word irritated Rachel more than any denial could have.
“Unavailable is not an answer.”
Daniel sat at the long table in the library and admitted he had entered through the service door.
He admitted Margaret had given him access to archived invoice boxes.
He admitted he was behind the cleaning closet door when Anna entered the foyer.
But he denied touching the cameras or the statue.
“Why hide?” Ethan asked.
“I wasn’t hiding.”
“You came through a service gate, entered a locked closet, and waited until the cameras were off.”
Daniel looked at his attorney.
The attorney said nothing.
Daniel finally exhaled.
“Margaret told me you had ordered a confidential records review.”
“I did not.”
“I know that now.”
“What were you looking for?”
Daniel’s face tightened.
“A folder Julia kept.”
Ethan stood.
“What folder?”
Daniel looked toward the windows.
“She called it the Garden File.”
Julia had loved the glass garden room at the back of the mansion.
She used it as an informal office during spring and summer.
After her illness worsened, the room had been closed and left mostly untouched.
Ethan had avoided it because every chair and plant still reminded him of her.
Now he walked there with Anna, Rachel, Charles, and Marcus behind him.
Dust covered the writing desk.
A pale circle remained where Julia’s coffee mug used to sit.
Noah waited at the doorway with Dr. Hart.
Ethan opened the desk drawers.
Nothing.
Anna examined the shelves.
Nothing.
Rachel checked behind framed photographs.
Nothing.
Then Noah walked toward a tall planter containing Julia’s old lemon tree.
He pointed at the wooden base.
“Mom put paper there.”
Ethan knelt.
A removable panel had been fitted beneath the planter stand.
Inside was a flash drive wrapped in a silk handkerchief.
There was also a small notebook.
The first page carried Julia’s handwriting.
GARDEN FILE.
The notebook listed vendors, dates, invoice numbers, and initials.
M.V. appeared repeatedly.
So did D.V.
Daniel looked as though all the air had left the room.
“I can explain those.”
Rachel turned on him.
“You have been saying that since yesterday.”
The flash drive contained scanned invoices and voice notes Julia had recorded for herself.
In one note, Julia sounded tired but determined.
She said Margaret had been approving inflated household contracts.
She said Daniel had questioned several foundation vendors but later stopped responding to her requests.
Then her tone changed.
“I do not yet know whether Daniel is involved or afraid.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
The next voice note was dated six days later.
“Margaret has begun limiting who sees Noah when I am resting.”
“I told Ethan she is becoming too controlling, but I did not explain the financial concern because I still need proof.”
The final recording lasted only eighteen seconds.
“If Ethan finds this, the red key opens the second compartment.”
Everyone looked at one another.
The red key was in Marcus’s evidence envelope.
It was an electronic fob.
But on one side, beneath the enamel shell, was a narrow metal blade.
Anna saw the tiny keyhole underneath Julia’s writing desk.
Ethan inserted the red key.
A hidden drawer released with a soft click.
May you like
Inside lay the missing second half of Julia’s letter.
And beneath it was an envelope addressed to Margaret Vale.
