Chapter 8 - CAMILLE’S DEBT
Claire found Camille at a hotel bar.
Camille did not deny the call.
“I was there.”
Claire sat across from her.
“Start talking.”
Camille looked around the nearly empty room.
“Your father asked me to meet him that night. He had evidence Marjorie was laundering company money through firms connected to me.”
“Because she was blackmailing you.”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“We argued. He wanted me to testify.”
“And?”
“I refused.”
Claire’s jaw tightened.
Camille continued.
“He left. I followed him because I was afraid he would go straight to federal investigators.”
“Then his car crashed.”
“No.”
Camille’s voice dropped.
“Then his brakes failed.”
Claire stopped breathing.
“You saw it?”
“I saw him trying to slow down. I saw the brake lights flashing. He hit the guardrail.”
“Why didn’t you call police?”
“I did. Then I called Marjorie.”
“Why?”
“Because I panicked.”
Claire’s eyes burned.
“You called the woman who wanted him silenced.”
“I didn’t know she caused it.”
“Did she?”
Camille shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
Claire slammed her palm against the table.
“Stop saying that!”
Several people looked over.
Camille stayed calm.
“This is what Marjorie wants. She wants you furious. She wants you certain before you have proof.”
Claire forced herself to sit back.
Camille was right.
That made Claire hate her more.
“What did you see at the crash site?”
Camille swallowed.
“Grant arrived.”
“Before police?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“He went to your father’s car.”
Claire leaned forward.
“What did he take?”
“A leather document case.”
Claire remembered Daniel always carrying one.
“Where is it?”
“I don’t know.”
Claire stood.
Camille caught her wrist.
“There’s more.”
Claire looked down.
“Your father was alive when Grant arrived.”
Everything inside Claire went still.
“What?”
“He was conscious.”
Camille’s voice broke.
“I heard him speaking.”
“To Grant?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
Camille released her.
“Ask Grant.”
Claire left the bar and drove directly to the Caldwell house.
Grant was in his study.
She locked the door behind her.
“He was alive.”
Grant turned pale.
Claire stepped toward him.
“My father was alive when you got there.”
Grant did not deny it.
“What did he say to you?”
“Claire—”
“What did he say?”
Grant’s eyes filled with something she had never expected.
Shame.
“He told me the crash wasn’t an accident.”
Claire’s knees almost gave way.
“Then who did it?”
Grant whispered:
“He said my father did.”
Claire stared at him.
“Your father had been dead for seventeen years.”
Grant reached into his desk.
He removed a sealed envelope.
“This is what I took from Daniel’s car.”
Claire looked at the handwriting on the front.
Her father’s.
May you like
One line.
FOR CLAIRE — WHEN SHE KNOWS WHO HENRY REALLY WAS.
