Chapter 4 - THE MISSING NOTE
Vanessa had shown Michael Natalie’s goodbye note eight months earlier.
I need space. Do not look for me. I’m tired of being everyone’s problem.
Michael remembered the handwriting.
He never questioned it.
Now Laura asked for the original.
Vanessa said she threw it away.
Why?
“She asked me to.”
Michael stared.
“You kept every birthday card she ever sent you.”
Vanessa looked at him.
“This was different.”
The police had no original.
Only a photograph Vanessa sent Michael that night.
Forensic review of the image showed:
printed text,
not handwriting.
Michael had remembered handwriting because Vanessa told him Natalie wrote it.
The image itself showed a typed note.
His memory had filled the gap.
That realization shook him.
Then Natalie was well enough to give a formal interview.
She said Vanessa asked her to stay at the Carter house temporarily.
Why?
Natalie had relapsed after nearly three sober years.
Not drugs.
Alcohol.
She called Vanessa ashamed.
Vanessa said:
“Come here. Michael doesn’t need to know yet.”
Natalie agreed.
She was terrified Michael would judge her.
He had never said he would.
But Vanessa told her:
“He doesn’t want instability around Emily.”
Emily had been ten months old then.
Natalie believed she was protecting the family by hiding.
Vanessa brought her into the crawlspace through the service hatch.
There was a sleeping mat.
Portable light.
Water.
A small fan.
“Just one night,” Vanessa said.
Then another.
Then another.
Natalie slept there during the day while Michael worked from home upstairs.
At night, Vanessa let her out when Michael slept.
Michael stared at Laura.
“That is impossible.”
Natalie described the living room sounds.
Michael’s conference calls.
Emily’s crying.
The television.
His habit of dropping coins into a ceramic bowl beside the couch.
Details she could know only from being close.
Then Natalie said:
“At first, the hatch wasn’t locked.”
Michael leaned forward.
May you like
“When did it change?”
“After I told Vanessa I was leaving.”
