Chapter 1 - THE DOCUMENT IN THE LEATHER FOLDER
David stared at the man in the dark suit as if he had spoken another language.
“Arrest?”
Julianne’s hand slipped out of his.
“What arrest?”
The man opened the leather folder.
“My name is Special Agent Marcus Reed.”
He displayed his credentials.
“Federal Financial Crimes Task Force.”
David looked toward the two state troopers.
Then toward me.
“Maya, what did you do?”
I almost laughed.
Even now, somehow, everything was something I had done.
Agent Reed continued.
“David Vance, you are being taken into custody pursuant to warrants involving wire fraud, conspiracy, falsification of trust documents, and obstruction of a federal financial investigation.”
David’s suitcase slipped from his hand.
“No.”
Julianne stepped backward.
“What is he talking about?”
David ignored her.
His eyes stayed on me.
“This is insane.”
I stood beside the fireplace where Lily’s school photograph used to sit.
The photograph was gone now.
So was the fireplace mantel.
So was almost everything else in the house.
“What happened here?”
David demanded.
“Where is everything?”
“Mine is gone.”
I said.
“Everything belonging to my father’s estate is in storage.”
“The furniture was ours.”
“No.”
I looked around the empty room.
“You just never bothered reading the trust inventory.”
David’s face tightened.
Then something occurred to him.
“Where’s Lily?”
The room changed.
Agent Reed glanced toward me.
One of the troopers looked at the floor.
Julianne frowned.
David repeated himself.
“Where is Lily?”
I had imagined this moment every night for fourteen days.
In some versions, I screamed.
In others, I slapped him.
Sometimes I forced him to listen to every voicemail I had left from the ICU.
But when the moment finally came, I felt almost nothing.
I walked toward Agent Reed.
He handed me one page from the leather folder.
I held it out.
David stared at it without taking it.
“What is that?”
“Take it.”
His fingers touched the paper.
He read the first line.
Then the second.
His entire face changed.
CERTIFICATE OF DEATH.
LILY GRACE VANCE.
AGE: SEVEN YEARS.
David stopped breathing.
His eyes moved toward the date.
Then the time.
11:42 P.M.
Fourteen days earlier.
His mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Julianne whispered.
“Oh my God.”
David looked at me.
“No.”
I said nothing.
He looked back at the document.
“No.”
His hands started shaking.
“Maya.”
I watched him read Lily’s name again.
“You called me.”
His voice cracked.
I finally answered.
“Fifty times.”
He closed his eyes.
“No.”
“You rejected forty-three of them.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You sent me a message after number forty-four.”
His lips parted.
Agent Reed watched silently.
I recited the words exactly.
“Stop suffocating me with your anxiety.”
David’s knees nearly buckled.
“I didn’t know she was dying.”
“No.”
My voice remained calm.
“You never stayed on the phone long enough to find out.”
He looked toward Julianne.
She was already crying.
David turned back to me.
“Why didn’t someone else call?”
“The hospital did.”
He froze.
“Three times.”
I continued.
“They left messages.”
He reached for his phone.
Agent Reed stopped him.
“That phone is now evidence.”
David stared at him.
Then at me.
“Maya, please.”
I felt something inside me harden.
“Lily asked for you.”
His face collapsed.
I had not planned to tell him that yet.
But I did.
“She asked me why Daddy wouldn’t answer.”
David covered his mouth.
“And I lied to her.”
Tears burned behind my eyes.
“I told her you were on an airplane.”
His knees hit the floor.
Julianne turned away.
I continued because stopping would have protected him.
“And when she couldn’t breathe anymore, she asked if you knew she loved you.”
David made a sound I had never heard from another human being.
I looked at Agent Reed.
“I’m done.”
Reed nodded toward the troopers.
They stepped toward David.
But before they reached him, David looked up.
His face was wet.
“What does Lily have to do with federal agents?”
Agent Reed’s expression changed.
“Nothing.”
He closed the leather folder.
“Your daughter’s death is not why we are here.”
David stared at him.
Reed continued.
“We are here because while your daughter was dying, you were using her trust fund to finance the yacht you were standing on when your wife called.”
Julianne stopped crying.
She looked at David.
May you like
“What?”
And for the first time since entering the house, David looked afraid of something other than grief.
