Chapter 7 - THE EMPTY GRAVE
The funeral home parking lot was surrounded by police vehicles before dawn.
Claire was not allowed inside.
Neither was Ethan.
Mara insisted they remain at the secure facility.
But photographs from the crime scene arrived every few minutes.
The coffin platform was empty.
Broken pieces from the lid were scattered across the floor.
A set of tire tracks led from the rear loading bay.
Security recordings had been erased.
The funeral director was missing.
So was the night employee.
Richard’s plan had become larger than a fugitive husband trying to escape.
Someone was still actively protecting him.
Mara returned to the safe facility at six-thirty in the morning.
Claire was waiting.
“Tell me.”
“We found the vehicle used to remove the coffin.”
“Where?”
“Abandoned warehouse district.”
“The coffin?”
“Gone.”
Claire rubbed her forehead.
“What about the funeral director?”
“Still missing.”
“Richard?”
“No confirmed sighting.”
Laura stood near the window.
“What vehicle?”
“Commercial delivery truck.”
“Registered to?”
“A shell company called Bellmont Services.”
Laura closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
Mara looked at her.
“You know it?”
“It appears in the ledger.”
“For what?”
“Cash transfers.”
“How much?”
“Over four million in two years.”
Claire stared.
“What does Bellmont do?”
“Nothing.”
“It has no employees.”
“No office.”
“No public contracts.”
Mara wrote the name down.
“We’ll trace it.”
Laura shook her head.
“You won’t find the real owner through corporate filings.”
“Then how?”
“There’s an accountant.”
“Name?”
“Victor Saye.”
Claire recognized it.
“Richard plays golf with him.”
Laura nodded.
“He creates the shell structures.”
Mara sent another message.
Ethan walked into the room carrying a paper cup of water.
His face looked older than it had the day before.
“Did they find the coffin?”
Claire hesitated.
“No.”
Ethan sat down.
“The key was underneath the lining.”
Mara looked at him.
“Exactly where?”
“Near your feet, Mom.”
“How did you put it there?”
“When everyone left me alone before the service.”
“You opened the coffin?”
“No.”
Ethan shook his head.
“There was a little space near the bottom where the fabric wasn’t glued.”
“I pushed it in.”
Laura approached.
“Would somebody searching quickly find it?”
“No.”
“Would they have to tear the coffin apart?”
“Probably.”
Mara looked toward Laura.
“So whoever took the coffin may still be looking.”
Laura nodded.
“Which gives us a little time.”
Claire crossed her arms.
“For what?”
“To find out where they took it.”
Mara’s phone rang.
She answered.
“Yes.”
She listened.
Then her eyes shifted toward Ethan.
“Send me the picture.”
The call ended.
“What?” Claire asked.
Mara waited for an image to arrive.
When it did, she turned the screen around.
A photograph showed a man tied to a chair inside an abandoned office.
Ethan looked away.
Claire leaned closer.
“The funeral director.”
Mara nodded.
“He was found alive.”
“Where?”
“Twenty miles north.”
“Did he see who took the coffin?”
“Yes.”
“Richard?”
“No.”
Laura stepped closer.
“Who?”
Mara enlarged the photograph attached to the report.
It showed grainy security footage from a gas station.
A woman stood beside the delivery truck.
Claire stared.
“I know her.”
Ethan did too.
He had seen her at the funeral.
She had cried louder than almost anyone.
She had hugged Richard beside the coffin.
She had told Ethan that his mother was in a better place.
“Aunt Rebecca.”
Claire’s voice barely worked.
Mara looked between them.
“Rebecca Sloan is your sister.”
Claire stared at the image.
“She helped steal my coffin.”
Laura’s expression became guarded.
“Claire.”
“No.”
Claire turned on her.
“Do not tell me there is another explanation.”
“There might be.”
“My sister helped them.”
“We don’t know that.”
“She is standing beside the truck.”
Mara added, “The funeral director identified her.”
Claire looked sick.
“What did he say?”
“He said Rebecca arrived after midnight.”
“She claimed the family needed the coffin transferred.”
“He refused.”
“Then two men restrained him.”
“Did Rebecca hurt him?”
“No.”
“Did she stop them?”
“No.”
Claire sat down.
For four days, Rebecca had been one of the people comforting Ethan.
She had helped choose flowers.
She had selected hymns.
She had cried over Claire’s supposed death.
Had all of it been a performance?
Ethan looked at his mother.
“Maybe Richard threatened her.”
Claire wanted that to be true.
Then Mara’s phone buzzed again.
Another message.
This one was from an unknown number.
Mara opened it carefully.
A photograph loaded.
Rebecca sat in the same black sedan seen outside the hospital.
Beside her was Senator Jonathan Vale.
The timestamp was from three months earlier.
Laura whispered.
“That changes things.”
Claire stood.
“Find her.”
“We already are.”
“No.”
Claire’s voice sharpened.
“Find her now.”
Mara looked at her.
“You cannot leave this building.”
“That’s my sister.”
“And Richard is trying to kill you.”
“Rebecca knows where he is.”
“Maybe.”
“She helped him take the coffin.”
“We don’t know why.”
Claire slammed one hand against the table.
“My son put a key inside that coffin.”
“Richard needs it.”
“Vale needs it.”
“And somehow Rebecca is sitting beside Vale three months before anyone thought I was dead.”
Ethan had never heard his mother sound so furious.
Mara remained calm.
“We’ll find her.”
Claire turned away.
Ethan noticed something on the detective’s screen.
“What is that?”
Mara looked.
“What?”
“The building behind Aunt Rebecca.”
The photograph showed Rebecca and Vale leaving the sedan.
Behind them stood an old stone building with a circular window.
Ethan pointed.
“I’ve been there.”
Claire turned.
“Where?”
“I don’t remember.”
“When?”
“With Richard.”
The room went silent.
“When did Richard take you there?”
“Last summer.”
Claire stared.
“You told me you were at the lake.”
“We went there first.”
“Why?”
“Richard said he needed to pick something up.”
Mara crouched beside Ethan.
“Can you remember anything about the place?”
“There were horses.”
“A lake?”
“No.”
“A barn?”
“Yes.”
“And a big stone house.”
Laura looked sharply at Claire.
“Vale’s family estate.”
Claire frowned.
“You’re sure?”
“I’ve seen photographs.”
Mara was already searching.
Minutes later, she placed an image on the table.
Ethan recognized it immediately.
“That’s it.”
The property was called Blackridge Farm.
It belonged to a trust controlled by the Vale family.
Claire stared at the map.
Fifty-three acres.
Private road.
Multiple barns.
An abandoned chapel.
And according to county documents, a private family cemetery.
Laura’s eyes narrowed.
“The coffin.”
Mara looked at her.
“What?”
“If Vale needed time to search it without police finding him, where would he take it?”
Claire felt sick.
“A private cemetery.”
Mara called the tactical unit.
Ethan stared at the image of Blackridge Farm.
Something bothered him.
Then he remembered the day Richard took him there.
A man had opened the gate.
Not Richard.
Not Vale.
Someone Ethan had seen again only yesterday.
“Mom.”
Claire looked at him.
“The guy who opened the gate was Dr. Voss.”
Mara froze.
“Malcolm?”
“Yes.”
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
Mara stepped away to make another call.
Claire looked toward Laura.
“Malcolm knows the estate.”
Laura nodded slowly.
“Which means he knows more than he admitted.”
At that exact moment, twenty miles away, Malcolm Voss woke inside a hospital intensive-care room.
He looked toward the police officer guarding his door.
Then toward the nurse checking his IV.
“Detective Quinn.”
The nurse leaned closer.
“What?”
Malcolm’s voice was weak.
“Tell Detective Quinn she cannot go to Blackridge.”
The officer stood.
“How do you know she’s going there?”
Malcolm’s eyes filled with fear.
May you like
“Because that’s where Vale wants her.”
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