Chapter 5 - The Bracelet Hides A Signal
Henry’s confession moved the investigation from suspicion to history.
Detective Ruiz asked everyone except Clara, Marcus, Julian, and Maya to leave the study while she questioned him.
Henry sat with both hands wrapped around a cup of untouched coffee.
“Amelia Vance came here seventeen years ago,” he said. “Not for a party. She came to see Richard Sterling.”
Marcus looked up at the mention of his late father.
“My father?”
Henry nodded.
“They argued in the library for nearly an hour. Not with each other. About something they had found.”
Clara’s mother had died when Clara was thirteen.
Amelia existed in her memory as perfume, piano music, red scarves, and the sound of a laugh Clara could no longer perfectly recall.
The idea that Amelia had been secretly investigating anything felt impossible.
“What did she find?” Clara asked.
Henry shook his head.
“I don’t know. But when she came out, she was crying. She gave me that key and said Richard knew what it opened.”
Marcus glanced toward the built-in shelves lining the study.
“My father never mentioned it.”
Henry looked ashamed.
“Because he died six months later.”
The room went quiet.
Richard Sterling’s death had been ruled a heart attack.
Marcus looked at Ruiz.
“Don’t.”
Ruiz remained calm. “I haven’t said anything.”
“But you’re thinking it.”
“So are you.”
Marcus turned away.
Clara reached for the brass key.
“B-17. Bank box?”
Maya leaned closer.
“Possibly.”
Henry nodded. “Amelia said, ‘If anything happens to me, the truth is where Daniel cannot reach it.’”
Julian closed his eyes.
Clara stared at him.
“You knew she suspected Dad?”
“No.”
“Did you know anything?”
“I knew they were fighting before she died. I was seventeen. Dad told me Mom was having some kind of breakdown.”
Clara felt sick.
That was exactly what Daniel had told her too.
Ruiz’s phone buzzed.
She read a message and stood.
“Dr. Bell is asking for a lawyer.”
“That’s not surprising,” Maya said.
“No. This is.”
Ruiz looked at Clara.
“The hospital still has your tox screen from the staircase fall. You tested positive for zolpidem.”
Clara frowned.
“I don’t take sleeping pills.”
Marcus went perfectly still.
Ruiz continued.
“The concentration was low and could have been dismissed as prescribed use if no one knew to question it. But you were drugged before or immediately after the fall.”
Clara remembered Andrew’s silver bracelet swinging near her face.
A charm shaped like a key.
“Why would he drug me after I’d already fallen?” she asked.
Julian answered quietly.
“To make you doubt what you remembered.”
That possibility hurt more than Clara expected.
Because she had doubted herself.
For three weeks she had apologized for being forgetful. She had laughed when Marcus teased her for misplacing things. She had even wondered whether stress had caused the lights to seem darker than they were.
Someone had not only hurt her.
Someone had tried to take ownership of her memory.
Marcus crouched beside her.
“We’re done letting them tell you what happened.”
A uniformed officer appeared at the door.
“Detective, we found something in Dr. Bell’s coat.”
He handed Ruiz another evidence bag.
Inside was a small electronic transmitter.
Julian recognized it first.
“That’s a short-range RF trigger.”
Maya frowned. “For what?”
Ruiz turned the device over.
“Could be used for a garage door, alarm relay, smart switch.”
Marcus looked toward the grand living room.
“The lights.”
Julian shook his head.
“Too obvious.”
He took a photo of the device and searched the model number.
Thirty seconds later, his face changed.
“It’s not for lights.”
He turned the screen toward them.
The transmitter was commonly paired with hidden magnetic release mechanisms used in stage props, display cases, and motorized fixtures.
Clara thought of the shattered glass coffee table.
The heavy sculptural chandelier above it.
The antique wall cabinet beside where Victoria had been standing.
Marcus followed her gaze.
“What?”
Clara stood slowly.
“When Victoria shoved me tonight, she kept looking past me.”
“To what?”
“The ceiling.”
They rushed into the living room.
Police had already cleared most guests to one side.
Ruiz looked up at the chandelier.
Nothing.
Then Clara noticed the bronze curtain rod mounted above the shattered window alcove.
One bracket had partially released.
A heavy decorative spearhead hung crooked above the exact place she had fallen.
Marcus stared at it.
“If she’d fallen six inches farther…” Maya whispered.
Clara did not need her to finish.
Ruiz called for the crime-scene technician.
And from across the room, Daniel Vance watched the examination with a face too controlled to be innocent.
Then Clara saw something else.
The silver bracelet charm recovered from Andrew Bell was blinking.
Once.
Twice.
May you like
Three times.
Someone in the mansion was still sending it a signal.
