Chapter 8 - THE PRICE OF SILENCE
Natalie contacted Ryan the next morning.
Unknown number.
“Hello, Ryan.”
He gripped the phone.
“Where are you?”
“Still giving orders.”
“Come near Ava and I’ll—”
“You’ll what?”
Natalie laughed softly.
“Become the violent husband I’ve already told people you are?”
Ryan stopped.
“What do you want?”
“Ten million dollars.”
“For the drive?”
“For my silence.”
“About my mother?”
“About everyone.”
“Natalie.”
“Yes?”
“Who killed Emily?”
A pause.
“I’ll tell you when I’m paid.”
“You killed Daniel.”
Another pause.
“That wasn’t the question.”
“You hurt Ava.”
Natalie’s voice turned cold.
“She was an inconvenience.”
Ryan shut his eyes.
The casualness of it was worse than denial.
“She’s four years old.”
“She’s Emily’s daughter.”
Ryan understood.
Natalie had not simply resented Ava.
Ava reminded her of Emily.
“Where do you want the money?”
“Instructions will come.”
The call ended.
Maya had been listening.
“Good.”
Ryan looked at her.
“What?”
“She talked long enough.”
They traced the signal.
Not to Natalie.
To a prepaid phone abandoned on a commuter train.
She had anticipated the trace.
Marcus studied the secret office.
The encrypted drive Natalie displayed in the video had a distinctive blue casing.
Ava wandered past his laptop.
She pointed.
“Natalie puts that in Teddy.”
Everyone stopped.
“What Teddy?”
“My bear.”
Ryan raced home.
Ava’s stuffed bear sat on her bed.
A seam along its back had been restitched.
Inside was a tiny storage key.
Locker number.
A bus terminal in Los Angeles.
Police opened it.
The blue drive was gone.
But another object remained.
Daniel’s wedding ring.
Claire identified it instantly.
Daniel had not been wearing it when his body was found.
Natalie had kept it.
Trophy.
Insurance.
Memory.
Whatever the reason, it connected her directly to evidence from Daniel’s death.
Beneath the ring was a handwritten note.
EVAN KNOWS WHERE THE ORIGINAL IS.
Evan survived the shooting.
Ryan visited him in the hospital.
“Original what?”
Evan looked exhausted.
“Daniel made two recordings.”
“One was on Claire’s phone.”
“The second recorded the entire argument.”
“Where is it?”
“I hid it.”
“Why?”
“Because it proved I was there.”
Ryan leaned closer.
“And Natalie?”
“Yes.”
“Did it prove she pushed him?”
Evan nodded.
Ryan closed his eyes.
“Give it to Maya.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
Evan looked toward the hospital window.
“Because Emily found it before she died.”
Ryan froze.
“What did she do with it?”
“I don’t know.”
Then Evan remembered.
“The night before her crash, she said she finally had enough to destroy Natalie.”
Ryan’s heart pounded.
“What else did she say?”
May you like
Evan swallowed.
“She said if something happened to her, Ava would have the answer.”
