Chapter 4 - A Name on a Bracelet
Daniel sent the photograph to Maya. Within an hour she called him from the hospital.
"Nora Ellis is awake," she said. "She asked for you. Only you."
"Is Vanessa being arrested?"
"Not yet. Don't contact the number that sent the photo."
Daniel arranged for Lily to stay with his older sister, Rachel, and drove to St. Anne's. Nora sat upright in a hospital bed with an oxygen tube beneath her nose. She looked younger than he'd expected, perhaps thirty-five, with a bruise spreading along her jaw.
Nora had tried official routes first. She'd mailed complaints, requested records and sat in crowded waiting rooms explaining the same timeline to exhausted clerks. One investigator had been sympathetic but said the evidence didn't prove intent. Another asked whether she was merely angry about her inheritance. She had started keeping a notebook of every date, every name and every wrong answer. That notebook was in a waterproof sleeve in her bag when she went to Daniel's house. She had intended to hand him photocopies at the gate and leave before anyone noticed. Seeing Vanessa by the pool changed that plan. Nora still wasn't sure whether approaching her had been brave or reckless. She only knew she couldn't bear watching another family get pulled apart while she kept silent.
"I need you to listen before you decide I'm crazy," she said.
"Go ahead."
"Vanessa used to be called Vanessa Price. Four years ago she worked for a private elder-care agency. My mother was one of her clients."
"What happened?"
"My mother died after signing a new will. Half her savings disappeared first. I reported it. Vanessa told everyone I was stealing from a sick woman."
Daniel gripped the chair arms.
"I followed her here because I found another family," Nora continued. "A boy named Ben Ward. His father accused Vanessa of forging medical consent forms after his wife died. Two weeks later the father was arrested for something he swore he didn't do."
"What does that have to do with my daughter?"
Nora took a breath. "She marries into families with money, Daniel. She learns which people can be isolated and which people can be dismissed. Then she gets the signatures she needs."
"Where's your proof?"
Nora reached for a paper hospital bag. Inside was a child's friendship bracelet, blue with yellow beads.
"I found this caught on your garden gate," she said. "It has the same initials as the bracelet in a photograph taken at Ben's last birthday."
Daniel looked at the beads. B.W.
"Where is Ben now?" he asked.
May you like
Nora's eyes filled.
"Nobody will tell his grandmother."
