Chapter 6 - Aunt June's Bargain / The Promise He Broke
June Whitmore answered on the third ring.
“Claire, sweetheart? I heard something happened at the wedding. Are you all right?”
Claire stared at the ledger. “Did you pay someone to burn my mother's studio?”
The silence on the line lasted too long.
“Where are you?” June asked.
“Answer me.”
“I did what I had to do.”
Lena made a sound of disgust. Ruiz held out her hand for the phone, but Claire shook her head.
“What did you have to do?” Claire asked.
“Your mother was going to destroy the family.”
“My mother was making dresses.”
“She was going to expose your father. The company was already in trouble. If those papers came out, everything would have been lost.”
“So you burned the studio?”
“I paid a man to scare her. I didn't know Rosa would go back inside.”
Claire closed her eyes. “You knew there was a chance someone could die.”
June began to cry. “I thought they would leave.”
“Who?”
“Your father. Margaret. All of them. They were fighting over the designs, the money, the patents. Evelyn wanted to give Rosa half. Your father said it would ruin him.”
“Then why did you sign the payment?”
“Because he asked me to.”
“You always told me you saved me.”
“I raised you.”
“You raised me on a lie.”
June's voice broke. “Claire, please. I loved your mother.”
“No. You loved being the person who got to decide what happened to her.”
Claire ended the call.
For a moment, no one spoke. Then Lena touched the photograph. “Our mothers wanted us to have this.”
“Our mothers,” Claire repeated.
She looked at the two women in the picture. The old story had always been that Evelyn had designed the famous gown alone. But the ledger showed payments to Rosa's workshop, and the cassette might hold the missing explanation.
Ruiz found a portable player in the evidence kit. The tape clicked, hissed, and began.
Evelyn's voice filled the dusty room.
“If you're hearing this, then they found the dress. Claire, my sweet girl, I need you to know that the person who betrayed me wasn't the person you think.”
The tape crackled.
Then Evelyn said a name.
“Daniel.”
Claire turned toward Daniel.
He looked as though he wanted the floor to open beneath him.
The tape continued. “Daniel was only a boy when his father brought him to the studio. He saw what happened. He tried to warn me. He was the only one who did.”
Claire felt the anger inside her twist into something more painful.
The recording went on. “I asked him to keep a copy of the photographs. I told him to hide them until he was old enough to understand. If he ever finds Claire, tell her I didn't blame him.”
The tape clicked off.
Daniel rubbed both hands over his face. “I was seventeen. My father told me the fire was an accident. I saw him arguing with Evelyn that night. I heard him say he would make her regret it. I ran to get help, but by the time I came back—”
“You kept the photographs?” Claire asked.
He nodded. “One. I kept one.”
“Where?”
“In my father's old office.”
“You knew the truth.”
“I knew part of it.”
“You knew enough to tell me.”
“I was afraid you would hate me.”
Claire's laugh was empty. “You let me walk down an aisle in a dress built on my mother's stolen work. You let me stand in front of everyone and make vows while you held back the truth.”
“I loved you.”
“You loved the version of me who didn't ask questions.”
Daniel flinched.
Lena stepped between them. “He isn't the only one who lied. My mother kept quiet too. She was terrified. We all inherited somebody else's fear.”
Ruiz closed the ledger. “We have enough to bring in June and reopen the fire investigation. But we still need the original photographs and the full recording.”
Daniel offered to take them to his father's office.
Claire looked at him for a long moment. “I'm coming.”
“Claire—”
“If there is one more secret with my name on it, I will hear it from the source.”
Outside, rain began to strike the windows.
As they reached the front steps, a black sedan pulled away from the curb. Its rear window lowered just long enough for Claire to see Margaret inside.
The older woman held up a phone.
On its screen was a photograph of Claire as a child.
Then the car sped away.
May you like
The drive to the estate passed in a blur of wet roads and red brake lights. Lena sat beside Claire without touching her. Every few minutes, Claire glanced at her sister's profile and found some small resemblance: the shape of the cheek, the way she pressed her lips together when thinking. It was unsettling to recognize family in a person she had once called a stranger.
THE DRESS FULL OF SECRETS |
