Chapter 4 - The Man at the Door
Everyone turned.
The man in the hallway wore a black suit without a tie and carried a camera bag over one shoulder. He was in his mid-forties, with tired eyes and rain-dark hair.
Eleanor recognized him after three seconds.
“Caleb Price?”
He had photographed Caldwell Foundation events for years. Thomas trusted him because Caleb never sold private pictures to tabloids, even when magazines offered five figures.
Sloan looked less pleased to see him.
Caleb stepped into the study. “I’m sorry. Mara called me.”
Mara lifted her chin. “After the auction house called Mr. Reeves.”
Harrison pointed to the forged form. “You said you know who signed this.”
“I know who asked me to photograph it.”
Sloan’s voice went cold. “Careful.”
Caleb looked at her. “I have been careful for six weeks.”
He placed his camera bag on Thomas’s desk and removed a laptop.
“The foundation gala in August. Mrs. Mercer asked me to stay after the event. Said she needed product shots for an insurance file.”
“What products?” Eleanor asked.
“Your husband’s watch. Two paintings. The sapphire brooch. A set of first-edition books.”
Harrison closed his eyes.
Eleanor felt the room tilt, but her voice stayed steady. “Did you photograph them?”
“Yes. I believed she had permission.”
Sloan scoffed. “Because I did.”
“No,” Harrison said.
His wife turned to him.
He looked devastated, not angry. That frightened her.
Caleb opened a folder of photographs. Each image had a timestamp. The final picture showed something unexpected: Sloan’s hand resting beside the watch box, holding a cream envelope with Daniel Reeves’s law firm logo in the corner.
Daniel stepped closer.
“That envelope never came from my office.”
Sloan moved toward the laptop.
Eleanor blocked her path.
“What was in it?”
“Nothing.”
“Then why did you try to save an envelope from a burning handbag?”
Sloan’s breath caught.
Harrison stared at the photograph. “Is that the same envelope?”
Nobody answered.
Caleb clicked to the next image.
The room went silent.
The photo had been taken by accident, reflected in the glass of the display cabinet.
Sloan was not alone in the study.
A man stood behind her.
Eleanor knew him immediately.
So did Harrison.
May you like
It was Harrison’s younger brother, Grant.
The brother who had not spoken to the family in four years.
