Chapter 20 - The Final Chess Move
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Tears of profound relief and deep grief spilled down my cheeks. Arthur had protected us from the grave. He had gathered the intelligence, secured the evidence, and left it where only I could find it. I could save my son from the loan sharks, send Evan to federal prison, and force Victoria out of our lives forever.
I reached for my cell phone to call Sarah, ready to execute the final strike.
But as my hand hovered over the screen, a loose piece of paper slipped out from the very back flap of the blue ledger and fluttered to the floor.
I bent down and picked it up. It was a receipt from a private investigative firm, dated just two days before Arthur’s sudden, fatal heart attack.
Frowning, I turned the page over. Arthur had written a final, hurried note on the back of the receipt. The handwriting was erratic, wildly different from his usual neat script. He had been terrified when he wrote this.
Eleanor. If you find this, you must understand I didn't mean for it to go this far. I hired a PI to look into Victoria's background to force her to leave David. What they found... my god. She isn't who she says she is. The medical records from her first husband's death... she knows I know. She was in the house tonight. My chest hurts. I think she put something in my—
The sentence ended in a jagged pencil streak that ran off the edge of the page.
The air in the study turned to ice in my lungs. Arthur hadn't died of a random heart attack. He had been murdered. And the woman who did it had just been standing in my kitchen, threatening to take my grandchildren.
May you like
Suddenly, three heavy, rhythmic knocks echoed from the front door.
I slowly looked up from the paper, my blood running cold. I was entirely alone in the house. I slipped the paper into my pocket, grabbed my cane, and walked toward the foyer to see who was waiting in the dark.
