Chapter 5 - What Grief Had Not Taken
Rachel listened to Agent Ortiz without moving.
The apartment seemed to grow smaller around every word.
Messages.
Financial records.
A connection requiring further investigation.
No final determination yet.
Rachel heard all of it.
What stayed was widow.
Daniel had reduced her to a condition.
A woman without a husband.
A problem with a child attached.
“Did Vincent know?” she asked.
Ortiz answered carefully.
“We have found no evidence that he did.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
From the doorway, Vincent said, “No.”
Rachel turned.
He had arrived after Cole called him, but remained outside until Ortiz asked whether Rachel wanted him present.
She had said yes.
Now she looked at him as though the floor beneath them had changed.
“Your company paid me.”
“Yes.”
“Your company sent flowers.”
“Yes.”
“Your company told me the insurance delay was normal.”
His face tightened.
“What delay?”
She laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“Eight months. I sold Aaron’s truck. I borrowed from Naomi. Then your house manager offered me extra shifts, and I was grateful.”
Vincent looked at Ortiz.
She made a note.
Rachel stood.
“Please leave.”
He nodded immediately.
That seemed to hurt her, too.
At the door, he stopped.
“I should have known what was happening inside my own company.”
“Yes,” she said.
He accepted it.
Outside, Cole waited beside the elevator.
“Boss—”
“Find every delayed employee death benefit. Every settlement Daniel approved. Give the records to Miriam.”
“And Rachel?”
“She asked me to leave.”
Cole did not argue.
For three days, Vincent did not visit.
He sent no flowers.
He did not attempt to pay her into forgiveness.
Through Miriam, he arranged independent legal representation for employees affected by the suspected fraud. Rachel chose her own attorney from a list that included firms with no Mercer connections.
At night, he read records until the words blurred.
His father’s signature appeared on older transactions.
His own appeared on newer ones.
Sometimes beside approvals he had barely examined.
There were many ways to participate in wrongdoing.
He was beginning to recognize the quiet ones.
On the fourth afternoon, Rachel called.
“Lucy wants to know whether you still have her rabbit.”
Vincent looked at the toy sitting beside his desk.
“Yes.”
“She says he gets lonely.”
“I can have Cole bring him.”
A pause.
“You can bring him.”
At the apartment, Lucy met him wearing a paper crown.
“Rabbit had a business trip,” she announced.
“A difficult one.”
“Did he behave?”
“Better than most of my employees.”
She accepted that and carried the rabbit into the bedroom.
Rachel stood by the window.
“I’m still angry,” she said.
“You should be.”
“I don’t know how much belongs to you.”
“Neither do I.”
She turned toward him.
That answer seemed to matter.
They sat across from each other while Lucy colored at the coffee table.
Rachel told him about the insurance forms. The unanswered calls. The manager who suggested Aaron might have violated safety procedures by driving tired.
Vincent wrote down every name.
Then he closed the notebook.
“I can’t give him back.”
“No.”
“I won’t ask you to feel better because I’m trying to fix something.”
She looked down at her hands.
“Aaron was funny,” she said. “People keep talking about him like he was only evidence.”
Vincent stayed.
For an hour, Rachel told stories.
Aaron burning pancakes shaped like dinosaurs. Aaron crying at a dog-food commercial and denying it. Aaron learning to braid Lucy’s hair by practicing on yarn taped to a chair.
Sometimes Rachel laughed.
Sometimes she couldn’t finish.
Vincent listened to the life behind the documents.
When he rose to leave, Lucy ran after him.
“Mommy laughed today.”
He crouched.
“I heard.”
“Can you come when she’s sad, too?”
He glanced toward Rachel.
She met his eyes.
“If she wants,” he said.
Rachel nodded once.
Outside, his phone rang.
Miriam’s voice was tense.
“Daniel emptied his office.”
Vincent looked back at the apartment door.
“How long ago?”
May you like
“We don’t know.”
Then she added, “His company car was found near Naomi Bennett’s street.”
