Chapter 9 - Britney Came to My Hospital Room
Britney came to see me under federal protection.
I almost refused.
Then I decided I wanted to look at the woman who had helped destroy my marriage.
She entered wearing jeans and a gray sweater.
No makeup.
No expensive jewelry.
She looked younger than I remembered.
Twenty-six, yes.
But frightened enough to seem nineteen.
She stopped near the door.
“Rachel.”
“Sit.”
She did.
Neither of us spoke for several seconds.
Then I asked the question I had been carrying.
“Did you sleep with my husband?”
Her eyes lowered.
“Yes.”
Pain moved through me.
Not the same sharp pain as before.
A duller one.
Almost distant.
“How long?”
“Eleven months.”
“Did you enjoy it?”
She looked shocked.
“I…”
“I’m asking.”
“Sometimes.”
I appreciated the answer more than a lie.
“Did you know I was pregnant?”
“Yes.”
“With twins?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know he canceled my insurance?”
“No.”
“Would it have mattered?”
She started crying.
“I don’t know.”
I stared.
“Then stop crying.”
She wiped her face.
“I’m sorry.”
“No. You’re scared.”
“Yes.”
“Those aren’t the same thing.”
She nodded.
For several minutes, I questioned her.
Britney’s father Victor had worked for Martin Vale for twenty-three years.
She grew up around money without understanding where it came from.
After Victor developed cancer, he confessed pieces of what he had done.
Fake contractors.
Offshore accounts.
Bribes.
Surveillance.
He had helped Arthur Bellini and Martin Vale siphon money from Russo companies.
Daniel discovered it.
Victor helped cover it up.
“Did your father kill mine?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“Who did?”
“I don’t know.”
“But Arthur does.”
“I think so.”
“Why?”
“My father recorded Arthur talking about it.”
She handed Evelyn another drive.
Then she looked at me.
“Bradley wasn’t supposed to marry me.”
“What?”
“The Cabo wedding was theater.”
“For whom?”
“You.”
I frowned.
“Vale wanted you emotionally destroyed.”
“Why?”
“So you would sign whatever Bradley put in front of you.”
I remembered all the paperwork.
“What was I supposed to sign?”
“A divorce settlement.”
My stomach tightened.
“The agreement transferred any undisclosed marital assets to Bradley in exchange for him assuming marital debt.”
I laughed in disbelief.
“He was going to make me sign away the trust.”
“Yes.”
“Could he?”
“If the trust distributions were characterized as marital property and you voluntarily waived claims…”
Evelyn interrupted.
“It would have been challenged.”
“But expensive,” Britney said.
“And messy.”
Exactly what Bradley had spent years teaching me to avoid.
Conflict.
Lawyers.
Questions.
Bradley always said, “Just sign it. I’ve handled everything.”
He hadn’t been handling things for me.
He had been training me.
I looked at Britney.
“Why did you come to the NICU?”
“To give you the drive.”
“Why not your attorney?”
“I didn’t trust anyone yet.”
“You could have called.”
“I thought your phone might be monitored.”
“By whom?”
She looked toward Dominic.
“Vale.”
Dominic frowned.
“Can he monitor hospital systems?”
“No. But he had someone close to Bradley.”
“Who?”
Britney looked at me.
“Your divorce attorney.”
I stared.
“I don’t have a divorce attorney.”
“Yes, you do.”
“No.”
“Bradley hired one for you.”
My blood turned cold.
“He told the firm you requested representation.”
Evelyn immediately began making calls.
Within an hour, we had a name.
Samuel Pike.
An attorney I had never met.
Yet documents filed in court identified him as counsel for me.
He had submitted paperwork supposedly agreeing to temporary asset transfers.
My signature appeared on multiple pages.
Forged.
The conspiracy had moved far beyond Bradley’s betrayal.
They were manufacturing my consent.
The next shock came when federal agents searched Pike’s office.
They found shredded records.
Burner phones.
And a handwritten list.
My name.
Bradley.
Britney.
Dominic.
My mother.
Next to my mother’s name was a date.
Three weeks before her death.
The same week Bradley claimed he had met her.
Beside it were two words:
She knows.
I stared at the page.
“What did my mother know?”
Nobody could answer.
But Britney could answer something else.
“My father said Claire had one piece of evidence nobody else knew about.”
“What?”
“A photograph.”
My heart accelerated.
“Of who?”
“Daniel’s killer.”
The room went silent.
I thought about the blue box.
The storage unit.
The old photographs.
Had we missed one?
Then I remembered something.
In my mother’s belongings, after she died, there had been an old photo album with one page cut out.
At the time I assumed she had removed a family picture.
Now I wasn’t so sure.
I called the storage company.
There had been two boxes.
Evelyn had retrieved only one.
The second had been removed three days before.
By someone presenting identification in my name.
Security footage still existed.
They sent us a still image.
A woman entered the facility wearing sunglasses and a cap.
She signed my name.
She carried out the missing box.
It wasn’t Britney.
It wasn’t anyone I knew.
Dominic stared at the image.
Then his entire face changed.
“You know her.”
He nodded.
“Who?”
“My mother.”
Arthur Bellini’s wife.
May you like
My grandmother.
And she had apparently stolen the one box that might identify the person responsible for my father’s death.
