Chapter 4 - The Fiancé Who Had Been Watching Her
Camille could hear the river outside.
Nothing else.
“You were driving?”
Luca looked at her.
“Yes.”
Her voice became almost inaudible.
“You told me my father didn't die in an accident.”
“He didn't.”
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“And you didn't think that mattered?”
“Every day for eight years.”
Camille stepped backward.
Richard Whitfield watched with quiet satisfaction.
“What happened?”
Luca's face was rigid.
“Your father called me that night. He said someone had found him. I picked him up near St. Charles.”
“And?”
“We were followed.”
Camille couldn't breathe properly.
“I tried to lose the car. At the intersection near the river, another vehicle came from the side.”
“You crashed.”
“Yes.”
“My father died.”
Luca looked down.
“No.”
Camille stared.
“What?”
“He survived the crash.”
Richard's smile vanished.
Luca continued.
“He was conscious when I pulled him out.”
Camille's knees nearly gave way.
“Then how did he die?”
“I don't know.”
Richard interrupted.
“Convenient.”
Luca ignored him.
“I was injured. An ambulance took me away. Étienne refused treatment.”
“That doesn't make sense.”
“He said he had to finish something first.”
“The blue pages.”
“Yes.”
Camille looked at the papers in her hands.
“My father was found six days later.”
“I spent those six days looking for him.”
Richard laughed.
“Such loyalty.”
Luca turned.
“Your security division erased footage from three cameras that night.”
Richard's face tightened.
Camille looked between them.
Then Preston stepped forward.
“Dad.”
Richard turned.
“Be quiet.”
“No.”
It was the first time Camille had ever heard Preston speak to his father that way.
Preston approached Camille.
“I found something.”
Richard's expression changed.
“Preston.”
“I found it months ago.”
“Shut your mouth.”
Preston removed his phone.
“There was an archived payment ledger in my father's office.”
Richard moved toward him.
Luca stepped between them.
Preston handed the phone to Camille.
A photograph showed a payment.
Eight years earlier.
Two days after the crash.
Recipient: M. Pierce.
Camille recognized the name.
Dr. Malcolm Pierce.
The specialist from the ballroom.
Purpose: Consultation and recovery.
Amount: $250,000.
Her blood went cold.
“Pierce.”
Preston nodded.
“He knew your father.”
Camille remembered Pierce's reaction when she asked about the blue pages.
Richard looked toward the security officers.
“Take the documents.”
Neither moved.
Luca glanced at them.
“They work for the auction house, Richard. Not you.”
One officer removed his radio.
Richard's confidence faltered.
Camille gathered the blue pages.
“We're leaving.”
Richard pointed toward her.
“If those documents become public, you will ruin people who had nothing to do with what happened generations ago.”
Camille turned.
“Then why did someone break into my apartment last night?”
Richard said nothing.
“Why did you spend years searching for them?”
Still nothing.
“Why did you send your son into my life?”
Preston closed his eyes.
Richard finally answered.
“Because your father wasn't satisfied with history.”
Camille waited.
“He found modern fraud too.”
There it was.
The truth beneath the truth.
Old crimes had created the fortune.
New crimes had protected it.
Luca drove Camille away from the warehouse.
Preston came with them.
Camille sat in the back.
She wanted distance from both men.
At Luca's house in the French Quarter, they photographed every blue page.
Copies went to three attorneys.
A university archive.
A journalist Étienne had once trusted.
Luca insisted.
“No more single copy,” he said. “That's how your father got trapped.”
Camille looked at him.
“Why should I believe anything you say?”
“You shouldn't believe it because I say it. Verify it.”
That answer again.
No demand for trust.
No performance.
Just evidence.
Preston sat across the room.
His ivory dinner jacket was gone now.
Without it, without the ballroom and champagne and easy smile, he looked smaller.
Camille turned to him.
“Tell me everything about us.”
He looked miserable.
She did not soften.
“When did your father send you?”
“Three weeks before we met.”
“Did he tell you to date me?”
“No. He told me to get close.”
“So you chose dating.”
“Yes.”
“The proposal?”
Preston looked at her.
“That was mine.”
Camille swallowed.
“Don't.”
“I know you don't believe me.”
“I believe you thought you loved me.”
“Camille—”
“But love without honesty is just another disguise.”
He looked down.
She removed his ring from her pocket.
She had picked it up before leaving the ballroom.
She placed it on the table.
“It stays yours.”
Preston stared at it.
For once, he didn't argue.
At noon, the university archivist called.
The blue pages were authentic.
By two, the attorney called.
The records appeared sufficient to reopen several property and fraud disputes.
At four, the journalist called.
She had found something else.
“Camille,” she said, “you need to see this in person.”
They met at a newspaper archive.
The journalist, Nora Bell, spread photocopies across a table.
“Your father visited me nine days before his death.”
Camille stared.
“You knew him?”
“He gave me part of the story. Not enough to publish.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“He made me promise not to contact you unless I found a particular name.”
“What name?”
Nora slid a document forward.
MALCOLM PIERCE.
Camille looked up.
Nora continued.
“Pierce wasn't merely an appraiser. Eight years ago, he worked privately for Richard Whitfield.”
Luca leaned closer.
“What did he recover?”
“According to this, a leather folio and personal effects belonging to Étienne.”
Camille's heart pounded.
“From where?”
“A hotel room.”
“What hotel?”
Nora hesitated.
“The Dauphine.”
Camille knew it.
Her father had been found near there.
“Is the room record still available?”
Nora smiled faintly.
“That's why I called you.”
She produced another sheet.
A guest registry.
Étienne had checked into room 214 after the crash.
But he wasn't alone.
A second name appeared beneath his.
Camille read it.
Then stopped.
She looked at Luca.
Then Preston.
“No.”
Nora said nothing.
Camille read the name again.
Celeste Thibodeaux.
Her aunt.
The woman who had raised Camille after her father's death.
The woman who had refused Luca's calls.
The woman who had told Camille for eight years that Étienne's death had been a tragic accident.
Camille immediately called her.
Celeste answered.
“Camille?”
“Were you with Papa before he died?”
Silence.
“Aunt Celeste?”
The older woman's breathing changed.
Then she whispered:
“You found the blue pages.”
Camille closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
Celeste began crying.
“Then they're going to come for you too.”
“Who?”
Another pause.
When Celeste answered, her words turned everything Camille believed upside down.
“Not Richard Whitfield.”
“Then who?”
May you like
“Malcolm Pierce.”
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