Chapter 3 - The Scar Beneath the Wool
The next morning, Norah found the photograph on Leo's desk.
She had entered only because Rosa said Leo wanted to speak with her.
He was standing by the window.
Norah saw the photograph before she saw him.
Seven-year-old Norah.
A blanket.
Smoke behind her.
She stopped breathing.
"Where did you get that?"
Leo turned.
"Records."
"Put it away."
He did.
Immediately.
That frightened her almost as much as refusing would have.
"What do you remember?"
"Nothing."
"Norah."
"I said nothing."
She backed toward the door.
Leo did not follow.
"Your mother died that night."
Norah's eyes filled.
"I know."
"The report says electrical fire."
"Then that's what happened."
"The report also says you originally told investigators Arthur and Declan were in the room."
Norah froze.
Leo saw the answer before she spoke.
"I was seven."
"Yes."
"Children say things."
"Children also get frightened into changing them."
Her face changed.
"Stop."
Leo remained still.
"All right."
"I mean it."
"I heard you."
Norah rushed from the room.
She made it halfway upstairs before the memory hit.
Smoke.
A locked bedroom.
Her mother's voice.
Arthur shouting.
Declan crying.
The smell of gasoline.
Then heat.
Norah grabbed the banister.
She was seven again.
She could hear Evelyn screaming.
Not from the flames.
Before them.
Norah sank onto the stairs.
Rosa found her.
She did not ask questions.
She simply sat beside her.
For nearly twenty minutes, neither woman spoke.
Finally Norah whispered, "My mother didn't die because of a wire."
Rosa's hand tightened around hers.
Downstairs, Leo heard every word.
But he stayed where he was.
For the first time, Norah had spoken without being forced.
He would not steal that from her.
That evening, she came to his office voluntarily.
"I remember a red can."
Leo looked up.
"Gasoline?"
She nodded.
"My father kept it in the garage."
"What else?"
"Declan was seventeen."
She stared at the floor.
"He was angry with Mom."
"Why?"
"She wanted to leave."
Leo said nothing.
"She had packed bags."
Norah's voice trembled.
"She told me we were going somewhere Arthur couldn't find us."
"What happened?"
Norah closed her eyes.
"Arthur found the bags."
The room became very quiet.
"He hit her."
Leo's fingers curled against the desk.
"Declan helped him."
A tear moved down Norah's cheek.
"I tried to stop them."
Her hand went to her shoulder.
Leo understood.
"The scar."
Norah nodded.
"They locked me outside the bedroom. I tried to open the door. Something burning fell. I don't remember what."
"And your mother?"
Norah opened her eyes.
"They told everyone she was already unconscious."
"But?"
"She wasn't."
Leo's face became stone.
"I heard her."
That night, Leo ordered Marco to reopen every piece of the Vale family's history.
By midnight they discovered the fire investigator who had originally questioned Norah was still alive.
By one, they found him.
By two, they learned Arthur Vale had paid him twenty thousand dollars.
By three, they discovered something worse.
Arthur's six-hundred-thousand-dollar theft had never been random.
He had been trying to leave the country.
Two tickets had already been purchased.
One for Arthur.
One for Declan.
None for Norah.
At dawn, Leo stood outside Norah's bedroom.
He did not knock.
Not yet.
Because Marco had just called with another discovery.
Arthur Vale had not disappeared.
May you like
He was still in the city.
And someone had seen him purchasing gasoline.
