Chapter 6 - VICTORIASamuel Pike sat at our kitchen table while three federal agents recorded his statement.
He had aged dramatically since I remembered him.
When I was little, Sam was the man who gave us lollipops whenever Dad brought a car to his shop.
I remembered his laugh.
His enormous hands.
His red toolbox.
Now those hands shook.
“I worked for Richard Sterling from 1998 until 2012,” he began.
“Not directly. Sterling Maritime used my garage for its executive fleet.”
Agent Cho asked, “How did you meet Victoria?”
“She worked for him.”
“Job title?”
Sam gave a humorless laugh.
“Depends which paperwork you're reading.”
Officially, Victoria Mercer had been a corporate consultant.
Unofficially, she fixed problems.
“She handled people,” Sam explained.
“What does that mean?”
“Bribes. Threats. Payoffs.”
My mother whispered, “Richard had someone doing that?”
Sam looked at her sadly.
“Elena, Richard had a dozen people doing things you didn't know about.”
Mom lowered her eyes.
Cho asked, “Tell us about the Santa Barbara incident.”
Sam inhaled slowly.
“Victoria brought Richard’s SUV to my shop three days before the trip.”
“She told you to damage it?”
“No. She asked questions about brake lines.”
“Why?”
“She said there was a recall.”
“And you believed her?”
“At first.”
Sam paused.
“Then I saw her under the vehicle after closing.”
My mother went pale.
“What did she do?”
“She scored the brake hose.”
Cho leaned forward.
“Meaning?”
“Cut partway through it.”
“So it would fail later.”
“Yes.”
Sienna stared at him.
“And you said nothing?”
Sam looked destroyed by the question.
“I confronted her.”
“What did she say?”
“That if I opened my mouth, she'd tell Richard I did it.”
“So you stayed quiet?”
“For one night.”
Sam looked at Mom.
“The next morning, I replaced the hose.”
Mom frowned.
“But the brakes failed.”
“Because she came back.”
The room went silent.
“She damaged the replacement.”
I asked, “Why would she try to kill us?”
“I didn't know then.”
“And now?”
He looked toward Maya.
“Claudia told me.”
Maya stiffened.
“My mother?”
“Years later.”
“What did she say?”
Sam hesitated.
“That Victoria believed Elena was the only thing keeping Richard from marrying her.”
Mom stared.
Sienna said, “Victoria was another mistress.”
“Yes.”
Dad hadn't had one secret relationship.
He had at least two.
Claudia.
Victoria.
Maybe more.
But Victoria apparently wanted more than secrecy.
Agent Cho asked, “Did Richard know about the sabotage?”
“No.”
“Did you tell him afterward?”
“Yes.”
Mom gasped.
Sam continued.
“I told Richard someone had deliberately damaged the line.”
“What did he say?”
“He told me never to repeat it.”
That sounded exactly like my father.
“What happened to Victoria?”
“She disappeared from the company for about a year.”
“Fired?”
“I assumed.”
Maya said, “She wasn't.”
Everyone looked at her.
“My mother had records showing Victoria receiving payments from an offshore account throughout that period.”
Cho nodded.
“So Richard kept her employed covertly.”
“Apparently.”
Sienna asked, “Why would Dad protect someone who tried to kill his wife and daughters?”
Nobody answered.
Then Sam said, “Maybe because she had something on him.”
Of course.
Everyone in Dad’s world seemed to possess evidence against everyone else.
That was how he built loyalty.
Not trust.
Mutual destruction.
Agent Cho asked about the Harbor Road crash.
Samuel looked at Sienna.
“This is the part I'm sorry about.”
She gripped my hand under the table.
He continued.
“Three days before your birthday party four years ago, Richard called me.”
“What party?”
“The hotel fundraiser.”
Sienna nodded.
“He said the convertible needed servicing.”
“What did you find?”
“Nothing.”
“So the brakes were fine?”
“When I returned the car, yes.”
My stomach tightened.
“When did Victoria access it?”
“The night of the crash.”
“How do you know?”
Samuel removed his phone.
“I kept something.”
Cho took it.
Sam explained.
“My shop installed GPS diagnostics in several Sterling vehicles. It recorded the hood opening, battery status, onboard error codes.”
“The convertible had one?”
“Yes.”
“At 11:52 p.m., its hood opened for eleven minutes.”
“At our house?”
“Yes.”
“Who opened it?”
“I didn't know until tonight.”
Sam looked at the footage from our garage.
“There is a blind spot behind the convertible, but when Margaret showed me the video, I noticed something reflected in the garage window.”
Mason enlarged the old security footage on his laptop.
At 11:51 p.m., a figure moved through the corner of the frame.
Female.
Dark hair.
Black dress.
The face was unclear.
But my mother whispered:
“Victoria.”
At 12:41, Dad gave Sienna the keys.
Less than an hour after someone tampered with the car.
“Did Dad know Victoria was there?” I asked.
Samuel shook his head.
“I don't know.”
Agent Cho said, “We need to find her.”
A younger agent entered.
“Sir?”
“What?”
“We may have.”
He handed Cho a tablet.
Victoria Mercer.
Age fifty-one.
Current residence:
Scottsdale, Arizona.
But another line caught my attention.
Occupation: President, Mercer Risk Solutions.
Cho scrolled.
Her company had consulting contracts with Sterling Maritime totaling nearly eight million dollars over ten years.
Mom whispered, “He's still paying her.”
Maya said, “Or paying for her silence.”
The agent added, “There's more.”
“What?”
“Mercer entered California yesterday.”
Agent Cho stood.
“Yesterday?”
“Airport camera at LAX.”
My skin prickled.
“Where is she now?”
“Unknown.”
Every phone in the room buzzed at once.
Mine.
Sienna’s.
Mom’s.
Maya’s.
Unknown number.
Same message.
I opened it.
YOUR FATHER ISN'T THE PERSON YOU SHOULD FEAR.
Attached was a photograph.
Taken minutes earlier.
Through our kitchen window.
It showed all of us sitting around the table.
Sienna screamed.
Federal agents drew weapons.
Cho shouted into his radio.
“Perimeter breach!”
The house erupted.
Agents rushed outside.
I stared at the image.
Someone had photographed us from our own garden.
Another message arrived.
This one only to me.
Avery, you survived the fire because you weren't supposed to be in that car. Don't make the same mistake twice.
Sienna saw it over my shoulder.
Her face turned white.
“What does that mean?”
I didn't know.
Then a third message arrived.
A video.
Eight seconds long.
Dad sat inside an interrogation room.
The camera angle looked like security footage.
Underneath were three words.
ASK HIM YOURSELF.
Agent Cho grabbed my phone.
“That's impossible.”
“Why?”
“This feed isn't public.”
Another agent said, “Someone breached our internal system.”
Cho’s face hardened.
“Move them.”
“Where?”
“Secure location.”
Mom started protesting.
I barely heard her.
I kept staring at that sentence.
You weren't supposed to be in that car.
I suddenly remembered something.
Something I had buried for four years.
The night of the crash, I had followed Sienna.
But I hadn't planned to.
Someone called our house.
A woman.
She told me Sienna was drunk.
She told me where the car was heading.
She told me:
If you love your sister, you'd better go after her.
I had assumed it was one of Sienna’s friends.
I never told anyone.
Now I understood.
Someone had deliberately sent me toward Harbor Road.
“Sienna.”
She looked at me.
“There was a phone call.”
“What?”
“That night.”
I told Agent Cho.
His expression became increasingly grim.
“Did you recognize the voice?”
“No.”
“Male or female?”
“Female.”
Mom whispered, “Victoria.”
Maybe.
But another detail suddenly returned.
The woman had called me by a childhood nickname.
A name almost nobody outside our immediate family used.
Avie.
My father.
My mother.
Sienna.
And one other person.
Our former nanny.
A woman named Patricia Bell.
Patricia disappeared two days after the accident.
For four years, Dad told us she had returned to Ireland to care for her mother.
But Patricia wasn't Irish.
She was from Boston.
I looked at Mom.
“Where is Patricia?”
Her expression told me she had just remembered the same thing.
“I don't know.”
Agent Cho frowned.
“Who's Patricia?”
“Our nanny.”
“When did she leave?”
“Immediately after Harbor Road.”
Cho began typing.
Mom added, “Richard hired her.”
Maya said, “What was her last name?”
“Bell.”
Maya stared.
“What?”
“My mother's middle name was Bell.”
Nobody spoke.
Maya pulled out her phone.
“Claudia Bell Reyes.”
I felt a chill.
“Was Patricia related to your mother?”
“I've never heard of her.”
Agent Cho searched a database.
His expression tightened.
“Patricia Bell doesn't exist.”
Mom blinked.
“What?”
“Not with the Social Security number your family provided on employment paperwork.”
Sienna whispered, “Then who lived in our house for six years?”
Cho turned the screen.
A photograph appeared.
Not Patricia.
Victoria.
Younger.
Blonde hair instead of dark.
Different makeup.
But unmistakably the same woman.
Our nanny had been Victoria Mercer.
She hadn't infiltrated our lives the night of the crash.
May you like
She had raised us.
And suddenly I understood why the mysterious caller knew my nickname.
