Chapter 5 - HER WEDDING-NIGHT CONFESSION
Z
The Caruso estate was locked down before the last guest left.
Every gate closed.
Every security camera was reviewed.
Every vehicle was checked.
Vincent spent two hours in his study with Daniel and four senior men while Claire sat upstairs in a wedding gown stained with champagne and dust from the ballroom floor.
She did not change.
She barely moved.
Her father had known.
That fact repeated through her mind.
Patrick had known armed men would open fire.
Whether Vincent was the intended target or someone else hardly mattered.
Claire had been standing beside him.
Her sisters had been inside.
Patrick had walked away anyway.
At eleven forty-seven, someone knocked.
Claire stared at the door.
“Who?”
“Vincent.”
Her chest tightened.
“Come in.”
He entered alone.
His jacket was gone.
His white shirt sleeves were rolled to his elbows, and a thin line of someone else’s blood marked one cuff.
Claire stood immediately.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“The blood—”
“Security guard. Shoulder wound. He’ll live.”
Claire exhaled.
Vincent closed the door behind him but remained near it.
“We found Patrick’s vehicle.”
“Where?”
“Abandoned near the marina.”
“And my father?”
“Gone.”
“Marino?”
“Also gone.”
Claire nodded slowly.
Vincent watched her.
“You should change.”
She looked down at her dress.
“I forgot.”
Something about the answer hurt him.
“I’ll send Teresa.”
“No.”
Vincent waited.
Claire twisted her wedding ring.
“There’s something I need to tell you.”
His expression became still.
“Tonight?”
“Especially tonight.”
Vincent gestured toward the sitting area.
Claire shook her head.
“If I sit down, I might not say it.”
“All right.”
She looked toward the window.
“When my father told you I’d had relationships with men around his organization, that wasn’t random.”
Vincent said nothing.
Claire continued.
“There was one man.”
His posture changed almost imperceptibly.
She noticed.
“Not like that.”
Vincent relaxed slightly.
“His name was Sean Brady. He worked for my father.”
“I know the name.”
Claire looked surprised.
“He disappeared eighteen months ago.”
Vincent knew more than that.
Sean Brady had been a mid-level logistics manager who vanished after rumors spread that he had stolen money from Patrick.
No body had been found.
Claire swallowed.
“Sean was kind to me.”
Vincent waited.
“He used to bring financial reports to the house. Sometimes he’d ask me questions because he noticed I understood the numbers.”
Her eyes lowered.
“My father hated it.”
“Why?”
“Because Sean treated me like I was intelligent.”
Vincent’s expression hardened.
“One night Sean came to the library. He was scared.”
“What did he tell you?”
Claire’s hands began trembling.
“That my father was moving money through shell companies.”
Vincent went completely still.
“He had proof?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Claire looked at him.
“I have it.”
Silence.
Even the ocean outside seemed to disappear.
Vincent’s voice dropped.
“You have Sean Brady’s evidence?”
Claire nodded.
“Where?”
“In Massachusetts.”
Vincent’s jaw tightened.
“Claire.”
“I didn’t know what it meant.”
“You knew enough to hide it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Sean told me if anything happened to him, I had to make sure my father never found it.”
Vincent stared.
“What happened after that?”
“Two days later Sean disappeared.”
She looked down.
“My father told everyone Sean stole from him and ran.”
“And you believed him?”
“No.”
The answer was immediate.
“That was when I started being afraid of more than his temper.”
Vincent’s face changed.
“You think Patrick killed Brady?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you suspect it.”
“Yes.”
“Where’s the evidence?”
Claire drew a breath.
“Inside a book.”
Vincent almost laughed from sheer disbelief.
“Of course it is.”
She gave him the faintest smile.
“In the library at my father’s house. A first edition of The Count of Monte Cristo.”
Vincent stared.
“You hid evidence against a criminal inside a revenge novel?”
“I was nineteen.”
“Apparently nineteen-year-old you had a sense of irony.”
Her smile vanished as quickly as it came.
“There’s more.”
Vincent’s expression hardened again.
Claire looked terrified now.
“The night Sean came to me, he said my father wasn’t working alone.”
“With Marino?”
“I didn’t know the name then.”
“What did he say?”
“He said Patrick had a partner inside another organization.”
Vincent stopped breathing for half a second.
“What organization?”
Claire met his eyes.
“Yours.”
The room went cold.
Vincent’s voice became dangerously quiet.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sean didn’t give you a name?”
“He tried.”
Claire closed her eyes.
“He said, ‘If Caruso ever finds out who’s been opening his doors from the inside, half the eastern ports will burn.’ Then he heard someone in the hallway and left.”
Vincent did not move.
“Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”
Claire laughed softly, painfully.
“Because four days ago you were the terrifying stranger my father sold me to.”
Fair.
Vincent looked away.
“And yesterday?”
“Yesterday I still didn’t know if you believed me.”
“And now?”
Claire looked at the blood on his sleeve.
“Tonight my father helped someone shoot at you while I was standing beside you.”
Her voice broke.
“I think I finally understand which man I should be afraid of.”
Vincent walked toward her.
Slowly.
He stopped several feet away.
“Claire.”
She raised her eyes.
“Whatever happens next, you are not going back to that house alone.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
Vincent studied her face.
“Good.”
Claire’s fingers found the zipper at the back of her dress and failed twice because her hands were trembling.
Vincent looked away immediately.
She noticed.
“Vincent?”
“Yes?”
“Can you help me?”
He turned carefully.
“With the zipper.”
For some reason, that request felt more intimate than the wedding vows.
Vincent approached.
His fingers touched the small clasp at the top of the gown.
Claire went rigid.
He stopped.
“Do you want Teresa?”
“No.”
“You’re shaking.”
“I know.”
“Claire.”
She closed her eyes.
“I told you there’s never been anyone.”
Vincent’s hand fell away from the zipper.
She turned.
“This is what I was trying to tell you in the car.”
He stared.
“I’ve never…”
Her face turned scarlet.
“I know how ridiculous that probably sounds after everything my father told you.”
“It doesn’t sound ridiculous.”
“He made you think I was used up.”
Vincent’s expression darkened.
“Don’t use his words about yourself.”
Claire froze.
Vincent stepped closer, but did not touch her.
“You are not used merchandise. You are not damaged inventory. You are not a debt payment.”
Her eyes filled.
“You’re my wife because we both chose to continue this marriage after we learned the truth.”
“For strategy.”
“At first.”
Claire looked at him.
Vincent realized what he had said.
He did not take it back.
Her breath caught.
Vincent continued more quietly.
“And whatever does or does not happen tonight is your decision.”
“You don’t expect—”
“No.”
“But we’re married.”
“That doesn’t make your answer automatic.”
Claire stared at him.
The tears finally fell.
Nobody had ever given her permission to own something as basic as her own no.
Vincent reached up, then stopped before touching her cheek.
“May I?”
Claire nodded.
He wiped the tear away with his thumb.
She leaned into the touch before realizing she had done it.
Vincent’s eyes changed.
For one suspended second, neither moved.
Then his phone rang.
Daniel.
Vincent answered.
“What?”
Daniel’s voice was urgent.
“We found Patrick.”
Claire stiffened.
Vincent turned on speaker.
“Where?”
“He’s not with Marino.”
“Then where?”
“At Callahan House.”
Claire’s blood ran cold.
Daniel continued.
“He went back for something.”
Vincent looked at her.
Claire knew immediately.
“The book.”
Daniel went silent.
Vincent’s gaze hardened.
“Get the cars.”
He ended the call.
Claire reached for the closet.
Vincent blocked her.
“You’re staying here.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“The evidence is hidden somewhere only I know.”
“Tell me where.”
“If my father found the general hiding place, he may have moved books. There are twelve thousand volumes in that library.”
Vincent stared.
Claire met his eyes.
“You said you wouldn’t use me as bait.”
“I won’t.”
“Then don’t treat me like luggage either.”
Despite everything, he almost smiled.
“That mouth appeared quickly.”
“Maybe nobody ever gave it room.”
Vincent looked at her for a long moment.
Then nodded once.
“Change clothes.”
Twenty minutes later, Claire Caruso left Hawthorne Bay beside her husband.
May you like
Her father believed she had spent twenty-five years learning obedience.
He was about to discover she had also spent twenty-five years memorizing every secret passage in his house.
