Chapter 2 - The Note In My Handwriting
Laurel and Evan left the hospital ten minutes later.
They walked out with the calm confidence of people who believed the story had already been decided.
I remained in bed with the taste of fear in my mouth.
Evan knew about Elias.
Laurel knew about the card.
That meant Grant's secret investigation had never been secret at all.
I reached for the call button and asked the nurse whether I could speak to Deputy Collins privately.
He entered five minutes later carrying a small notebook and the careful expression of someone who had already formed an opinion but wanted to appear neutral.
"Feeling up to a few questions?"
"I need my clothes back."
"They are evidence."
"Why?"
He hesitated.
"Because we found a box cutter in your coat pocket."
My pulse jumped.
"That belonged to Evan."
"You remember that?"
I realized my mistake too late.
Collins's eyes sharpened.
"You said you did not remember anything after the brakes failed."
"I remember pieces."
"Which pieces?"
I thought of Elias's warning.
Not the deputies.
Not even family.
"I remember Evan holding something."
Collins wrote it down.
"Anything else?"
"No."
He studied me.
"Mrs. Whitaker, the brakes on your Subaru appear to have been physically damaged."
"The line was cut."
Relief almost made me cry.
At least that part could not be blamed on panic or wet roads.
Then Collins continued.
"The preliminary position of the cut suggests it may have been done from beneath the vehicle sometime before you left home."
"Exactly."
"Evan was with me all morning."
"He had access."
Collins did not react.
"So did you."
I stared at him.
"You think I cut my own brakes?"
"I did not say that."
"You did not have to."
He closed the notebook halfway.
"Your stepson says you were angry about an inheritance dispute."
"He says you threatened to destroy the cabin rather than transfer half to him."
"That is not true."
"He also says you had been taking sleep medication and drinking since your husband's death."
"I do not drink."
"We found an open bourbon bottle in your kitchen trash."
I felt the room narrow around me.
Grant had kept bourbon in the house.
I had thrown away the last unopened bottle two months after his funeral because seeing it made me cry.
There had been no bottle in my trash that morning.
"Someone planted it."
Collins's expression barely changed.
"And the note?"
"Planted."
"The box cutter?"
"Planted."
"The medication bottle in the glove compartment?"
My chest tightened.
"What medication?"
He opened the notebook again.
"Zolpidem."
"Your prescription."
I had been prescribed ten tablets after Grant died.
I used two.
The remaining eight had disappeared months earlier.
At the time, I assumed I had misplaced the bottle during a cleaning spree.
Now I knew better.
"How many pills were in it?"
"None."
Collins watched me carefully.
"Toxicology will tell us whether you took them."
"I didn't."
"Good."
He sounded almost disappointed.
"Then that will help clear things up."
I leaned back and closed my eyes.
The plan had layers.
Cut the brakes.
Plant a suicide note.
Plant my medication.
Plant a bourbon bottle.
If I died, the crash would look like a murder-suicide attempt by a grieving, unstable widow.
If Evan survived, he became the traumatized teenager who escaped his stepmother.
If I survived, I became the woman who had tried to kill him and failed.
Either way, the cabin dispute would dominate the story.
"Where is the note?" I asked.
"Evidence."
"I want a handwriting expert."
"We will follow procedure."
"And I want the Subaru secured where no one connected to Laurel Dane can access it."
Collins frowned.
"Why are you naming her?"
Because she whispered that I should have died.
Because her son tried to murder me.
Because she knew about Elias.
Because suddenly every ugly accusation she had made after Grant's death felt like rehearsal.
I said none of it.
"Because she is involved in the inheritance dispute."
Collins tucked away his notebook.
"Try to rest."
After he left, I waited until the nurse brought lunch.
Then I asked to use the bathroom.
She helped me into a wheelchair and rolled me down the hall.
On our way back, I spotted a familiar gray beard near the vending machines.
Elias was wearing clean jeans and a faded University of Tennessee sweatshirt.
He looked like somebody's grandfather waiting for test results.
He did not look at me.
The nurse rolled me past him.
A folded paper cup sat on the edge of a window ledge.
As we passed, Elias knocked it to the floor.
"Sorry," he muttered.
The nurse stopped to pick it up.
Something slid beneath my blanket.
A cheap prepaid phone.
I hid it against my thigh.
Back in my room, I waited until the nurse left.
Then I turned it on beneath the blanket.
One message was already waiting.
DO NOT CALL.
TEXT ONLY.
THE CARD IS SAFE.
I nearly sobbed from relief.
Another message appeared.
I SWITCHED YOUR COAT BEFORE EVIDENCE TECH ARRIVED.
THEY HAVE A BLANK CARD.
I typed with trembling fingers.
EVAN KNOWS ABOUT YOU.
The reply came immediately.
I KNOW.
Then another.
HE DID NOT LEARN MY NAME FROM GRANT.
I stared at the screen.
WHO THEN?
Three dots appeared.
Then vanished.
Appeared again.
Finally Elias replied.
THE SAME PERSON WHO WARNED LAUREL THAT GRANT HIRED ME.
I typed.
WHO?
His next message made me sit perfectly still.
YOUR ATTORNEY.
I read it three times.
My attorney was Charles Voss.
Charles had written Grant's will.
Charles had handled the trust for Evan.
Charles had sat beside me at Grant's funeral and promised to protect me from every legal attack Laurel might make.
He was the one who told me the cabin belonged solely to me under Grant's final will.
He was also the one who insisted I should not worry about Laurel's claim that Grant promised her half.
I texted Elias again.
PROOF?
His answer took longer.
NOT YET.
BUT GRANT SUSPECTED HIM.
The door opened suddenly.
I shoved the phone beneath my pillow.
Charles Voss walked in carrying a leather briefcase.
He was sixty-two, silver-haired, perfectly dressed, and calm in the way expensive attorneys seemed trained to be calm.
He closed the door behind him.
"Nora."
His face filled with concern.
"Thank God you survived."
I forced a weak smile.
"Charles."
He sat beside the bed.
"Laurel called me."
"The sheriff's office called me too."
"This is becoming very serious."
"I know."
He opened his briefcase.
"The good news is that I can protect you."
He removed a document and placed it on the tray table.
"I have prepared a temporary transfer of the Miller's Ridge cabin into a neutral family trust."
"Until this situation is resolved."
I looked at the signature line.
"You want me to give up the cabin?"
"Temporarily."
"To whom?"
"A trust administered by my office."
My skin prickled.
Charles smiled gently.
"Nora, the property dispute is now the prosecutor's likely motive."
"If you voluntarily remove yourself from ownership, we weaken their theory."
"It also shows Evan that you are not trying to cheat him."
I thought about the note planted in my car.
I thought about the brake line.
I thought about Laurel's whisper.
Then I thought about Elias's message.
YOUR ATTORNEY.
"I need time to read it."
Charles's smile thinned slightly.
"Of course."
He tapped one page.
"But we should act before the sheriff obtains a warrant to freeze your assets."
"That could happen today."
"Why would they freeze my assets?"
"Attempted murder investigations are unpredictable."
He reached for a pen.
"Sign now, and I can file it within the hour."
I looked directly at him.
"No."
His hand stopped.
For the first time in ten years of knowing Charles Voss, I saw irritation break through his polished expression.
It lasted less than a second.
Then the smile returned.
"You are concussed."
"I understand."
He put the pen away.
"We will revisit this tomorrow."
Charles rose, then paused as though deciding whether to try one more time.
"The cabin has become toxic, Nora."
"Not physically."
"Emotionally."
"Every time Evan looks at it, he sees his father choosing you."
I almost answered with sympathy.
That was the trap Charles had used for months.
He took a legal dispute and translated it into guilt.
After Grant died, he repeatedly told me that keeping the cabin might permanently damage my relationship with Evan.
He suggested I let the boy use it whenever he wanted.
I agreed.
Then Laurel demanded half ownership.
When I refused, Charles advised me not to respond publicly because family conflict could lower the value of the estate.
At the time, all of it sounded reasonable.
Now I saw how carefully the pressure had been staged.
"Did Grant ever tell you he promised Laurel half?" I asked.
Charles adjusted his cuff.
"People say many things during marriages."
"That wasn't my question."
He looked at me.
"No."
"Then why did you keep telling me her claim was emotionally understandable?"
"Because law and family are different things."
"Were you her lawyer too?"
The question came out before I planned it.
For half a second, something flickered across his face.
"I represented Grant in the divorce."
"That means you had confidential information about her."
"And about him."
"And now you control his estate."
Charles smiled thinly.
"You are beginning to sound suspicious of everyone."
"I went over a cliff today."
"I think I've earned a temporary license."
For the first time, he did not have a polished answer ready.
Then he leaned down to kiss my forehead.
His cologne was the same cedar scent I remembered from Grant's funeral.
As he straightened, his gaze moved briefly toward my pillow.
The prepaid phone was hidden beneath it.
I wondered if he had seen the shape.
"Rest," he said.
Then he left.
I waited thirty seconds before pulling out the phone.
I typed one message to Elias.
CHARLES JUST TRIED TO MAKE ME TRANSFER THE CABIN INTO A TRUST HE CONTROLS.
The reply came almost instantly.
DO NOT SIGN ANYTHING.
Then another message appeared.
GRANT SAID THE CABIN IS NOT THE PRIZE.
I frowned.
WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?
Elias did not answer.
Instead, he sent a photograph.
It showed Grant standing outside the Miller's Ridge cabin six months before his death.
He was holding a shovel beside an open patch of ground near the old stone fireplace.
On the back porch stood Charles Voss.
And beside Charles was Laurel.
The date on the photograph was the same weekend Laurel swore she had been in Atlanta.
May you like
Under the picture, Elias wrote five words.
THEY WERE LOOKING FOR SOMETHING.
