Chapter 9 - The Man Behind the CompanyDetective Ramirez refused even to entertain the idea of me going alone.
His photograph appeared on local television.
Police described him as a person of interest in an active financial investigation and requested information about his whereabouts.
They carefully avoided connecting him publicly to my father’s death.
Privately, everything pointed toward him.
Too perfectly.
I kept thinking about the medication bottle in his car.
Dad’s name.
Calvin’s vehicle.
The missing gun.
The threatening photograph.
It was the kind of evidence television detectives loved.
And the kind my father would have distrusted.
“Look at the date before the signature.”
Dad never accepted convenient answers.
Neither would I.
At eight that morning, Tabitha sat across from me in my kitchen.
Twenty-four hours earlier, she had ordered me to leave this house.
Now she wore yesterday’s clothes, no makeup, and one of my father’s coffee mugs sat between her hands.
Life had a strange sense of humor.
“Calvin didn’t keep Arthur’s medicine,” she said.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Because he hates clutter.”
I stared at her.
“That’s your argument?”
“I lived with him.”
“So did I.”
“Then you know.”
Unfortunately, I did.
Calvin threw away receipts weekly.
Organized socks by color.
Digitized paperwork.
He would never leave incriminating medication rolling around inside his car.
“Could he have put it there recently?”
“Why?”
“To threaten Evelyn?”
“With heart pills?”
Fair point.
“Did Calvin ever talk about Dad’s medication?”
“No.”
“Did Graham?”
She hesitated.
“Maybe.”
My attention sharpened.
“When?”
“The night he came to our house.”
“April eighteenth?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“He asked whether Arthur was still having cardiac episodes.”
“What did Calvin say?”
“That Arthur was stubborn and probably had ten years left just to irritate everyone.”
Despite myself, I almost smiled.
That sounded like both Calvin and Dad.
“What did Graham say?”
Tabitha looked uncomfortable.
“He said ten years was a long time when people were waiting.”
I stopped.
“Waiting for what?”
“I thought he meant retirement.”
He didn’t.
Dad’s death benefited someone whose forged documents required him not to be around to dispute them.
Calvin certainly benefited.
But so did Graham.
Maybe more.
“Why did Graham come through the side gate the night before Dad died?”
“I don’t know.”
“You were with him.”
“No.”
“The camera says otherwise.”
“I wasn’t with him.”
“You entered thirty seconds apart.”
“I went to see Arthur alone.”
“At midnight?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Her eyes filled.
Not with tears.
Humiliation.
“Because Arthur called me.”
That surprised me.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“That afternoon.”
“What did he want?”
“To talk about Calvin.”
“Why would he call you?”
“He said he had proof Calvin was lying to both of us.”
I leaned back.
“What did he show you?”
“Nothing. When I arrived, the study door was open but Arthur wasn’t there. I heard movement near the greenhouse.”
“You followed?”
“No. I got scared.”
“Of what?”
“Arthur had sounded strange on the phone. Not sick. Angry.”
“Did you enter the house?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“The side door was unlocked.”
“Then what?”
“I heard someone outside.”
“Graham?”
“I didn’t know who.”
“But the camera shows him.”
“I never saw his face.”
“Why didn’t you tell police?”
“Because I had no reason to think it mattered until yesterday.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
She gave me a look.
“You hated me.”
“I still don’t particularly enjoy you.”
“That makes two of us.”
Oddly, that was the first thing she said that made me trust her slightly.
“What time did you leave?”
“Around midnight.”
“Dad died sometime between one and four.”
“Yes.”
“Did you see him?”
“No.”
“What did you do inside?”
Her jaw tightened.
“Went into the study.”
“What did you take?”
“Nothing.”
“Tabitha.”
“I looked through his desk.”
My anger flashed.
“You searched my father’s desk the night he died?”
“I was trying to find whatever he wanted to show me.”
“The flash drive?”
“I never saw one.”
“Did you open the upper right drawer?”
“Yes.”
My heart stopped.
“Was there a flash drive?”
“No.”
So it had already been removed before Tabitha arrived.
Unless she was lying.
“Did you touch his medication?”
“No.”
“Did you see it?”
“There were pill bottles beside his bed when I passed the bedroom.”
“How many?”
She frowned.
“Three? Maybe four.”
Dad’s cardiac medication had supposedly vanished weeks earlier.
Yet Tabitha claimed she saw bottles that night.
“Would you recognize them?”
“Probably.”
I called Ramirez.
He arrived forty minutes later with photographs of Dad’s medications.
Tabitha identified two definitely.
A third possibly.
Then Ramirez showed her the bottle recovered from Calvin’s car.
She shook her head.
“That wasn’t there.”
“How can you know?”
“The cap.”
We all stared.
“The bottles beside Arthur’s bed had those easy-open white tops. This one has a childproof cap.”
Ramirez looked at the image.
“That’s not significant by itself.”
“Maybe it is,” I said.
Dad had arthritis.
His pharmacy specifically used easy-open caps.
Margaret confirmed it.
Ramirez called the pharmacy.
Twenty minutes later, we had a problem.
The bottle found in Calvin’s car came from the correct prescription batch.
But according to pharmacy records, Dad had received it with an easy-open cap.
Someone had replaced the cap.
Why?
Fingerprints.
A childproof cap offered ridges and surfaces that could retain prints.
“Whose prints are on it?” I asked.
“Lab isn’t finished.”
“What if someone planted Calvin’s?”
“Possible.”
A call came from forensics.
Ramirez listened.
Then looked at us.
“Calvin’s fingerprints are on the bottle.”
Tabitha whispered, “No.”
“Two clear prints.”
I stared at the bottle photograph.
“How old?”
“Prints can’t reliably be dated.”
“Convenient.”
Ramirez nodded.
“It is.”
“What about other prints?”
“Partial from an unidentified person.”
Graham.
Maybe.
Then another fact arrived.
The gun missing from Calvin’s case was registered to him.
But security footage from his neighborhood showed someone entering his garage at 3:12 a.m.
A hooded figure.
Calvin’s car left forty minutes later.
No clear driver image.
“So maybe Calvin wasn’t driving,” I said.
“We don’t know.”
“Where was he?”
“No confirmed location after ten thirty last night.”
Tabitha stared at the table.
Then abruptly stood.
“I know where he might go.”
We turned.
“Calvin has a cabin.”
I frowned.
“He hates camping.”
“It’s not really a cabin. More like a private river house.”
“Where?”
“Near Beaufort.”
“Whose name?”
“Not his.”
“Then whose?”
She hesitated.
“Diana Cross.”
The fifth name from Evelyn’s list.
“Who is Diana?”
“Calvin told me she was an investor.”
I remembered the name now.
Diana Cross.
Former operations director at Bennett Architectural Group.
She left suddenly four years ago after an internal disagreement with Dad.
“Does Calvin know her well?”
Tabitha laughed bitterly.
“Apparently everyone knows my husband better than I do.”
Ramirez immediately dispatched officers.
Two hours later, they found the river house.
Empty.
But someone had been there recently.
Food still warm.
A fire barely extinguished.
On the kitchen table sat Calvin’s phone.
Beside it was a note addressed to me.
Claire,
I know how this looks.
For once, believe me when I tell you I didn’t kill Arthur.
Graham is not the person you should fear.
Neither is Tabitha.
Ask yourself who knew the evidence before Arthur collected it.
I’m sorry for what I did to you.
But if they find me before I find the original ledger, I’m dead too.
—Calvin
Below the message was an address.
An abandoned Bennett Architectural warehouse outside Savannah.
Margaret looked at me.
“You cannot go there.”
“I know.”
Ramirez took the note.
“No one goes anywhere without police.”
I nodded.
And meant it.
Until my phone buzzed five minutes later.
A second message arrived from Calvin.
This one contained a photograph.
Calvin tied to a chair.
Blood running from his forehead.
Behind him stood a shadowed figure.
The message underneath said:
May you like
COME ALONE WITH ARTHUR’S STORAGE RECEIPT.
OR YOUR EX-HUSBAND DIES AT MIDNIGHT.
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