Chapter 3 - What Happened Before Robert Died
“Tell me about that night.”
Daniel looked away.
Emily closed the laptop.
“Daniel.”
“My father died of a heart attack.”
“I know how he died. I’m asking what happened before.”
He remained silent.
Emily felt cold.
Robert Mercer had collapsed in his study at the Lake Geneva house eighteen months earlier. Daniel had been there. Margaret had been there.
Emily had been told it was a family dinner.
Nothing more.
Daniel poured himself water.
His hand shook.
“Dad and Mom argued.”
“About MCS?”
“I didn’t know the name then.”
“What did you know?”
“That Dad thought money had been taken from the company.”
Emily’s breath caught.
“How much?”
“He didn’t say.”
“What did Margaret say?”
Daniel looked miserable.
“She said he was confused because of his medication.”
“Was he?”
“No.”
Emily sat down.
Robert had been seventy-one but mentally sharp. He still reviewed contracts, attended board meetings, and sent Emily newspaper articles about parenting because he was impatient for grandchildren.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because Dad died forty minutes later.”
Emily stared.
Daniel continued.
“He accused Mom of moving money. She accused him of hiding assets from her. They screamed at each other. I told them both to stop.”
“What happened next?”
“Dad went into the study. I followed him.”
“And?”
“He told me not to trust anyone with company accounts until I had an independent audit.”
Emily’s voice dropped.
“Then what?”
“I got angry.”
“At him?”
Daniel nodded.
“He’d been sick for months and refused to step down. I told him he had created a mess and expected me to clean it up.”
“What did he say?”
“He said, ‘If you protect the wrong person, you’ll become part of what she did.’”
Emily absorbed the words.
“Did he mean Margaret?”
“I assume so.”
“And then?”
“I left the study.”
“Forty minutes later he died.”
“Emily.”
“I’m not accusing you of killing your father.”
His eyes snapped toward hers.
She noticed.
“Why did you react like that?”
“Because the email is trying to make you suspicious of me.”
“Then help me not be.”
Daniel sat opposite her.
His voice broke slightly.
“I heard something crash. Mom screamed. I ran back. Dad was on the floor. We called 911. The paramedics couldn’t save him.”
“Was the MCS folder there?”
“I don’t remember.”
Emily opened the photograph again.
“Someone remembers.”
The next morning, Daniel left for the company headquarters in Oak Brook.
Emily stayed home.
Margaret’s guest room door remained open, the room suddenly empty.
She had sent a driver during the night to collect her clothes.
Emily should have felt safer.
Instead she felt watched.
At 10:13 a.m., the doorbell rang.
A woman in her late fifties stood outside.
“I’m Lucia Moreno.”
Emily recognized the name.
Lucia had worked for Margaret for almost twelve years.
Margaret had abruptly fired her six months earlier.
“I need five minutes,” Lucia said.
Emily hesitated.
Then she saw Lucia glance toward the street.
“Please.”
Emily let her inside.
Lucia refused coffee.
“I saw the kitchen video.”
Emily stiffened.
“How?”
“Mrs. Mercer sent it to me.”
“What?”
“She sent a short clip. Only the part after she fell.”
Emily’s pulse accelerated.
“She was trying to prove I attacked her?”
“She wanted me to say you had been violent before.”
Emily stared.
“Had I?”
“No.”
Lucia’s eyes filled with disgust.
“She offered me twenty thousand dollars.”
Emily sat slowly.
“To lie?”
“To sign an affidavit.”
The room became silent.
“Why are you telling me?”
Lucia removed an envelope from her purse.
“Because six months ago, she paid me to stay quiet about something else.”
Emily did not touch the envelope.
“What?”
“Mr. Robert.”
Emily’s stomach turned.
Lucia explained.
On the night Robert died, she had been working at the lake house.
She heard Robert and Margaret arguing.
Robert shouted that he had copies.
Margaret told him he would destroy Daniel if he exposed her.
Then Robert went into the study.
“What did you see?” Emily whispered.
“Later, Mrs. Mercer came out carrying a folder. She burned papers in the fireplace.”
Emily’s breath stopped.
“Before or after Robert collapsed?”
“After the ambulance left.”
Lucia opened the envelope.
Inside was a photograph taken on an old phone.
The fireplace.
Half-burned documents.
One surviving corner showed MCS CONSULTING LLC.
“Why didn’t you go to police?”
“Because I didn’t think she killed him. I still don’t.”
“Then what did she pay you to hide?”
Lucia looked ashamed.
“She made me sign a confidentiality agreement and gave me fifty thousand dollars after I told Daniel what I saw.”
Emily’s head lifted.
“You told Daniel?”
Lucia nodded.
“Three days after the funeral.”
The front door opened.
Daniel walked in.
He saw Lucia.
Then the envelope.
His face changed.
Emily stood.
“You knew she burned the records.”
Daniel stopped breathing.
“Emily—”
“You knew.”
Lucia looked between them.
Daniel closed the door.
“Yes.”
The word landed harder than his slap.
Emily stepped backward.
“You looked me in the eyes last night and lied.”
“I was trying to understand what was happening.”
“No. You were protecting her.”
Daniel’s voice rose.
“I was protecting the company!”
Lucia flinched.
Emily went still.
Daniel realized what he had admitted.
“The company,” Emily repeated.
He said nothing.
Her phone buzzed.
Another anonymous email.
This one contained a copy of a signed agreement.
Daniel Mercer’s signature appeared at the bottom.
The document authorized a confidential $750,000 settlement payment to MCS Consulting six months after Robert’s death.
Emily looked up at him.
“You didn’t just know.”
May you like
Her voice trembled.
“You paid her.”
