Chapter 4

I didn't want to ask him whether he loved me anymore, and I didn't want to hear him tell the story of that scar for the four-thousandth time.

I stepped back and pulled the door open.

"My lawyer will contact you tomorrow."

He came after me.

I got in the car, locked the doors, and started the engine.

In the rearview mirror, he stood at the bottom of the steps. For the first time, he didn't turn around to comfort Vanessa.

It wasn't until I'd driven away from the Whitmore house that I realized I'd been shaking the whole time.

I pulled over and sent everything to my lawyer, the recording and all the photos I'd taken.

She called back almost right away.

Four years ago, she was the one who had filed my divorce petition.

After hearing it all, she asked only one thing.

"Are you going to withdraw it again this time?"

"No."

I bit down on the inside of my cheek until the trembling slowly stopped.

"And the medical records from back then. I want all of them."

She agreed, then told me to find somewhere safe to stay first.

I booked a different hotel.

Before checking in, I scrolled through my contacts looking for my old private doctor, and instead I came across a number I hadn't called in a long time.

Walt.

Julian's old driver.

Four years ago, when I was living at the hotel, he was the one who brought me clean clothes and my medicine.

Not long after the fire, he quit and moved back to his hometown.

Julian said Walt's father was sick. I even had someone pay him an extra six months' wages.

What Vanessa had said earlier kept echoing in my ears.

I pressed call.

It rang for a long time before he picked up.

"Mrs. Whitmore?"

"Uncle Walt, I want to ask you about the day of the fire four years ago."

The line went silent.

I tightened my grip on the phone.

"You were the one who drove Julian there that day, weren't you?"

"...Yes."

"Why did he come to the hotel?"

Julian had told me he'd been searching for me like a man gone mad, and that he had only just found out where I was staying when he saw smoke coming from the upper floors.

But on my very first day there, Walt had come by to drop things off.

He had always known where I was staying.

Only now did I realize that in four years, I had never once asked that question.

"Uncle Walt, tell me the truth."

A long sigh came through the phone.

"Ma'am, there are some things you're better off not knowing."

The tears came all at once.

"That's what all of you say."

"Putting someone else's kids under my name, that was for my own good too. Tricking me onto the operating table, that was for my own good too."

"Uncle Walt, what else is there that I'm not allowed to know?"

His breathing grew heavy.

After a long while, he said:

"I didn't leave back then because I wanted to."

"Mr. Whitmore took the memory card out of my dashcam, gave me a sum of money, and told me never to come back."

My fingertips went cold.

"But the car had broken down that day, and before that I'd sent a video to the mechanic."

"The one he took wasn't the only copy."

Ten minutes later, a video came through on my phone.

It was shot in front of the hotel.

In the footage, Julian's car was parked by the curb.

He didn't get out right away. Instead, he tilted his head, listening to the person in the passenger seat.

That person was Vanessa.

She was wearing a loose, oversized coat, and her belly was already clearly showing.

The timestamp in the top right corner was twenty-three minutes earlier than the time the fire started, according to the fire department's report.

I held the phone steady, and it took me several tries to turn on the sound.

First came Vanessa's tearful complaining.

"As long as she refuses to divorce you, I have to hide away with this belly every single day?"

Julian said something, too low to make out.

She asked again:

"Then does what you promised me still count?"

In the footage, Julian looked up at the hotel.

Then I heard his voice.

"Just let her suffer a little."

"I'll get her out before the fire starts inside."

My breath stopped short.

The video kept going.

Vanessa stroked her belly and suddenly smiled.

"Then call her now."

"I want to hear who she begs first when she finds out the door's been locked from the outside."

The next second, a familiar ringtone sounded in the video.

It was the call Julian had made to me four years ago.