Chapter 2 - The Name Her Mother FearedLily Bennett had barely taken off her coat when Claire asked the question that made their mother drop a kitchen knife.
“Mom, did Dad ever know a man named Vale?”
The knife struck the tile with a sharp metallic crack.
Margaret stood motionless beside the counter.
For a moment, even the bubbling stew seemed unusually loud.
“Why would you ask that?” Margaret whispered.
Claire looked from her mother to her sister.
“Because I treated a patient last night. His last name was Vale.”
Margaret's face lost its color.
Lily bent to retrieve the knife, but Claire stopped her.
“Leave it.”
“Claire, you're scaring me.”
Their mother gripped the edge of the counter.
“Was he injured?”
Claire felt something cold settle in her stomach.
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“His shoulder.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
Claire took one step closer.
“Mom. Who is he?”
Instead of answering, Margaret turned off the stove.
“Lily, go upstairs.”
“I'm twenty-two.”
“Please.”
Something in their mother's voice ended the argument. Lily picked up her backpack and disappeared into the hallway, although Claire knew perfectly well she would listen from the stairs.
Margaret waited until the footsteps stopped.
Then she said, “Your father made me promise never to speak that name again.”
Claire stared at her.
“For eight years, you told me Dad died because of faulty wiring.”
“That's what the fire report said.”
“That's not what I asked.”
Margaret lowered herself into a chair.
Her hands were trembling.
“Your father was an accountant, Claire. Not a criminal. Not a detective. He worked for a private investment company downtown.”
“I know.”
“What you don't know is that his employer was owned by the Vale family.”
Claire felt her heartbeat accelerate.
“Which Vale?”
“Adrian Vale.”
The name meant nothing to her yet.
Margaret continued.
“Adrian was the father. He controlled warehouses, shipping contracts, real estate. Some of it was legitimate. Some wasn't. Your father discovered money moving through companies that shouldn't have existed.”
“Money laundering?”
“Worse.”
Margaret looked toward the stairs.
“He found payments connected to missing witnesses. Judges. Police officers. People who had disappeared after agreeing to testify.”
Claire pulled out a chair.
“Did he tell the police?”
“He tried.”
“What happened?”
“He came home terrified.”
Margaret's eyes filled.
“Three days before the fire, your father told me that if anything happened to him, I was supposed to take you girls and leave Chicago.”
Claire remembered that week.
Her father had replaced the locks.
He had stopped letting Lily ride her bicycle outside.
He had sat awake at the kitchen table until dawn.
She had thought he was worried about money.
“Why didn't you tell us?”
“Because someone called after the funeral.”
“Who?”
“A man who knew what pajamas Lily was wearing.”
Claire went completely still.
Margaret wiped her cheeks.
“He said your father had made a terrible mistake. He said the mistake would end with him as long as I kept quiet.”
For eight years, Claire had believed her mother was too broken by grief to discuss the fire.
Now she understood.
Margaret had been protecting them.
Or trying to.
“Did you see the man who came to our house?” Claire asked.
“No.”
“Did Dad ever mention a son?”
Margaret hesitated.
“Adrian had two sons. One died young, I think. The other…”
She stopped.
“The other what?”
“He was supposed to inherit everything.”
Claire searched the name on her phone.
The first photograph appeared almost immediately.
A man in a charcoal suit stood outside a federal courthouse, surrounded by reporters.
Dark hair.
Gray eyes.
An expression that gave nothing away.
Sebastian Vale, 36. Chicago shipping executive. Alleged organized-crime figure. Never convicted.
Claire turned the screen toward her mother.
Margaret made a strangled sound.
“That's him.”
“You've seen him before?”
“Once. At your father's office Christmas party.”
Claire swallowed.
“Did he have a scar?”
“I don't know.”
Margaret reached across the table and seized her wrist.
“Listen to me. Whatever you think you saw, stay away from that man.”
Claire thought of Sebastian's eyes following her name badge.
“He recognized me.”
Margaret's grip tightened.
“Then he already knows.”
“Knows what?”
“That you're Robert Bennett's daughter.”
A floorboard creaked.
Both women looked toward the staircase.
Lily stood halfway down, her face pale.
“Dad wasn't killed by an electrical fire?”
Margaret began to cry.
Claire rose to comfort her sister, but Lily backed away.
“You let me believe that for eight years?”
“Sweetheart—”
“Eight years!”
Lily grabbed her coat.
Claire followed her outside into the snow.
“Lily, wait.”
Her sister stopped beside the car.
“I was fourteen,” Lily said. “I thought Dad died because I left my bedroom lamp on.”
Claire's chest tightened.
“What?”
“The investigators asked about the outlets. I thought…” Lily shook her head. “I thought maybe it was my fault.”
Claire pulled her into her arms.
“No. Absolutely not.”
Lily began crying against her shoulder.
For several minutes, neither spoke.
Then Lily whispered, “What are you going to do?”
Claire looked toward the gray Chicago sky.
“Find out what happened.”
Her phone vibrated.
An unknown number.
She answered.
“Claire Bennett?”
A man's voice.
Calm.
Professional.
“Yes?”
“This is Daniel Mercer. I'm calling on behalf of Sebastian Vale.”
Claire recognized the broad-shouldered visitor from the hospital.
“What does he want?”
“Mr. Vale would like to speak with you.”
“Tell him he can speak to the police.”
A pause.
Then Mercer said something that turned her blood cold.
“He says you should ask your mother what was inside the blue music box.”
Claire looked toward the house.
Her mother was standing in the kitchen window.
Watching.
Claire had never told anyone about the blue music box.
May you like
It had belonged to her father.
And it had disappeared the night he died.
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