Chapter 9 - THE MISSING WOMAN
Selene disappeared at 8:53 p.m.
Her attorney had spoken to her eleven minutes earlier.
A security driver was supposed to take her from a temporary apartment to another location.
She never came downstairs.
The apartment was empty.
One rear window was open.
Her phone sat on the kitchen counter.
At first, everyone assumed Julian had taken her.
I didn't.
“Check her laptop.”
David looked at me.
“What for?”
“Travel.”
“She surrendered the laptop.”
“Then check her old search history.”
Within twenty minutes, they found it.
Mexico City.
Lisbon.
Buenos Aires.
Private charter companies.
Countries with complicated extradition procedures.
Dad looked at me.
“You think she ran.”
“I think Selene always chooses herself.”
I wasn't angry about it.
I almost respected the consistency.
Then investigators found blood on the rear stairwell.
Not much.
But enough to change the assumptions again.
Security footage from a neighboring building showed a dark SUV entering the alley behind Selene's apartment.
Its plates were obscured.
Two men entered through the service door.
Nine minutes later, they left carrying something that could not be clearly identified.
I felt sick.
Julian might have been cruel.
But hiring men to abduct someone?
I didn't know.
That was the problem.
I no longer knew where his limits were.
At midnight, my phone rang.
I expected David.
Instead, I heard Julian.
“You ruined everything.”
His voice was ragged.
“Where is Selene?”
He laughed.
“So now you care about her?”
“Where is she?”
“I don't know.”
“Don't lie to me.”
“Listen to yourself.”
His voice rose.
“You sound like your father.”
“Good.”
Silence.
Then something softer.
“You really hate me now.”
I stared into the dark window.
“I don't know what I feel.”
“I loved you.”
“No.”
“I did.”
“You investigated me before you proposed.”
Another silence.
That one lasted longer.
“Who showed you?”
“So it's true.”
“Elena.”
“Why did you approach me?”
He exhaled.
“At first?”
My heart started beating harder.
“Yes.”
“At first, I wanted information.”
The words should have crushed me.
Instead they confirmed what I already feared.
“About my mother?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because my father left a letter.”
Richard Vale had written Julian a letter shortly before his death.
It warned that Catherine Marlowe had discovered transactions capable of destroying the Vale family.
It instructed Julian to locate any remaining records.
Then it mentioned Catherine's daughter.
Me.
Julian found me.
He learned almost nothing useful.
Then, according to him, something changed.
“I fell in love with you.”
I closed my eyes.
“How convenient.”
“It wasn't.”
“You married the woman you were investigating.”
“I stopped investigating you.”
“When?”
He didn't answer.
“Before or after you forged my signature?”
“Elena.”
“Before or after you set up a company to frame me?”
“That wasn't supposed to happen.”
I almost laughed.
“You designed it.”
“I was trying to protect Vale.”
“From whom?”
“Everyone.”
“Including me.”
“You don't understand what it was like growing up under my father.”
There it was again.
Explanation as absolution.
Richard had controlled Julian.
Humiliated him.
Tested him.
Taught him that vulnerability was weakness.
Maybe all of it was true.
It still did not make Julian innocent.
Pain can explain a person.
It does not excuse what they choose to become.
“Where are you?”
I asked.
“Does it matter?”
“If you didn't take Selene, someone did.”
He became quiet.
Then whispered, “Crane.”
I frowned.
“Who?”
“Marcus Crane.”
The name was familiar.
Vale Industries' chief financial officer.
He had been placed on administrative leave that morning.
“What does Crane have to do with Selene?”
“Everything.”
Julian's breathing became uneven.
“Sable wasn't my idea.”
I felt my stomach tighten.
“You signed the transfers.”
“Yes.”
“You forged my name.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“Crane built the structure.”
“Why?”
“To move money.”
“Where?”
“I didn't know at first.”
“Julian.”
“I swear.”
The desperation in his voice sounded real.
“Crane told me we were hiding reserves from activist investors.”
“Then I found out he was moving pension assets too.”
My mother's investigation flashed through my mind.
“Like your father.”
“Yes.”
“Did you stop him?”
“No.”
Of course not.
“Why?”
“Because by then I was already implicated.”
“And you needed someone to blame.”
He said nothing.
Me.
I was the insurance policy.
I asked, “Why would Crane take Selene?”
“Because she has the ledger.”
“She surrendered it.”
“No.”
My heart skipped.
“What?”
“The case she gave you contained copies.”
“She kept the original.”
I stood.
“How do you know?”
“Because I gave it to her.”
The entire room seemed to narrow around me.
“Why?”
“I needed one person outside Vale to have leverage on Crane.”
“Your mistress.”
“Yes.”
“Brilliant choice.”
“I didn't know she was recording me.”
“No.”
“You only knew she was helping you destroy your wife.”
“Elena.”
“Where is Crane?”
“I don't know.”
“Then why call me?”
His voice dropped.
“Because Crane doesn't just have Selene.”
A sound came through the phone.
A door closing.
May you like
Then Julian whispered the one thing that made every nerve in my body go cold.
“He has the original report about your mother's accident.”
