Chapter 5 - VANESSA’S TRUTH Vanessa called Daniel at 11:32 p.m.
“I need protection.”
Daniel almost laughed.
“You tried to drown my daughter.”
“I know.”
“You expect me to protect you?”
“No.”
Her voice broke.
“I expect you to protect Sophie.”
Daniel became still.
“Where are you?”
Vanessa gave him an address.
Reed arranged the meeting.
Abandoned church.
Police perimeter.
Vanessa arrived alone.
Her blonde hair was disheveled.
No elegant beige dress.
No confidence.
She looked like someone who had finally understood that the people she served considered her disposable.
Daniel stood across the sanctuary.
“Talk.”
Vanessa looked at him.
“I met Rachel two years ago.”
Daniel waited.
“She suspected money was being moved through the foundation. I worked for Thomas.”
“You were spying on her.”
“Yes.”
“And me?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Thomas believed Rachel told you everything.”
“She didn’t.”
“I know that now.”
Daniel stepped closer.
“Why Sophie?”
Vanessa cried.
“Because she remembered something.”
“What?”
“Rachel gave Sophie a phrase.”
Daniel frowned.
“What phrase?”
Vanessa looked toward the floor.
“Bluebird comes home in winter.”
Daniel remembered.
Sophie had said it repeatedly after Rachel disappeared.
He thought it was something from a children’s story.
“What does it mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“You tried to drown her over words you don’t understand?”
“I wasn’t supposed to kill her.”
Daniel’s anger rose.
Vanessa continued quickly.
“I was supposed to scare her until she stopped asking questions.”
“You held her underwater.”
“I lost control.”
“That is not a defense.”
“I know.”
Daniel stared at her.
Vanessa’s tears fell.
“She said Rachel was alive.”
Daniel froze.
“When?”
“At the pool.”
He remembered Sophie calling for him.
But before that?
He hadn’t heard.
Vanessa continued.
“She told me her mother promised to come back when the bluebird came home.”
Daniel whispered:
“Winter.”
Vanessa nodded.
“Thomas believed Rachel gave Sophie information about where she was going.”
Daniel finally understood why Sophie had become a target.
Not because she knew Rachel was alive.
Because criminals believed a seven-year-old possessed the key to finding her.
Vanessa looked at him.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Thomas didn’t order Rachel’s disappearance.”
“Who did?”
Vanessa hesitated.
Daniel’s eyes hardened.
“WHO?”
She whispered a name.
“Eleanor Cole.”
May you like
Daniel stopped breathing.
His mother.
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