Chapter 2 - The Husband’s Mistake
The silence in the DeLuca living room was absolute. It wasn’t the quiet of a paused conversation. It was the breathless, suffocating silence of a room where all the oxygen had just been ignited. Vincent didn’t blink. He didn’t shout. He simply looked at the man in the gray overcoat, and then he looked at the woman who was wearing a four-carat diamond ring on her left hand. “Your husband,” Vincent repeated. His voice was lower now, dangerously calm. Caroline’s face lost all its color. “Vincent, please,” she said, her voice shaking. “He’s my ex-husband. We’ve been separated for three years. He’s unwell. He’s prone to delusions.” Mark frowned, stepping further into the room. “Delusions?” Mark asked, looking confused and slightly offended. “Caroline, we had breakfast this morning. You told me you got a consulting job for the DeLuca family and needed me to transport an elderly client to our new apartment.” Caroline stepped toward him, her hands raised in a frantic, placating gesture. “Mark, stop talking. You’re having an episode.” Vincent raised a single hand. Caroline froze. “You bought an apartment?” Vincent asked Mark. “Closed on it yesterday,” Mark said, pulling a folded piece of heavy blue paper from his inside coat pocket. “Caroline wired the down payment on Tuesday. I have the deed right here.” Tuesday. The day Caroline had asked my agency to change my shifts. The day she had told Helen she needed to leave. Vincent took the blue paper from Mark’s hand. He opened it. I watched Vincent’s dark eyes scan the page. The muscles in his jaw tightened so fiercely I thought his teeth might shatter. “Three million dollars,” Vincent read aloud. “Paid in cash. From an offshore LLC.” He looked up at Caroline. “The exact amount that went missing from our family’s charitable foundation on Monday.” The relatives in the room began to murmur. Vincent’s aunt covered her mouth. Caroline backed away, her composure entirely shattered. “Vincent, I can explain. It’s a bridge loan. My family was in trouble.” “You told me your family was dead,” Vincent said. “They are!” “Then who is Mark?” Before Caroline could answer, Helen wheeled her chair forward. Her hands were shaking, but her eyes were fixed sharply on Mark’s left wrist. As Mark had handed over the deed, his sleeve had ridden up, revealing a heavy, scratched gold watch. “Where did you get that watch?” Helen asked. Her voice cracked, a sound of pure, unadulterated shock. Mark looked down at his wrist. “It was a gift from Caroline,” he said. “For our anniversary last month.” Helen looked up at Vincent, tears suddenly spilling over her wrinkled cheeks. “Vincent,” she whispered. “That’s your father’s watch. The one he was wearing the night he died.”
