Chapter 8 - The Family Secret
The room fell dead silent.
“My brother?” Claire whispered, her voice barely a breath. “Arthur was behind this?”
Detective Miller pulled up Arthur Vance’s financial profile on his tablet. His face went pale as he scrolled through the encrypted transaction logs.
“The Parker Family Trust,” Miller read aloud, his voice dropping into a dangerous register. “Fifty million dollars. Left to Claire and Ethan after Ethan’s biological father passed away five years ago. But there was a clause…”
“If I die without a living spouse,” Claire realized, her hand trembling violently against the bedsheets, “the management of the trust reverts entirely to the eldest living sibling. To Arthur.”
“Richard was deeply in debt to offshore gambling syndicates,” Miller continued, connecting the pieces of the twisted puzzle. “Arthur paid off Richard’s debts, and in exchange, Richard agreed to facilitate the ‘accidental’ death of Claire. They split the fifty million down the middle.”
Ethan felt a cold pit drop into his stomach.
Arthur—his uncle—the man who had held Ethan’s hand in the front row of the funeral, whispering words of comfort while Ethan’s mother was suffocating inside a wooden box five feet away.
“Where is Arthur now?” Miller barked into his shoulder radio, turning toward the door.
“Unit 4 reports Arthur Vance left the funeral home during the commotion,” the dispatcher replied over the crackling radio. “His vehicle tracker shows him heading west toward the private airfield in Crestview.”
“He’s getting on a plane,” Claire said, trying to push herself out of the hospital bed. “Miller, you can't let him leave!”
“Stay in bed, Claire,” Miller ordered, pulling his jacket back on. “He isn't getting out of state. I’m calling state troopers to lock down the airfield.”
“Wait!” Ethan called out, reaching into his pocket.
He pulled out a heavy, brass key on a leather lanyard—the key he had snatched from Richard’s pocket during the struggle in the mortuary basement.
“This was on Richard’s keyring,” Ethan said, holding it out to Miller. “It has a crest on it. A crown and an anchor.”
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Miller took the key, examining the crest under the fluorescent light. “That’s the logo for the Crestview Private Hangar 4. That’s not a car key. That’s the key to a private security safe.”
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