Chương 5
Criminal defense.
Not scandal.
Not family drama.
Crime.
Anna swallowed.
“Is she arrested?”
“I can’t answer that with certainty.”
“You’re downstairs.”
“That does not make me omniscient.”
Anna almost smiled.
Elena continued.
“I can tell you something that is not privileged because it concerns your safety. Alexander has instructed hotel security to preserve every available recording from the property and turn requested material over through proper channels. He has also instructed them not to contact witnesses about what they saw.”
Anna said nothing.
“He is aware,” Elena added, “that doing the right thing after the fact does not erase what happened.”
That sentence irritated Anna because it sounded exactly right.
“Tell him I don’t want his help.”
“I can tell him that.”
“And tell him not to talk about me publicly.”
“I already did.”
Anna blinked.
“Why?”
“Because you are not a press strategy.”
For the first time since the ballroom, Anna felt some small part of her body unclench.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Three hours later, Anna left through a side entrance in borrowed clothes.
There were cameras at the main entrance.
Two at the emergency room exit.
One man with a long lens standing beside a hot-dog cart.
Alexander’s security team had offered a car.
Anna refused.
Then she saw the cameras and changed her mind.
The driver took her and Priya to a hotel in Brooklyn booked under Elena’s name. Alexander paid for it, which Anna discovered only after arguing with the desk clerk for ten minutes.
She called Elena from the elevator.
“I said I didn’t want his help.”
“You said you did not want his help. You also said you did not feel safe going home.”
“That doesn’t mean he gets to decide.”
“You’re right.”
There was no defense.
That made Anna angrier.
“I’ll repay him.”
“I’ll document that.”
“You’re very annoying.”
“I bill accordingly.”
Anna ended the call before she laughed.
The room had two beds, beige curtains, a desk, and a framed photograph of the Brooklyn Bridge that looked as though it had been selected by an algorithm designed never to offend anyone.
Priya put down the overnight bag.
“This is nicer than our apartment.”
“Our apartment has personality.”
“Our apartment has a radiator that screams.”
“That’s personality.”
Anna sat carefully on the edge of the bed.
Then she remembered the original letter.
She stood again.
“Oh, God.”
“What?”
“The cashbox.”
Priya’s face changed.
“Under your bed?”
“Yes.”
“We should go get it.”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Anna thought of the address spreading online.
She thought of Victoria knowing where Margaret had lived.
Of the email leak from Alexander’s office.
“No one.”
Priya folded her arms.
“That document is the only reason any of this happened.”
“I know.”
“And it’s sitting under a bed beside your winter boots.”
“I know.”
They stared at each other.
Priya sighed.
“I hate rich people.”
“You were just excited about their hotel room.”
“I contain multitudes.”
Anna called Detective Lopez.
He told her not to retrieve the document herself if she believed anyone might be watching the apartment.
“Can you get it?”
“If it’s relevant evidence, we can discuss that. But I need you to be clear about what you’re asking us to take and why.”
“It’s the letter Victoria stole a copy of.”
“The original?”
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
Anna told him.
He was quiet for a moment.
“You keep important documents under your bed?”
“My mother did.”
“Fair enough.”
The police collected the cashbox that afternoon with Anna’s written consent.
Nothing about it was dramatic.
Two officers met Priya’s cousin at the apartment because he had the spare key. They photographed the box in place, opened it after Anna described the contents, documented the lab report, and placed it into evidence.
The process took hours.
Anna spent those hours eating crackers and watching cable news discuss her life.
She turned the television off after a man who had never met her said she appeared “emotionally calculated” in the ballroom video.
Priya took the remote.
“You’re banned.”
“From what?”
“News.”
“I need to know what they’re saying.”
“No, you need to know what the police and your lawyer say. You do not need Kevin in Connecticut deciding your facial expression was suspicious.”
“Who is Kevin?”
“I made him up.”
“He sounds real.”
“All Kevins in Connecticut are real.”
Anna lay back carefully.
Her phone rang.
Unknown number.
She almost ignored it.
Then answered.
“Hello?”
A woman said, “Is this Anna Mercer?”
“Who’s asking?”
“My name is Claire Hale.”
Anna sat up.
The movement pulled at her back.
“I’m Alexander’s aunt.”
Anna knew the name.
Claire Hale Bennett, Nathan Hale’s younger sister. Sixty-four. Pediatrician. The one member of the family Anna had almost never seen at hotel functions.
“I don’t think we should talk.”
“That is probably wise.”
Anna waited.
Claire breathed into the phone.
“I saw the video.”
“I’m sorry.”
The apology came automatically, an old service-worker reflex.
Anna hated it.
Claire said, “Why are you apologizing to me?”
“I don’t know.”
“Good. Stop.”
Her voice was low, practical.
Not warm.
Not unfriendly.
“I’m calling because I saw the photograph of your mother online.”
Anna’s fingers tightened around the phone.
“And?”
“I knew Margaret.”
The room seemed to narrow.
Priya looked up from the other bed.
Anna stood and walked into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.
“How?”
“She worked for my brother.”
“What does that mean?”
“She was a junior accountant at Hale Properties. Before the hotels. Before any of this became what it became.”
“When?”
“Nineteen ninety-seven through two thousand.”
Anna sat on the closed toilet lid.
“My mother told me she worked for a real-estate company.”
“She did.”
“She never said which one.”
“I’m not surprised.”
“Why?”
Claire was quiet.
Anna pressed the phone closer.
“Why?”
“Because my brother paid her to leave.”
Anna’s mouth went dry.
“How much?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know or you don’t want to tell me?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you know about me?”
May you like
Another silence.
This one answered.
