Chapter 6 - The Woman Who Helped Kill My Father
The blood in Claire Bennett’s motel room did not belong to her.
Laboratory testing identified it as animal blood, likely taken from a butcher shop.
The scene had been staged to terrify us.
Claire might still be alive.
Or whoever took her wanted us to believe she was.
Police found signs of a struggle, but no fingerprints beyond Claire’s and motel staff. Her rental car remained in the parking lot. Her phone lay crushed beneath the bed.
Lucas discovered a second phone taped behind the toilet tank.
It contained one unsent message addressed to me.
Arthur did not act alone. Ask who signed William’s death certificate.
The physician who signed my father’s death certificate was Dr. Samuel Wren.
He had retired nine years earlier.
According to public records, he lived in a coastal town two hours away.
Victoria contacted federal investigators, but they warned us not to approach him without coordination. They wanted surveillance first.
Lucas and I ignored that advice.
Not completely.
We notified the lead agent where we were going, but we did not wait for authorization.
Dr. Wren’s home stood near a marsh, weathered by salt air and surrounded by tall grass. An old pickup truck sat in the driveway.
Lucas knocked.
A thin man with white hair opened the door.
The moment he heard my name, he tried to close it.
Lucas blocked the door with his foot.
“We need five minutes,” he said.
“I have nothing to say.”
“You signed William Mercer’s death certificate,” I said.
Dr. Wren’s face sagged.
“My father was poisoned, wasn’t he?”
“No.”
“You answered too quickly.”
“I treated William for years. His heart was weak.”
“He suspected someone changed his medication.”
The doctor looked past us toward the empty road.
“You should leave.”
“Did Arthur pay you?”
“No.”
“Did Harrison Drake threaten you?”
His silence answered.
Lucas lowered his voice.
“Claire Bennett has disappeared.”
Dr. Wren gripped the doorframe.
“Claire is alive?”
“We don’t know.”
He stepped back and allowed us inside.
The living room smelled of dust and old tobacco. Medical journals covered the table, many unopened.
Dr. Wren poured himself a glass of water, but his hands shook so badly that half spilled onto the counter.
“William called me two days before he died,” he said. “He complained of dizziness, nausea, and an irregular heartbeat. I told him to stop taking the new pills and come to the hospital.”
“Did he?”
“No. Arthur called the next morning and said William felt better.”
“And when my father collapsed?”
“I was brought to the office before the ambulance arrived.”
“Why?”
“Arthur claimed William had a documented heart condition and wanted to avoid an unnecessary investigation.”
“You signed the certificate without an autopsy.”
“I knew his history.”
“You knew he might have taken altered medication.”
Dr. Wren closed his eyes.
“Harrison Drake was in the office when I arrived.”
I felt cold despite the sunlight pouring through the windows.
“He told me William’s death was unfortunate but natural. Then he showed me photographs of my daughter outside her college dormitory.”
Lucas leaned forward.
“He threatened her.”
“Yes.”
“So you lied.”
“I convinced myself an autopsy would not change anything.”
“It would have changed everything for me.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
For twelve years, I had mourned my father as if his body had betrayed him. I had thanked Arthur for holding me together. I had allowed the man responsible for my father’s death to raise my son beneath the roof purchased with my father’s money.
Dr. Wren opened a small safe beneath a bookcase.
Inside was a sealed medical vial.
“I kept one tablet,” he said.
“Why?”
“Cowardice and guilt often live in the same house.”
The tablet had been removed from my father’s prescription bottle the night he died.
Modern testing could determine its composition.
Before we could leave, Lucas’s phone rang.
His expression changed.
“What happened?” I asked.
He listened, then looked at me.
“The apartment building is on lockdown.”
“Ethan?”
“He’s safe. Victoria is with him.”
My knees nearly failed.
“What happened?”
“A package was delivered to the lobby. It contained a photograph of Ethan sleeping.”
The image had been taken the previous night.
Inside the secured building.
Someone had been close enough to enter his room.
Lucas called the security director and demanded employee records, access logs, and surveillance footage.
Every camera on the residential floor had gone offline for eleven minutes at 2:14 a.m.
One security badge entered the floor during that period.
The badge belonged to a guard named Daniel Reece.
He had not reported for work that morning.
Police found his apartment empty.
On the drive back, I watched the road behind us.
“We cannot keep moving Ethan from place to place,” I said.
“We need somewhere outside Arthur’s network.”
“My mother has a farm in Vermont.”
“Does Arthur know about it?”
“Yes.”
“Then no.”
“There’s another place.”
My father had owned a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains under his mother’s maiden name. After his death, the property passed to me, but Arthur never visited it. He disliked anything remote, old, or unprofitable.
Only three people knew I still owned it.
My mother.
Victoria.
And me.
We relocated Ethan that evening using two vehicles and a false route.
The cabin stood at the end of an unmarked road surrounded by forest. It had no internet connection, limited cellular service, and a wood stove that filled the main room with the smell of cedar.
Ethan loved it immediately.
He explored the loft, found my childhood board games, and asked whether we could stay forever.
“Not forever,” I said.
“Until Dad stops being bad?”
I did not know how to answer.
Lucas installed motion sensors around the property.
Victoria remained in the city to manage the case. Federal agents took possession of Dr. Wren’s tablet and promised expedited testing.
That night, Ethan slept upstairs while Lucas and I sat near the fire.
“You never talk about your family,” I said.
“There isn’t much to say.”
“Everyone has something to say.”
He stared into the flames.
“My younger brother worked for a contractor connected to Drake. He discovered false safety inspections. Three days later, he fell from a scaffold.”
“The case you mentioned.”
Lucas nodded.
“They called it an accident.”
“You didn’t believe them.”
“I proved it wasn’t one, but the witness disappeared before trial.”
“So this is personal for you.”
“Yes.”
“Is that why Victoria hired you?”
“She hired me because I know Drake’s network.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
He looked at me.
“Yes. That is why I accepted.”
The honesty mattered.
Before I could respond, a motion sensor beeped.
Lucas extinguished the lamp.
A shape moved between the trees.
Then another.
Two people approached the cabin from opposite directions.
Lucas handed me a phone.
“Take Ethan into the storm cellar.”
“What about you?”
“Go.”
I ran upstairs, lifted my sleeping son, and carried him toward the cellar entrance beneath the kitchen floor.
A knock sounded at the front door.
Three slow strikes.
Lucas raised his weapon.
“Who is it?”
A woman answered.
“Teresa, it’s Claire.”
I froze.
“Please,” she cried. “They’re hunting me.”
Lucas opened the door only a few inches.
Claire Bennett stood outside, bruised and bleeding, her clothing torn.
Then the second figure emerged behind her.
Arthur raised both hands.
“Don’t shoot,” he said.
May you like
Blood covered the front of his shirt.
“They’re coming for all of us.”
