Chapter 3 - THE VOICE FROM THE DEAD
Robert found a laptop in the study and placed it on the dining-room table.
Grace sat beside Katherine while Caleb remained on the opposite side of the room. He kept his distance, but his eyes never left the silver flash drive.
No one mentioned Frank.
Not yet.
Robert inserted the drive.
Several folders appeared on the screen.
Original Dunmore Reports.
Executive Correspondence.
Insurance Records.
Then one file named:
BEATRICE — 11:42 P.M.
Katherine gripped Grace’s hand.
“I’ve only listened to it once,” she whispered.
Robert clicked the file.
Static filled the room.
Then a woman’s breathless voice emerged from the speakers.
“Katherine, it’s Beatrice. I found the altered load calculations. You were right. The east platform cannot carry the concrete delivery scheduled for tomorrow.”
Caleb’s face lost all color.
The recording continued.
“I tried to call Victor, but he told me to stop asking questions. Frank was with him. They said delays would cost the company millions.”
Grace slowly turned toward the empty chair where Frank had eaten wedding cake only hours earlier.
Beatrice’s voice became quieter.
“I copied the original files. If anything happens to me, do not trust the report in the official system. Someone changed it.”
A loud metallic sound echoed in the background.
Beatrice gasped.
“They’re here.”
The recording ended.
Caleb did not move.
Robert played it again.
The second time, Grace watched her son.
Every trace of anger disappeared from his face. What remained was horror.
“Frank was there,” Caleb whispered.
Katherine pulled her hand away from Grace’s and stood.
“I warned Beatrice not to go to the site alone. She believed she could photograph the damaged supports before the morning crew arrived.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police?” Caleb demanded.
“I did.”
“And?”
“The detective said the recording wasn’t enough to prove sabotage. The company claimed Beatrice had been confused because she was under pressure.”
“You had the original report.”
“I had a digital copy. The company accused me of fabricating it after the collapse.”
Caleb shook his head.
“No. There was an investigation.”
“There was an investigation controlled by people who had millions of dollars to lose.”
Katherine opened another folder.
On the screen appeared a termination letter.
Her termination letter.
She had been dismissed three days after Beatrice’s death for alleged document tampering and professional misconduct.
“I lost my career,” Katherine said. “Every engineering firm in Virginia refused to hire me. I changed fields, changed cities, and stopped telling people what I used to do.”
Grace looked at her.
“Why did you never tell Caleb?”
“Because when we met, he told me Beatrice had been his closest friend. He spoke about her like she was the best person he had ever known.”
Katherine’s eyes filled with tears.
“I was afraid that if I told him my name was connected to the collapse, he would never believe me.”
“You should have trusted me,” Caleb said.
Katherine stared at him.
“You married me to punish me, Caleb. Tell me again why I should have trusted you.”
He looked as if she had struck him.
Robert stepped between them.
“This is not the time.”
“It will never be the time,” Katherine replied. “There is nothing he can say that will make last night disappear.”
Grace stood beside her.
“No one is asking you to forgive him.”
Caleb’s head snapped up.
“Mom—”
“No.”
Grace faced her son.
“You will listen now. You brought a frightened woman into this family under false promises. You used marriage as a weapon. Whether you touched her or not, you trapped her in that room and made her believe she was in danger.”
Caleb lowered his eyes.
Grace continued.
“If you are truly sorry, you will stop defending yourself.”
A phone began vibrating on the table.
It was Frank’s.
He must have left it behind while fleeing.
Robert picked it up.
The screen showed seven missed calls from someone saved only as V.H.
Then a new message appeared.
YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO DESTROY THE DRIVE BEFORE THE WEDDING.
A second message followed.
IF THE GIRL TALKS, WE ALL GO DOWN.
Caleb stepped closer.
“V.H.,” he whispered. “Victor Hale.”
Victor Hale was the regional director of the construction company where Caleb worked.
He had also been Caleb’s mentor for six years.
Katherine opened another file on the drive.
A photograph appeared.
Victor and Frank stood beside the Dunmore construction site on the night of the collapse.
Between them was Beatrice.
She was alive.
The timestamp showed the photograph had been taken nineteen minutes after the time listed on her official death certificate.
Caleb stared at the image.
“That’s impossible.”
Katherine zoomed in.
Behind Beatrice stood a black vehicle.
Its rear door was open.
“Her body was never recovered,” Katherine said.
Grace remembered the news reports. Investigators had claimed Beatrice had fallen into the river beneath the collapsed platform.
Katherine looked at Caleb.
“I don’t believe Beatrice died that night.”
Caleb’s knees nearly gave way.
“Then where is she?”
A loud knock struck the front door.
Everyone froze.
Three more knocks followed.
Robert moved toward the hallway, but Katherine stopped him.
Through the narrow window beside the door, Grace saw a woman wearing a dark coat and a yellow scarf.
The same yellow scarf from Caleb’s photograph.
Grace opened the door.
The woman looked older, thinner, and terrified.
May you like
But she was unmistakably alive.
“Caleb,” Beatrice said, staring past Grace. “You married the wrong woman to get revenge.”
