Chapter 18 - The Fire
Police moved immediately.
Emily watched firefighters break the front windows while officers entered through the garage.
The model home filled with black smoke in minutes.
She didn't know who.
Then Henry appeared.
An officer carried him out through the front door, wrapped in a blanket, oxygen mask over his face.
Emily ran to him.
"Henry!"
His eyes opened.
"Paul?" he rasped.
A second team emerged with Paul in handcuffs.
The detective approached Emily later while paramedics examined Henry.
"We recorded the call. His statement about your father's boat is preserved."
"He said Daniel knew."
"We'll pursue it."
As if summoned by the words, Daniel's SUV appeared at the roadblock.
He got out shouting that his father was inside.
An officer stopped him.
Emily walked toward him.
Daniel saw her face and knew.
"What did Paul say?"
"You tell me."
"Emily—"
"Did you know what he did to my father's boat?"
Daniel's eyes flicked toward Paul.
That was answer enough.
"I was nineteen," he said quietly.
Emily stared at him.
"You knew."
"Afterward. Not before."
"And you said nothing for fourteen years."
"My mother said Paul made a mistake. She said telling anyone would destroy all of us."
"So you protected them."
"I was a kid."
"And when you were thirty? When you tracked me down? When you married me? When you forged my signature? Were you still a kid?"
Daniel's face twisted. "I did love you."
"You studied me before you met me."
"At first. Then it became real."
"Real people don't turn their wives into evidence disposal."
He stepped closer. "I can fix this."
"You already had four years."
Federal agents approached from behind him.
Daniel saw them and backed away.
"Emily, please."
She felt no satisfaction.
Only clarity.
"You told me your mother was teaching me to be a better wife."
Daniel closed his eyes.
"She did," Emily said. "She taught me exactly what kind of wife I refuse to be."
The agents took him by the arms.
As they led him away, Henry called weakly from the ambulance.
Emily turned.
He held out a smoke-stained envelope.
"Paul had this," he said. "He was going to burn it."
Emily opened it.
Inside was a signed confession.
May you like
But the signature at the bottom was not Paul's.
It was Gloria's.
