Chapter 4

The police found the original file of that old video.

It wasn't some technological miracle.

A suspect's cloud files had been seized in another case.

The full version was 19 minutes long.

Ethan had only ever seen the first 30 seconds.

In the full footage, my wrists were tied.

There was blood at the corner of my mouth.

Someone off camera kept threatening me.

The so-called lover was just one of their own, forced into the shot.

The whole point was to fabricate evidence of an affair that my husband would find convincing.

Caleb couldn't stand to watch it.

He switched off the screen partway through.

But Ethan wouldn't let it go.

"Keep going."

No one listened to him.

He turned it back on himself.

He watched it from beginning to end.

Then he ran into the bathroom and threw up.

When he came out, he looked years older.

"Why didn't she tell me?"

Caleb looked at him.

"How was she supposed to tell you?

"You never even went looking for her."

Ethan braced himself against the wall.

"Back then, I—"

"Back then, what?

"Back then, you slept with Olivia, didn't you?"

Ethan looked up.

That was when I learned the answer too.

He didn't deny it.

Caleb punched him.

Ethan hit the floor.

"And you've got the fucking nerve to say she betrayed you?"

It was the first time my brother had ever hit anyone for me.

But it didn't make me feel one bit better.

Four years ago, I'd needed him to believe me.

Now I didn't.

When my parents got to the station, my mother, Laura Hart, could barely walk.

She kept saying the same thing over and over. "How can it be Mara?"

My father, Robert Hart, asked Caleb, "Could there be some mistake?"

Caleb pushed the DNA report across the table.

"There's no mistake."

My mother pressed a hand over her mouth.

"But back then she—"

"She didn't run."

Caleb cut her off.

"She was dead.

"She was already dead before you ever announced you were cutting her off."

My father sat down.

For the first time, that stern, self-righteous look was gone from his face.

When I came in second in my class as a kid, they asked why I wasn't first.

When I gave up grad school to start a business with Ethan, they said I was throwing my life away.

After I disappeared, they never even stopped to ask themselves one question.

"She's eight months pregnant. Would she really just run off with someone?"

They never asked because the story fit what they'd always thought of me.

Rebellious.

Immature.

Bound to get burned someday.

So when it happened, they believed it faster than anyone.

See?

Sure enough, she'd ruined her own life.

Caleb's voice was low. "None of us reported her missing."

My mother finally began to sob.

I stood off to the side.

It didn't feel nearly as satisfying as I'd once imagined.

I just felt tired.

Olivia was formally questioned for the first time, but they didn't arrest her right away.

The police didn't have enough evidence yet.

She sat in the interview room.

Still calm.

"Lots of people had access to the spare computer.

"Ethan gave me the necklace.

"As for Mara, I honestly thought she ran off back then."

A detective took out a photo of the pendant.

"Recognize this?"

Her expression flickered.

It was the rose pendant missing from my necklace.

A few months earlier, Ethan had a jeweler attach it to her necklace.

She'd claimed she'd bought it secondhand from an auction house.

The police traced the sale.

The seller was a small jewelry shop.

The owner admitted that four years ago, someone had brought in several pieces of jewelry to sell for cash.

This pendant was one of the pieces.

The person who brought it in was a nurse from the illegal clinic.

The evidence was starting to come together.

When Olivia left the station, Ethan was standing in the hallway.

She rushed over to him.

"You believe me, right?"

Before, Ethan would have pulled her into his arms.

Not this time.

He only asked, "That five million. Did you move it?"

Tears spilled down her face.

"You suspect me too?"

"Answer the question."

"No."

"What about the video?"

"Someone else sent it to me. That's all."

"Then how did Mara's pendant end up with you?"

Olivia finally snapped.

"What's that supposed to mean?

"She's been dead for four years!

"And now you come down here to interrogate me over a dead woman?"

Ethan went completely white.

"Yes.

"She's been dead for four years.

"But I waited until today to ask."