Chapter 3 - What Victoria Wanted
Daniel Kim met them at the hotel at 1:20 in the morning.
He arrived carrying a laptop, a leather folder, and the particular expression lawyers wore when they were trying not to alarm their clients before they understood how alarmed they should be.
Lily had finally fallen asleep in the bedroom.
Ethan sat at the dining table with Daniel.
Between them lay the blue notebook.
“What exactly did Victoria ask you?” Ethan said.
Daniel opened his folder.
“She called my office on September seventeenth. She said you were considering consolidating family assets before the wedding.”
“I wasn’t.”
“I told her I couldn’t discuss estate matters with her.”
“Then what?”
“She asked hypothetically whether the Mercer Street townhouse could be sold before Lily turned eighteen.”
Ethan stared.
Claire had inherited the SoHo townhouse from her father.
In her will, she left it to a trust for Lily.
Ethan was trustee, but the property could not be sold merely because he wanted cash. Claire’s trust agreement required any sale outside ordinary administration to be reviewed by an independent trust adviser.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Daniel’s mouth tightened.
“I did.”
Ethan frowned.
“When?”
“I emailed you that afternoon.”
Ethan searched his memory.
Nothing.
Daniel turned the laptop.
“I also copied Victoria because she had initiated the call.”
The message was there.
Subject: Claire Hart Trust — Inquiry.
Ethan’s inbox showed it as read.
He had never seen it.
He searched.
No copy.
Daniel looked at him.
“Check deleted mail.”
Nothing.
“Archived?”
Nothing.
Ethan felt his pulse accelerate.
Victoria knew his password.
She managed invitations from his phone occasionally.
Ordered gifts.
Handled travel.
He had thought intimacy meant nothing in the house required locked doors.
Daniel leaned back.
“There’s more.”
Ethan said nothing.
“Two weeks after that call, someone requested a valuation from Brennan Fine Arts for pieces listed in Claire’s estate inventory.”
“The paintings?”
“Yes.”
Claire had owned six major works inherited from her mother. Four were displayed in the East Seventy-Ninth Street apartment. Two were in climate storage.
“They belong to Lily’s trust too.”
“I know.”
“Who requested it?”
“The form used your email address.”
Ethan felt nauseated.
“I didn’t.”
Daniel studied him.
“Before tonight, I assumed you had.”
Ethan opened his phone.
Search history.
Deleted folders.
Shared documents.
He suddenly noticed how much of his digital life Victoria had touched.
“We need to slow down,” Daniel said. “The fact that Victoria asked questions doesn’t automatically mean criminal conduct. She may have been planning finances badly. She may have overstepped. We need evidence, not conclusions.”
Ethan nodded.
Claire would have said the same thing.
Facts deserved somewhere safe to live.
Daniel photographed every page of Lily’s notebook.
Then they looked at messages.
Victoria’s texts were shifting.
First pleading.
Then defensive.
Then wounded.
By 12:40, she had become accusatory.
I HAVE SPENT A YEAR TRYING TO HELP YOUR DAUGHTER.
YOU KNOW SHE FIXATES ON CLAIRE.
SHE HAS TAKEN THINGS BEFORE.
I PANICKED.
YOU ARE LETTING A CHILD CONTROL OUR MARRIAGE.
The last message read:
ASK LILY WHERE CLAIRE’S RED BOOK IS.
Ethan stared.
Daniel noticed.
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“What red book?”
“I have no idea.”
They heard a sound behind them.
Lily stood in the doorway wearing hotel slippers.
Her hair was tangled.
Her eyes were half closed.
“What red book?” Ethan asked gently.
Lily stared at the phone.
“Victoria asked?”
“Yes.”
Lily stepped into the room.
“Mommy had a red notebook.”
Ethan and Daniel exchanged a look.
“When?”
“Before she got really sick.”
“What was in it?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where did you see it?”
“In her desk.”
Ethan’s mouth went dry.
The same desk Lily said Victoria had searched.
Lily climbed into the chair beside him.
“She used to write numbers in it.”
“What kind of numbers?”
“I don’t know. Big ones.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“Did your mother ever give it to you?”
“No.”
“Did she tell you where she put it?”
Lily shook her head.
Then paused.
“One time she said some things need two homes.”
Ethan looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
“I asked because she was putting papers in envelopes.”
“What did she say?”
Lily closed her eyes, trying to remember.
“She said if truth only lives in one place, somebody can kill it.”
Daniel sat very still.
Claire Hart had been an attorney before Lily was born.
She had served eight years on the board of the Vale-Hart Children’s Arts Foundation.
Victoria’s foundation.
The charity hosting tonight’s gala.
Ethan suddenly remembered something he had not thought about in years.
Claire resigned from that board six months before her cancer diagnosis.
She refused to explain why.
At the time, Ethan had been irritated.
The foundation was important to his family’s public profile.
His mother called Claire dramatic.
Victoria had called her “burned out.”
Ethan had accepted that.
Now a memory surfaced.
Claire standing in their kitchen late one night, holding a red leather ledger.
She had closed it when Ethan entered.
“What’s that?” he had asked.
“Something I hope never matters.”
He had kissed her forehead and forgotten.
Ethan pushed away from the table.
“My wife knew Victoria.”
Daniel’s expression sharpened.
“Of course she did. They were on the board together.”
“No.”
Ethan stood.
“I mean she knew something about her.”
Lily watched him.
Daniel asked, “What are you remembering?”
Ethan crossed to the window.
Manhattan glittered below.
He remembered Claire quitting.
His mother criticizing her.
Victoria arriving with flowers after Claire’s diagnosis.
Victoria speaking beautifully at Claire’s memorial.
Victoria beginning to call him eight months later.
Coffee.
Dinner.
Sympathy.
Then love.
Or what he had believed was love.
He turned around.
“Victoria didn’t come into my life after Claire died.”
Daniel frowned.
“She was already there.”
Lily spoke quietly.
“She didn’t like Mommy.”
Ethan looked at her.
“How do you know?”
“Because Mommy told her to leave once.”
The room became still.
“When?”
Lily swallowed.
“A little before Mommy went to the hospital the last time.”
“What happened?”
“I was upstairs.”
Lily’s eyes drifted toward the floor.
“I heard Victoria yelling.”
“What did she say?”
Lily looked up.
“She said, ‘If you ruin me, I’ll make sure Ethan remembers you as the woman who destroyed his family.’”
Ethan could not move.
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Lily’s next sentence was softer.
“Mommy said, ‘No, Victoria. You’re going to do that yourself.’”
