Chapter 9 – THE DETECTIVE IN THE DARK
Detective Miller stepped into the light of the fireplace. His hair was gray now, his trench coat worn, but his eyes held the same cold detachment I remembered from when I was a grieving child.
“What are you doing in my house?” I demanded, my heart hammering against my ribs.
Miller chuckled, pointing to the train ticket in my shaking hand. “Just tying up loose ends, Miss Morgan. I thought you might want to know why your father supposedly bought a ticket to run away the night his car went off the bridge.”
“He didn’t run away,” I said fiercely. “He loved us.”
“You’re right,” Miller nodded slowly. “He didn’t run. I bought that ticket. I planted the evidence to make it look like a suicide so the insurance company wouldn’t pay out your family.”
A sickening wave of nausea washed over me. “Why?”
“Because Adrian’s father paid me to,” Miller said flatly. “And now, I need the new head of the Valenti family to pay me for my continued silence.”
I took a step back. “Adrian would never pay you. He’s not his father.”
“I know,” Miller smiled, pulling a revolver from his coat. “That’s why I’m not here for him. I’m here for you, Claire. You own the deed now.”
He aimed the gun directly at my chest.
“Sign the trust over to me, or I finish the job I started on your family twenty years ago.”
I looked at the heavy brass fireplace poker sitting on the hearth, calculating the distance.
But before I could move, a small voice echoed from the doorway.
“Put that down.”
Miller spun around.
Standing in the doorway was seven-year-old Toby. And in his small hands, he was holding Adrian’s heavy, loaded pistol, aiming it directly at the detective.
“Toby, no!” I screamed.
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