Chapter 7 — A Dead Woman’s Signature

The SUV struck us before Tessa reached the intersection.

My shoulder slammed against the door. The Ford lurched sideways, tires scraping the curb, and Tessa dragged the wheel back with both hands.

“Stay on the road,” I said.

“I’m trying.”

In the mirror, the SUV’s headlights filled the space where our rear window had been.

Knox was still in my ear.

“Police are approaching from the east. Take the next right.”

I looked at the street ahead.

“Next right,” I told Tessa.

She turned hard enough to throw broken glass across the back seat.

The SUV followed.

A second pair of headlights appeared beyond the intersection. For a moment, I thought they belonged to another car coming to finish the job.

Then red and blue lights came on.

The SUV braked.

Tessa kept going.

Two patrol cars passed us, and the pursuing vehicle swerved down a side street. One cruiser followed it. The other turned across the road behind us.

“Pull over,” I said.

Tessa stopped beneath a streetlamp.

Her hands remained fixed to the wheel.

I put my palms where the approaching officers could see them.

A voice shouted through the open window.

“Both of you, keep your hands visible.”

“We’re the people who called,” I said.

“We’ll establish that. Don’t move.”

For once, I did exactly as I was told.

An officer opened my door. Another checked Tessa.

Knox arrived a few minutes later and explained what he had reported. My men remained farther down the road, where I could see their car behind a police vehicle.

Nobody had been shot.

The Ford had three holes in its body and no rear window.

Tessa stared at the damage as though she had only just understood how close those bullets had come.

I called Daniel.

“I need you at the station.”

“What happened?”

“Someone tried to kill us.”

“Where are you?”

I gave him the location.

Then I called the men watching Joanna’s house.

No answer.

I tried the second number.

Nothing.

Knox saw my face change.

“Both?”

I nodded.

He stepped away to make his own calls.

I asked the nearest officer to send someone to the address.

“There’s a child there. She may be connected to this.”

He took the details, called them in, and asked me to repeat the name.

“Piper Brennan,” I said. “Seven years old.”

At the station, I handed over the silver drive after Daniel arrived.

I watched an officer label the evidence bag. I gave a separate account of how Tessa had obtained it and what she had told me.

By two in the morning, Detective Harlow Reed sat across from me.

She had short gray-streaked hair and the patient expression of someone who had heard powerful men explain why ordinary rules should bend for them.

She didn’t offer her hand.

“Mr. Ashford.”

“Detective.”

“I know who you are.”

“Then we can save some time.”

Her expression didn’t change.

“Your reputation won’t make this move faster.”

“I’m asking you to find a child.”

“And I have officers at the address you provided. While they do their jobs, you’re going to answer my questions.”

Daniel sat beside me.

I looked at him, then back at Reed.

“Ask.”

She started with the cemetery.

The girl. The photograph. The note.

I told her about Noelle’s letter and the birth record. Knox sent copies through Daniel while I spoke.

Reed asked what I knew about the transfers.

“When did you first become aware of them?”

“Yesterday.”

“What did you do?”

“Preserved the records. Suspended the questionable payments. Revoked the permissions we identified.”

“On whose advice?”

Daniel answered.

“Mine, in consultation with the company’s finance director.”

Reed wrote that down.

“You understand that your company will be examined.”

“Yes.”

“All of it that investigators determine is relevant.”

“Yes.”

She held my gaze a moment longer before moving on.

Tessa was being interviewed separately. Reed had already spoken to the officers who recovered the Ford and documented the bullet damage.

The mechanic’s name lay on the table between us.

“You haven’t contacted him?” she asked.

“No.”

“Your people?”

“Not yet.”

“Keep it that way.”

I felt Daniel’s attention shift toward me.

Reed leaned forward.

“If his account is true, I need him alive, willing to speak, and able to identify what he did. I don’t need him terrified into repeating your version.”

“I want the truth.”

“Then let us ask him.”

I nodded.

It was harder than making a threat.

Reed left the room to arrange contact. While she was gone, Knox came in with news about my watchers.

“One called from a stranger’s phone,” he said. “They were hit near the house.”

I stood.

“Piper?”

“He doesn’t know. A van stopped beside their car. Two men dragged them out. One got away after they left.”

“How long ago?”

“Less than an hour.”

“They didn’t call?”

“They took their phones. The other man is hurt.”

I turned toward the door just as Reed returned.

“Sit down,” she said.

“My men were attacked.”

“I’ve been told.”

“Then tell me what your officers found.”

“They’re still checking the house.”

I stayed on my feet.

She let the silence stretch.

Finally, she said, “Going there yourself won’t undo whatever happened. It will give us another person to account for.”

I sat.

Reed took the chair opposite me.

“One more thing,” I said. “Celeste’s death certificate.”

“What about it?”

“I received it by email. From her lawyer. Six months after Wyatt died.”

“Did you attend a funeral?”

“No.”

“Did you see her body?”

“No.”

“Why?”

Because I had wanted her gone.

Because the woman who had survived the car that killed our son could still call me, and I couldn’t bear to hear her voice.

Because when the email arrived, I had closed it after reading three lines.

“I didn’t question it,” I said.

Reed asked Daniel to provide the file.

The certificate appeared on her screen a few minutes later.

She studied it, then made a call.

I watched the clock above the door.

Tessa was brought in after her interview, carrying a cup of water she hadn’t touched. She sat at the far end of the table.

“Did you suspect she was alive?” Reed asked her.

“Yes.”

“Based on what?”

“Payments that continued through people connected to her. A message from a number Garrett had used. I couldn’t establish who sent it.”

“Why didn’t you report that?”

Tessa looked at the table.

“I didn’t know who I could trust.”

Reed’s phone rang.

She answered, listened, and asked two questions.

When she put it down, she turned the laptop toward us.

“The reference number doesn’t match the record it claims to represent. We’re requesting further confirmation, but this document is not an authentic copy from the issuing office.”

Daniel leaned closer.

“Could it be an administrative error?”

“The formatting has discrepancies too. We’ll verify the rest.”

I stared at Celeste’s name.

For two years, I had believed she was buried somewhere in Florida.

She might have spent those years breathing, eating, walking through cities where nobody recognized her.

Wyatt had stayed beneath the same piece of granite.

“Find her,” I said.

Reed’s radio interrupted.

“Detective Reed, we have an adult female at the Padilla address. Head injury. Medical assistance is on scene.”

I stood again.

Reed raised one hand, listening.

The officer continued.

“The residence has been searched. Other children are accounted for.”

My hands went cold.

“Piper?” I asked.

Reed repeated the question into the radio.

A pause followed.

Then the officer answered.

“Piper Brennan is not here.”