Chapter 11 - Emma Remembers Who Dug the HolePolice had no intention of handing Daniel to Wade.
Daniel had no intention of obeying police.
That conflict lasted nearly an hour.
“He threatened Emma.”
“Which is exactly why you don't go alone,” Ortiz said.
“He'll disappear if he sees police.”
“He may kill you if he doesn't.”
Sarah stood between them.
“Enough.”
Both turned.
She looked at Daniel.
“You are not playing hero.”
“Sarah—”
“Our daughter needs one parent who isn't in the hospital or a grave.”
His face tightened.
Then she turned to Ortiz.
“But we can't ignore the message.”
“We won't.”
Ortiz proposed a controlled operation.
Daniel would appear to bring the notebook.
Undercover officers would surround the quarry.
A duplicate notebook would be prepared.
The original would remain in evidence.
Wade would be taken alive if possible.
Linda wanted to help.
Sarah laughed when she heard.
“No.”
Linda stood behind the interview-room glass, watching them.
“She knows Wade,” Ortiz said.
“She also helped Wade bury my daughter.”
“She may recognize changes in his behavior we won't.”
“Use her voice on a phone. She doesn't leave this building.”
Linda eventually agreed.
Not because Sarah convinced her.
Because prosecutors made something clear.
Cooperation might affect sentencing.
Nothing would erase what happened to Emma.
At the hospital, Sarah explained only part of the plan.
“We're going to help the police catch Mr. Bennett.”
Emma immediately grabbed her hand.
“Don't go.”
Sarah's heart tightened.
“I'll stay with you.”
“What about Dad?”
“He'll be with police officers.”
Emma shook her head.
“Mr. Bennett knows.”
“Knows what?”
“That Dad will come.”
Sarah frowned.
“What makes you say that?”
Emma looked at Daniel.
“At the cabin he said Daddy always comes when someone threatens family.”
Daniel and Sarah exchanged looks.
“How would he know that?”
Emma didn't know.
Then she remembered another conversation.
Wade and Linda had argued before driving her home.
Wade said Daniel was “just like Robert.”
Linda answered, “That's exactly what scares me.”
“What did he mean?” Sarah asked.
Emma shrugged.
“Then Mr. Bennett said he knew Daddy would go to the quarry.”
Ortiz, standing near the door, immediately stepped closer.
“He mentioned the quarry before Emma was buried?”
Emma nodded.
That changed the operation.
The midnight invitation wasn't spontaneous.
Wade had been planning to lure Daniel there before Linda surrendered.
“Why?” Daniel asked.
Emma closed her eyes.
“He said he needed Dad to open something.”
The sealed entrance.
Robert's old hiding place.
Wade hadn't simply been running from police.
He had been moving toward something.
Emma continued.
“When we got near our house, another car came.”
Sarah remembered Wade saying, She'll think Linda did all of it.
“Did you see the person?”
“No.”
“Man or woman?”
“I don't know.”
“Did Grandma?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
Emma thought.
“She said, ‘You called her?’”
Sarah looked at Ortiz.
Her.
A woman.
Wade had a female accomplice.
“What happened?”
“Mr. Bennett told Grandma to shut up.”
Then Wade took Emma from the SUV.
Linda followed.
Another vehicle remained beyond the trees with its headlights off.
“Who dug the hole?” Sarah asked.
“Mr. Bennett.”
“Who put you inside?”
“Him.”
“Who covered you?”
Emma hesitated.
“Grandma put some dirt.”
Sarah's jaw tightened.
“But?”
“The lady did more.”
Everybody froze.
“What lady?”
“I didn't see her face.”
Emma's memories were fragmented by the sedative and rain.
She remembered a woman's voice.
You should have dealt with the child at the cabin.
Linda answered, I never agreed to kill her.
Wade said, Nobody is killing anybody.
The woman laughed.
Then Emma remembered the woman kneeling beside the shallow hole.
Cold hands pulled branches over her.
“Did she say anything to you?”
Emma nodded.
“What?”
“She said, ‘Your father should've minded his own business.’”
Daniel went pale.
This wasn't about Emma.
Not originally.
It was about Daniel uncovering the fraud.
“And Grandma?”
“She was crying.”
“Did she try to stop her?”
Emma shook her head.
Sarah forced herself not to react.
Whether Linda put on one handful of dirt or a hundred didn't matter anymore.
She had watched.
Emma suddenly sat upright.
“I remember her shoes.”
“The woman?”
“Yes.”
“What kind?”
“Red bottoms.”
Sarah frowned.
Ortiz understood.
“Designer heels?”
Emma nodded.
Even in the rain, the woman wore expensive shoes with red soles.
Daniel slowly looked at Ortiz.
“There is a woman in my company who wears those constantly.”
Sarah's stomach tightened.
“Who?”
“My chief financial officer.”
Ortiz's eyes sharpened.
“Name?”
“Melissa Grant.”
Sarah knew Melissa.
Forty-two.
Elegant.
Brilliant.
Daniel trusted her with everything.
“She found the duplicate invoices,” Sarah said.
Daniel nodded.
“She was the one who told me something was wrong.”
Ortiz's expression changed.
“What if she didn't discover the fraud?”
Daniel stared.
“What if she showed you exactly enough of it to control where you looked?”
Silence.
Sarah remembered Wade's sentence.
She'll think Linda did all of it.
Not Sarah.
Not police.
She.
Melissa.
Perhaps Wade had expected Melissa to believe Linda would take the blame.
Or perhaps Melissa intended Linda to.
Ortiz called investigators.
Melissa's phone was off.
She wasn't at home.
Her car was missing.
At 9:03 p.m., police searched her office.
Behind a locked panel they found copies of every fraudulent invoice Linda and Wade had created.
But there was something else.
A printed photograph of the Miller yard.
The patch of soil beside the lawn had been circled in red.
The photograph had been printed Monday.
One day before Emma disappeared.
Daniel stared at it.
“That hole wasn't improvised.”
“No,” Ortiz said.
Sarah felt sick.
They had chosen the location before Emma ever walked into Linda's room.
“But why?”
Ortiz turned the photograph over.
Three words were handwritten on the back.
ROBERT'S BOX HERE.
Sarah understood.
The shallow excavation had originally been planned to retrieve the box Linda had buried.
Emma had simply become something they decided to leave behind.
Then Ortiz's phone rang again.
Investigators had located Melissa's vehicle.
At Old Bennett Quarry.
May you like
Three hours before midnight.
The trap was already waiting.
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