When the plane landed in Portland, police officers boarded before passengers were allowed to leave.
Celia was escorted from the aircraft.
As she passed Lydia, she stopped.
“You think your father was the one who uncovered Vane Meridian?”
Arthur stood.
“Keep walking.”
Celia ignored him.
“Ask your mother who actually found the accounts.”
Then she was escorted away.
Lydia turned to Arthur.
“Was it my mother?”
His silence answered.
Elaine Carver had not always been the quiet school librarian Lydia remembered.
Before Lydia was born, she had worked as a forensic accountant.
She had discovered the first suspicious transfers.
Graham had stepped forward publicly so attention would fall on him instead of Elaine.
The crash had not silenced an investigator.
It had frightened a husband into making himself disappear so the people watching their family would believe the wrong parent held the evidence.
Lydia looked at the brass key.
Suddenly, her father’s disappearance seemed both more understandable and more painful.
