Chapter 7 - The Lawyer Who Followed Roman’s Mother

No one spoke.

I thought of the old lawyer at the anniversary dinner.

His careful voice.

His tired eyes.

The envelope in his hand.

Roman looked at Michael.

“Arthur followed my mother?”

Michael nodded slowly.

“I never knew.”

Thomas said:

“You never wanted to know.”

Roman turned on him.

“Quiet.”

Then he called Mr. Price.

The phone rang four times.

He answered.

“Roman.”

Roman put him on speaker.

“Are you alone?”

A pause.

“Yes.”

Julian shook his head.

Roman saw it.

“Arthur, were you with my mother the night she died?”

Silence.

Then the old lawyer exhaled.

“Yes.”

Roman’s face went cold.

“You followed her car.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because she asked me to.”

Michael stared.

“What?”

Mr. Price continued.

“Eleanor knew someone had been watching her.”

Roman looked at Michael.

“My mother knew?”

“She knew more than I did.”

Price said:

“She told me to follow at a distance and make sure she reached the district attorney’s office.”

Roman gripped the phone.

“She never arrived.”

“No.”

“What happened?”

Another pause.

“I lost her at the tunnel.”

Thomas laughed without humor.

“Convenient.”

Price’s voice hardened.

“You want to talk about convenience, Thomas?”

Roman looked at him.

“What does that mean?”

Mr. Price said:

“Ask your uncle why Lorenzo Vale was trying to stop your mother from leaving the office.”

Thomas leaned against the wall.

Julian looked at him.

Celeste whispered:

“Father was trying to stop her?”

Price continued.

“Because Lorenzo had changed his mind.”

Michael frowned.

“About what?”

“Everything.”

Mr. Price’s words came slowly.

“Eleanor convinced him to testify.”

Celeste sat down.

Roman looked at her.

Her father.

The man everyone believed had wanted the truth buried.

Mr. Price said:

“Lorenzo agreed to give prosecutors the shell companies, the account names, and the police contacts.”

Michael stared.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because before we could meet, Eleanor died.”

“And Lorenzo?”

“Disappeared for six weeks.”

Celeste whispered:

“He told us he was in Europe.”

“He was hiding.”

Thomas said:

“This is sentimental nonsense.”

Mr. Price answered:

“No, Thomas.”

“It is the part you never expected anyone to put together.”

Roman’s voice lowered.

“Arthur.”

“Yes?”

“Who killed my mother?”

Silence.

Longer this time.

“I don’t know.”

Roman’s jaw tightened.

“But I know who ordered her car tracked.”

“Who?”

Mr. Price said:

“Thomas.”

Roman looked at his uncle.

Thomas did not move.

Price continued.

“I found the invoice years later.”

Thomas shrugged.

“Tracking a car is not murder.”

“No.”

Mr. Price agreed.

“But the mechanic who serviced Eleanor’s brakes received twenty thousand dollars from a company you controlled.”

Roman looked like the room had tilted.

Michael closed his eyes.

Celeste whispered:

“Oh, God.”

Thomas finally lost his calm.

“That payment was not for her car.”

Roman stepped toward him.

“What was it for?”

Thomas did not answer.

Julian did.

“A warehouse fire.”

Everyone looked at him.

Julian opened another file.

“Same mechanic.”

He turned the laptop.

Invoices.

Dates.

Payments.

Roman stared.

Thomas said:

“You have no context.”

Julian replied:

“Then give us context.”

Thomas looked at Roman.

For the first time, he looked old.

“Twelve people were going to be exposed if your mother testified.”

Roman’s voice became very quiet.

“And you were one of them.”

“Yes.”

“You paid the mechanic.”

“Yes.”

“For what?”

Thomas looked down.

“To disable a delivery truck.”

Roman frowned.

“Why?”

“To destroy records being moved out of a warehouse.”

Michael stared.

“The Queens warehouse.”

“Yes.”

The same place where Michael had later been attacked.

Thomas continued.

“The mechanic handled vehicles for us. That is why the payment exists.”

Roman said:

“So someone else used him to sabotage my mother’s car.”

“I believe so.”

“Who?”

Thomas looked at Celeste.

She went still.

“No.”

Thomas said:

“Lorenzo.”

Celeste shook her head.

“Arthur just said my father agreed to testify.”

Thomas smiled bitterly.

“After he ordered the car work.”

Mr. Price interrupted through the phone.

“That is a lie.”

Thomas shouted:

“You weren’t there.”

Price shouted back:

“I was the one who met Lorenzo afterward.”

Silence.

Roman looked between them.

Two old men.

Two versions.

One dead woman.

Then I noticed something on the laptop.

A second file attached to the garage video.

An audio file.

I pointed.

“What is that?”

Julian clicked it.

Static filled the room.

Then Eleanor Arden’s voice.

Roman’s mother.

Clear.

Calm.

Alive seventeen years earlier.

“If anything happens to me, the person you need to look at is not Lorenzo Vale.”

Roman stopped breathing.

The recording continued.

“He is frightened.”

A pause.

“The dangerous one is the man who believes Roman belongs to him.”

Thomas’s face changed.

Eleanor’s voice spoke one final sentence.

“Thomas will never let Michael raise our son if Michael destroys the company.”

Roman looked at his uncle.

Thomas whispered:

“She misunderstood.”

Roman said:

“No.”

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Then he picked up the ledger.

“She understood you perfectly.”