Chapter 2 - The Woman Margaret Was Trying to StopDaniel had grown up believing his father died of a heart attack.
Charles Bennett collapsed inside his study nine years earlier.
He was fifty-eight.
Healthy enough that his death shocked everyone.
The family physician described it as catastrophic cardiac failure.
No autopsy.
Margaret refused.
Daniel had been twenty-four.
Too devastated to question anything.
Now Detective Walker sat across from Margaret in the mansion library.
“You poisoned your future daughter-in-law because she knew something about your husband?”
Margaret shook her head.
“I did not poison her.”
“You ordered Helen to coat the ring.”
“I told Helen to make Sophia afraid to wear it.”
Walker stared.
“With pesticide?”
Margaret looked toward Helen.
“I told you to use the irritant.”
Helen cried.
“That bottle was in the greenhouse cabinet!”
Margaret’s face changed.
There had been two containers.
One harmless skin irritant used to discourage animals from ornamental plants.
One concentrated pesticide.
Helen had taken the wrong one.
Walker said:
“You still conspired to contaminate an object someone would wear.”
Margaret lowered her head.
“Yes.”
Daniel stood near the fireplace.
“You still haven’t answered me.”
Margaret looked at her son.
“Sophia has been searching this house.”
“For what?”
“Your father’s records.”
Daniel laughed in disbelief.
“She’s planning our wedding.”
“She requested access to your father’s study four times.”
“She was arranging photographs.”
“She copied the key.”
Daniel stopped.
Margaret continued.
“Three weeks ago I found her inside the locked archive room.”
“What archive room?”
Margaret looked away.
That reaction told Daniel there were still parts of his own home he did not know.
Walker asked:
“What did Charles Bennett leave?”
Margaret remained silent.
Daniel shouted:
“Mother!”
She flinched.
“My husband discovered Richard Reynolds was laundering money through Bennett construction projects.”
Daniel stared.
Sophia’s father.
Margaret continued.
“Charles intended to report him.”
“When?”
“The week he died.”
Daniel felt cold.
“What happened?”
Margaret whispered:
“He died first.”
Walker asked the obvious question.
“Do you believe Richard Reynolds killed him?”
Margaret looked toward the detective.
“I have spent nine years trying not to know.”
That sentence chilled everyone.
Daniel moved closer.
“What does that mean?”
After Charles died, Richard Reynolds approached Margaret.
Not publicly.
Privately.
He told her Charles had been involved in transactions that could destroy Bennett Holdings if investigators started asking questions.
Margaret believed him.
Or chose to.
Richard offered a solution.
Silence.
The Bennett company remained untouched.
Reynolds Development protected certain contracts.
No investigation.
No scandal.
Margaret agreed.
Daniel stared at her.
“You made a deal with the man you suspected killed Dad?”
“I didn’t know he killed him!”
“You suspected!”
“I was trying to protect you!”
The sentence echoed through the library.
Walker noticed Daniel’s reaction.
So did Margaret.
Daniel whispered:
“Everything you people do is apparently to protect me.”
Nobody answered.
Then Walker asked:
“How does Sophia fit into this?”
Margaret explained.
Sophia was sixteen when Charles died.
Years later, she discovered references to hidden Bennett records in her father’s private files.
She became curious.
Then she met Daniel.
Coincidence, Margaret initially thought.
Eventually she realized Richard had encouraged the relationship.
Why?
Marriage would give the Reynolds family legitimate access to the Bennett estate.
Sophia could search without attracting suspicion.
Margaret began watching her.
And three weeks before the wedding, Sophia found something.
A safe hidden behind the paneling in Charles’s study.
She could not open it.
But Margaret found scratches around the lock.
That was when panic began.
Walker asked:
“What’s inside?”
Margaret looked at Daniel.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s your answer?”
“Charles never gave me the combination.”
Daniel whispered:
“But Emily knows.”
Everyone turned.
Margaret’s face changed.
Daniel finally understood why his mother had always trusted the maid differently.
Why she had spoken to Emily privately.
Why Emily had warned Sophia about the ring.
“Does she?”
Margaret did not answer.
Walker immediately ordered an officer to locate Emily Carter.
They found her twenty minutes later at a bus station.
She agreed to return only after Walker assured her she was no longer suspected of theft.
When Emily entered the library, she did not look at Margaret.
Daniel stepped toward her.
“Emily.”
She stopped.
“I’m sorry.”
“For which part?”
He swallowed.
“All of it.”
“Good start.”
Walker asked:
“Do you know about Charles Bennett’s safe?”
Emily looked at Margaret.
Then Daniel.
“Yes.”
The room tightened.
“Do you know the combination?”
“No.”
Walker frowned.
“Then what do you know?”
Emily reached into her handbag.
She removed a small brass key.
Margaret stood abruptly.
“Emily!”
Everyone turned.
Emily held the key tightly.
“Mr. Bennett gave this to me three days before he died.”
Daniel stopped breathing.
“What does it open?”
Emily’s eyes filled.
“Not the safe.”
“Then what?”
She looked toward the floor.
“A room under the chapel.”
The Bennett estate had a small private chapel near the eastern gardens.
Daniel had played there as a child.
Never knew it had a room beneath it.
Walker stood.
“Show us.”
Margaret whispered:
“No.”
Daniel looked at her.
For once, she seemed genuinely terrified.
“What’s down there?”
May you like
Margaret answered:
“The reason your father died.”
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