Chapter 2 - THE SEVENTH QUESTION
“Your daughter stopped waiting for you long before the accident, Mr. Moreland.”
Those were the first words Margaret Ellis had spoken to Damian without calling him sir in twenty-three years.
The sixty-eight-year-old housekeeper stood in Lily’s bedroom, her hands trembling around a folded cleaning cloth.
Damian sat on the little pink bed.
His daughter’s hospital bracelet lay across his palm.
“Margaret,” he said quietly. “Tell me what happened.”
“You already know what happened.”
“I need to know everything.”
Margaret looked at the drawing on the bed.
“Then start by looking at what she left you.”
Damian picked it up.
Three figures stood beneath a yellow sun.
Claire wore a blue dress.
Lily held her mother’s hand.
Damian stood near the edge of the paper, beside something black and rectangular.
At first, he assumed it was his limousine.
Then he noticed the words.
DADDY'S SPECIAL PHONE.
His stomach tightened.
“What is this?”
Margaret swallowed.
“Your daughter drew that after her birthday.”
Damian closed his eyes.
Lily’s sixth birthday.
He remembered ordering a custom dollhouse from Paris.
He remembered approving a party that cost more than most families earned in a year.
He did not remember attending.
“Where was I?”
“New York, sir.”
“For business?”
Margaret hesitated.
“You told Mrs. Moreland it was business.”
Damian looked up.
Margaret continued.
“Lily waited beside the dining room window until nearly midnight. She wouldn't let anyone take away your plate.”
He stared at her.
“She thought if the food stayed warm, you'd come home.”
A terrible silence settled over the room.
Damian remembered the evening now.
He had been in a Manhattan penthouse with Sabrina Vale, celebrating the closing of a property deal.
Sabrina had complained that Claire kept calling.
Damian had silenced his personal phone.
But Lily had been calling another number.
His private business phone.
The black phone he carried everywhere.
The one he answered even during dinner.
“Why did she draw it?” he asked.
Margaret's eyes filled.
“Because she thought that phone was more important than she was.”
Damian looked down.
The black rectangle was almost as large as Lily.
And beside it, in crooked purple letters, she had written:
DADDY ALWAYS ANSWERS THIS ONE.
He pressed his fingers against his mouth.
Margaret stepped toward the doorway.
“There’s something else.”
She opened Lily’s little desk drawer and removed a shoebox decorated with butterflies.
Inside were folded pieces of paper.
Dozens of them.
Every page contained a drawing.
Damian recognized birthdays, Christmas mornings, school concerts, and family dinners.
In almost every picture, he was missing.
Sometimes Lily drew an empty chair.
Sometimes a telephone.
Sometimes a small airplane flying away.
Margaret handed him one dated three months earlier.
It showed a little girl standing beneath a Christmas tree.
Beside her was an empty chair.
Underneath, Lily had written:
MAYBE NEXT TIME.
Damian's breathing changed.
He had spent years believing Claire exaggerated his absences.
He had accused her of making him feel guilty whenever she asked him to come home.
Now his daughter's drawings showed what Claire had been trying to tell him.
Not once.
For years.
“Did Claire see these?”
“Of course.”
“Why didn't she tell me?”
Margaret stared at him.
“She did.”
Damian looked away.
Margaret's voice softened.
“Mr. Moreland, your wife told you every day.”
He remembered Claire standing in his office six months earlier.
She needs you, Damian. Not your money.
He had barely looked up from his laptop.
Everything I do is for this family.
Now he was sitting inside the bedroom of the family he had barely visited.
And no amount of money could change it.
He reached for Claire's phone.
One recording.
Then he noticed something beneath the audio file.
A draft message.
It had never been sent.
The recipient was Damian’s private business number.
The message was dated the morning before the accident.
Damian, Lily found something in Sabrina's things. I need to speak with you before she sees it again. Please come home.
Damian frowned.
Sabrina's things?
He opened the attached photograph.
His daughter stood inside his study, holding a small silver bracelet.
A tiny blue butterfly hung from its clasp.
Damian recognized it immediately.
He had purchased the bracelet in Monaco.
For Sabrina.
It had been missing for nearly a month.
He had assumed she'd misplaced it.
But the photograph showed something more disturbing.
Lily was holding the bracelet beside an opened envelope bearing the Moreland family crest.
Damian enlarged the image.
Only a portion of the envelope was visible.
Three words could be read.
LILY MORELAND — BENEFICIARY.
His expression changed.
Lily had a substantial trust established by Damian’s late mother.
Its assets were separate from his businesses.
Claire was its designated guardian.
Damian had forbidden anyone outside his attorney and financial office from discussing it.
So why had Sabrina been carrying an envelope with Lily’s name?
He called his chief of security, Thomas Reed.
“Find out whether Sabrina entered my study while I was away.”
Thomas hesitated.
“Mr. Moreland, I need to tell you something.”
“Tell me.”
“Mrs. Moreland asked me the same question two weeks ago.”
Damian went still.
“What did you tell her?”
“That Miss Vale had permission to enter the house.”
“Permission from whom?”
“Your office, sir.”
Damian frowned.
“I never authorized that.”
Thomas said nothing.
“Who signed it?”
A pause.
“Your brother.”
Damian slowly stood.
Vincent Moreland.
His younger brother.
The man who managed the legitimate side of his shipping empire whenever Damian traveled.
“Where is Vincent?”
“At headquarters.”
“Tell him to stay there.”
Damian ended the call.
Then Margaret spoke again.
“Mr. Moreland?”
He turned.
She was holding Lily's butterfly shoebox.
“One of those drawings isn't hers.”
Damian frowned.
Margaret removed a paper from the bottom.
Unlike the others, this drawing had been made with a ruler.
A black truck stood beside a silver car.
The truck had a red stripe across its door.
Underneath, someone had written:
SHE KNOWS WHAT SHE SAW.
Damian stared at the words.
“Where did you find this?”
“Inside Lily's schoolbag. Mrs. Moreland found it three days before the accident.”
His blood turned cold.
“Why wasn't I told?”
May you like
Margaret's answer was barely audible.
“Your wife tried, Mr. Moreland. But someone answered your phone and told her never to call again.”
