Chapter 3 - THE WATCH IN HELENA’S DRAWER
Richard did not raise his voice.
That made Helena more frightened.
“You had Fiona’s watch?”
Helena looked at Thomas.
Thomas looked genuinely confused.
“I gave it to Eleanor tonight.”
Eleanor nodded.
“He did.”
Richard held the watch between two fingers.
“Then how did Leo see it in Helena’s room last week?”
Helena pressed her palms against the piano.
Leo stood close to Rose.
“I was looking for my blue marker,” he said.
Richard glanced at him.
“What marker?”
“The one Helena borrowed.”
It was such an ordinary answer that it made the room feel worse.
“I opened the little drawer,” Leo continued. “The watch was there.”
Thomas stared at Helena.
“You made a copy.”
Helena said nothing.
Richard examined the back more carefully.
Then he saw it.
The scratches around the initials were too clean.
Too recent.
“This isn’t Fiona’s watch.”
Eleanor stepped closer.
“What?”
Richard had bought Fiona the original on their fifth anniversary.
There had been a dent near the crown from the night she dropped it on the kitchen floor.
This watch had no dent.
He looked at Thomas.
“This is a replica.”
Thomas’s face drained.
“I swear I didn’t know.”
Helena finally spoke.
“I had it made.”
Richard turned.
“Why?”
“Because Thomas stole the original.”
“How did you know he had it?”
“Because I searched Fiona’s belongings after she died.”
Rose stared at her.
Helena met her eyes.
“Yes. I searched everything.”
“For money?” Rose asked.
“For evidence.”
Richard stepped closer.
“Evidence of what you did?”
Helena’s composure cracked.
“Evidence of what your father did.”
That name stopped him again.
Victor Sterling.
Even dead, he could silence a room.
Helena took a breath.
“Your father created Halcyon.”
Richard shook his head.
“The corporate filing is in your maiden name.”
“Because he needed someone outside the Sterling family.”
“You expect me to believe my father handed you millions in property?”
“No. He used me to hide it.”
Thomas spoke bitterly.
“And then you decided hiding it paid well.”
Helena turned on him.
“Don’t pretend you’re clean.”
“I’m not.”
Thomas’s answer killed her momentum.
“I was a coward. I signed as a witness when Fiona couldn’t even hold a pen.”
Richard moved toward him.
Eleanor stepped between them.
“Not yet.”
Richard stared at her.
“Move.”
“No.”
“You have no idea what he did.”
“I know exactly what he did. Fiona told me.”
That stopped everyone.
Thomas looked stunned.
“She knew?”
“Of course she knew.”
Thomas’s face folded with something close to grief.
“I thought she believed Victor.”
“She knew you were scared of him.”
Richard’s expression hardened.
“That doesn’t excuse it.”
“No,” Eleanor said. “It explains it.”
Richard looked away.
Rose understood that distinction mattered to him.
Explanation was not forgiveness.
But it was where truth started.
Richard turned back to Helena.
“Where is the real watch?”
She did not answer.
“Helena.”
“In my room.”
Richard ordered two security guards to accompany her.
“No one touches anything except the watch.”
Helena paused at the doorway.
Then she looked back.
“You should also bring Fiona’s blue coat.”
Eleanor’s face changed.
“What blue coat?”
“The maternity coat.”
Rose suddenly remembered.
Heavy navy wool.
Large pearl buttons.
Fiona had worn it during the final months of her pregnancy because she was always cold.
After her death, Rose had packed it with several winter dresses.
“It’s in the old nursery storage room,” Rose said.
Helena nodded.
“Bring it.”
Richard watched her leave.
“What’s in the coat?”
Helena answered without turning.
“The reason Fiona wrote 1:42 on the watch.”
Twenty minutes later, the ballroom had been emptied into the east wing under guard while Detective Harris waited downstairs.
Richard refused to explain anything until he understood it himself.
Rose retrieved the coat.
It still smelled faintly of cedar.
Eleanor touched one sleeve.
“She wore this the week Leo was born.”
Rose nodded.
Fiona had been thirty-six and enormous with pregnancy, laughing every time she tried to button it.
That memory hurt.
Richard stood across the room, holding the real watch Helena’s guard had retrieved.
This one had the dent near the crown.
On the back:
B.C. — 1:42
Same marks.
Original.
Thomas took the replica and compared them.
“Why copy it?”
Helena folded her arms.
“Because I knew eventually somebody would find the real one.”
“So you planned to replace it?”
“If necessary.”
Richard’s disgust showed.
Helena looked at him.
“I am not asking you to admire me.”
“No danger of that.”
Rose ran her fingers along the coat lining.
Nothing.
She checked the pockets.
Empty.
Then Leo spoke.
“Mom had a secret pocket.”
Everyone looked at him.
Rose blinked.
“How do you know?”
“She kept candy in it.”
For the first time that night, Richard almost smiled.
Rose turned the coat inside out.
Near the left seam was a narrow opening.
Her fingers found something stiff.
She pulled out a faded hospital bracelet.
BABY STERLING
01:42
Eleanor covered her mouth.
Thomas sat down.
Richard stared at it.
The official certificate had always said 2:14.
Thirty-two missing minutes.
Rose reached into the pocket again.
Another object.
A folded piece of paper.
Richard opened it.
It was not a contract.
Not a confession.
Just a handwritten note in Fiona’s slanted handwriting.
Richard—
If they tell you Leo was born at 2:14, don’t believe them.
He was born at 1:42.
He was taken from my room before I could hold him.
Ask Thomas who carried him.
Richard slowly lifted his eyes.
Thomas went white.
Leo looked at his uncle.
“You took me?”
Thomas’s lips parted.
No sound came.
Richard moved between Thomas and the boy.
“What did you do with my son?”
Thomas looked at Leo.
Then at Richard.
And finally said the words he had avoided for ten years.
“I carried him through the west wall.”
Richard’s hands clenched.
“Where?”
“To Dad’s study.”
“Why?”
Thomas swallowed.
“Because Victor told me there were men downstairs who would kill Leo if they knew he had been born.”
Richard frowned.
“That night there was no attack.”
“I know that now.”
“You believed him?”
“I was twenty-eight. Dad told me three armed men had entered the estate.”
Richard stepped closer.
“He lied.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Thomas looked toward the navy coat.
“Because while Fiona was unconscious and Leo was gone, Victor needed every person upstairs to believe there was an emergency.”
“For what?”
Thomas’s voice dropped.
“To make the papers look legitimate.”
Helena interrupted.
“That still isn’t the worst part.”
Richard turned.
She looked at the bracelet in his hand.
“The agreement supposedly signed at 2:03 required two witnesses.”
“Thomas was one.”
“Yes.”
“Who was the other?”
Helena’s eyes moved toward Rose.
Rose felt cold.
Richard followed her stare.
“No.”
Helena said nothing.
Rose shook her head.
“I wasn’t there.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you looking at me?”
Helena’s expression softened in a way Rose hated.
“Because the second witness was your husband.”
Rose stopped breathing.
Robert Whitaker had been dead eight years.
Richard looked at Helena.
“You’re lying.”
Helena reached toward the microfilm.
“Frame seventeen.”
Richard held the strip beneath the lamp.
He counted slowly.
Fourteen.
Fifteen.
Sixteen.
Seventeen.
A payment ledger appeared.
One line showed Thomas Sterling.
Another showed a name Richard knew as well as his own.
ROBERT WHITAKER — $50,000
Rose stared at it.
Her knees nearly gave way.
Helena spoke quietly.
“Ask yourself why Fiona trusted Rose so much.”
Rose looked up.
May you like
Helena’s next words cut deeper.
“Then ask what Rose’s husband was paid fifty thousand dollars to bury.”
