Chapter 8 - THE MAN IN THE FALSE PHOTOGRAPH
Luca placed the photograph on the library table.
"That's my face," he said. "But I was in Chicago that morning."
Emily studied the image.
The man wore a black overcoat and stood beside Peter Walsh near the burned staircase.
From a distance, the resemblance was convincing.
But something was wrong.
"The man is holding a cane," Emily observed.
Luca looked closer.
A dark wooden cane rested beneath the man's right hand.
"I've never used a cane."
Eleanor nodded.
"Anthony did for several weeks after his skiing accident."
Marco examined the photograph under a lamp.
"The face looks altered. The lighting around the jaw doesn't match."
Luca's expression tightened.
"Someone manipulated the picture."
Eleanor frowned.
"Anthony told me it was evidence that you had inspected the property before the investigators arrived."
"Why would he want you to believe that?"
"He said you might be blamed for the fire if the photograph became public."
Luca stared at his mother.
"So he frightened you into keeping quiet."
Eleanor looked ashamed.
"Yes."
Marco photographed the original and arranged for a forensic image examiner to assess it.
Then Luca turned toward Emily.
"Will you come with me to meet Peter Walsh?"
Emily hesitated.
She had spent four years trying not to remember the lake house.
Going back through those details felt like opening an old wound.
But Sophie deserved the truth.
"Yes," she said.
That afternoon, they met Peter Walsh at his Milwaukee repair shop.
Peter was fifty-six, broad-shouldered, with tired eyes and grease-stained hands.
When he saw the photograph, he sighed.
"I knew this day would come."
Luca placed the picture on the counter.
"Who is that standing beside you?"
Peter studied it.
"Anthony. Somebody changed his face."
"Why were you at the ruins?"
"Anthony wanted me to inspect the damaged equipment."
"And the gasoline cans?"
Peter leaned against the counter.
"They were for the dock generator. Anthony told me to move them into the shed."
Emily frowned.
"You took one toward the house."
"Because the generator's spare parts were in the utility hallway. I put the can outside the rear entrance while I collected the parts."
"Did you smell gasoline inside?"
Peter nodded.
"Later. But by then, the fire had already started."
Luca felt his anger rising.
"Why didn't you tell investigators?"
"I did."
"What happened?"
"Anthony told me the insurance company wouldn't believe me. He said my contractor's license could be suspended."
Peter opened a battered metal cabinet.
Inside was a folder containing work orders and photographs.
He pulled out a receipt.
"The fuel wasn't delivered until after three that afternoon. There's no way I had poured it around the house earlier, like some people claimed."
Emily examined the receipt.
Then she noticed a handwritten note at the bottom.
Replace damaged ventilation fan—upper hallway.
She looked up.
"What was wrong with the fan?"
Peter frowned.
"It had been disconnected."
"Who disconnected it?"
"Anthony asked me to inspect it, but when I arrived, the wires had already been removed."
Luca stared at him.
"Why would anyone disable the ventilation?"
Peter shook his head.
"I assumed they were renovating."
Emily remembered the thick smoke beneath Sophie's bedroom door.
The hallway had filled unnaturally quickly.
"If someone knew the ventilation wasn't working..." she began.
Peter's expression changed.
"Then burning papers downstairs could have been much more dangerous."
Luca felt sick.
Vanessa had admitted starting a small fire.
But someone had known that smoke would spread.
"Did Anthony know the fan was disconnected?" Luca asked.
Peter nodded.
"He was the one who complained about it."
Luca stepped away.
His brother had not merely concealed financial fraud.
He may have allowed a dangerous situation to develop around a trapped child.
Then Peter reached into the cabinet again.
"There's one more thing."
He handed Luca a yellow carbon-copy work order.
The document authorized the removal of the ventilation system's protective shutoff.
It bore Anthony's signature.
Dated the morning of the fire.
Marco examined it carefully.
"Why did you keep this?"
"Because Anthony later told me to destroy my records."
Peter looked toward Emily.
"I kept them because a young woman almost died in that house."
Emily swallowed.
For four years, she had believed nobody remembered her injuries.
Yet this stranger had preserved evidence because of what happened to her.
Luca turned toward Marco.
"Contact the investigators. They need these originals."
Marco nodded.
Then he checked the records Peter had provided.
"Mr. Moretti, the protective shutoff was removed at 2:10 p.m."
Luca frowned.
"And Vanessa started burning the papers around four?"
"That's what she claims."
Emily studied the work order.
"Then someone prepared the house to fill with smoke before she ever lit the match."
Peter looked toward Luca.
"There's something else you should see."
He opened an old digital maintenance log on his laptop.
The last entry contained a short instruction from Anthony.
Disable the system before the afternoon meeting. Vanessa must not know.
Luca stared at the words.
Then Emily asked the question nobody wanted to answer.
"Was Vanessa being used to start the fire?"
Peter nodded slowly.
"That's what I think."
But Luca noticed another line beneath the instruction.
It contained the name of the person who approved the work.
ROBERT KESSLER.
May you like
And beside his name was a handwritten warning:
SOPHIE HAS THE BLUE CAMERA.
