I stood several feet away, overwhelmed by a feeling I couldn't name.
Relief.
Grief.
Regret.
Maybe all three.
Maya approached.
“We got enough on tape for conspiracy, coercion, assault, unlawful imprisonment, and likely more once Jake starts negotiating.”
“Melissa?” I asked.
“We'll reopen everything.”
Sophie looked at her father.
“So it's over?”
Alex did not answer.
Maya didn't either.
I noticed.
“What?”
Alex wiped the blood from his eyebrow.
“Caroline didn't have the evidence.”
“So?”
“So somebody else does.”
The answer came two days later.
Martin Vale regained consciousness.
He requested only one visitor.
Not Caroline.
Not Jake.
Not a lawyer.
Me.
I thought Maya had misheard.
“Why would he want Evelyn?” Alex demanded.
Martin refused to explain.
Against Alex's objections, I went.
Martin lay beneath tubes and monitors, his face bruised from the fall.
He looked far older than sixty-three.
When the guard left us alone, Martin smiled faintly.
