Chapter 6
Marris arrived with a woman in a navy blazer who didn't look like a cop. Short hair, glasses, leather portfolio.
"This is Susan Cho," Marris said in my living room. "Victim advocate, and she brought someone who can help with the paper part."
The someone was an older man in khakis and a polo who introduced himself as Don Heller, legal aid, not my lawyer, just there to explain what language to watch for.
I made tea I didn't drink. The plastic bag was on the coffee table with the harness folded inside and the recorder next to it. Heller didn't touch anything without asking.
"Can you play it once, from the start?" Cho asked gently.
I pressed play. The wind roar filled the room instantly, then Richard's voice, thin and small through the phone speaker but unmistakable: "I'm sorry, Amelia." My voice after, breathless: "Richard, our baby!" Then my own voice again, steadier than I remembered feeling: "You should have trusted me with everything. You really thought I didn't know? What happens to your shares if something happens to you?"
Heller wrote the last sentence word for word. Marris closed her eyes for a second when it finished.
"That's motive," Heller said quietly. "That's him being heard on motive in real time."
The doorbell rang. I flinched. Marris checked the window. "It's the courier from the county clerk. I asked for your filed amendment."
She brought in a manila envelope and laid out two pages on my table. The header said Restricted Stock Transfer — Spousal Contingency Amendment. The signatures at the bottom were Richard's and a notary's. Mine wasn't there.
Heller read aloud, his finger under each line. "'In the event of the death or permanent incapacity of spouse Amelia —, all unvested shares held by Richard — shall immediately vest and transfer to Richard — free of encumbrance.'"
He stopped.
"There is no reciprocal clause," he said. "If he dies, you get nothing automatic. This only runs one way."
Cho looked at me. "Did you sign anything like this?"
"No. I found it. I never signed it."
"Then it's either forged or it was filed without your consent," Heller said. "Either way, the company will want to know. And the insurer."
Marris bagged the pages in a clear sleeve. "We have enough for detectives to open an attempted homicide file now, not just reckless endangerment. The charter company gave us the manifest. Richard paid cash for a last-minute schedule change to go farther offshore. That plus the harness purchase receipt you gave us —"
"I kept the receipt," I said. I pulled it from the trench coat pocket, still damp, ink blurred but legible: Sport Chalet, black harness, dated nine days ago, paid debit.
Heller tucked it into the sleeve too.
My phone buzzed. Unknown number. I let it go to voicemail and the speaker filled the room before I could stop it.
"Amelia, it's Richard's attorney, Keller. Let's be adults. Bring whatever you think you have to my office downtown at four. We can resolve the share confusion without police and keep your medical matters private."
Marris and Cho exchanged a look.
"Don't go alone," Cho said.
"Don't go at all without a lawyer," Heller added. "He wants that recording off your phone."
I stared at the envelope on the table, at the one-way clause, at the harness straps coiled like a question.
"I'll go," I said. "But not the way he thinks."
Marris nodded slowly. "Then we wire you properly. And we make sure Keller knows we're listening from the parking lot."
May you like
I picked up the recorder, slipped it into my palm, and felt its weight. It had held me steady at eight thousand feet. It could hold me steady in a conference room.
"Four o'clock," I said. "Tell him I'll be there. With the bag."
