Chapter 4 - THE PRICE OF TRUTH
"You're a trespasser, Gerald," Natalie said, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly steady, rhythmic cadence. The gun didn't waver in her hand. She held it with the practiced ease of someone who spent weekends at the shooting range in Johns Island. "Castle doctrine applies in South Carolina. An old man breaks into his son's home in the middle of the night... tragic mistake. Daniel would be heartbroken, of course, but he’d have me to comfort him."
"Where is Daniel, Natalie?" I asked, keeping my hands visible, spread wide at chest level. I kept my eyes on her trigger finger. It was straight, pressed against the frame, not yet on the trigger. She was waiting for something. She wanted me to beg.
"He's downstairs in the kitchen, pouring himself a drink to calm his nerves," she said, a cruel little smirk touching her lips. "He thinks I came up to change out of my damp clothes. He has no idea his crazy old father is upstairs trying to steal from us."
"I didn't steal anything," I said, taking half a step forward, testing her reaction.
"Stop right there," she snapped, her finger dropping onto the trigger. The safety was off. "I know what you took. The folder. You think you can use that to ruin me? You think Daniel will believe a washed-up private eye over the woman who shares his bed?"
"He'll believe the forensic accountants, Natalie," I said, shifting the leverage. "Four hundred thousand dollars moved from his firm's escrow account into an offshore account in Grand Cayman. That's not a family dispute. That's federal grand larceny. The FBI doesn't care about your social status in Charleston."
For the first time, a flicker of genuine panic crossed her features. The gun shook slightly. "You couldn't have... you don't know that."
"I do know it. I have the wire transfer receipts in my pocket right now. And as for the note—the fake suicide note you used to torture Lily?" I let out a short, harsh laugh. "You're a sloppy forger, Natalie. You used a ballpoint pen with ink that wasn't even manufactured until three years after Elena died. A state police lab will tear that apart in ten minutes."
Natalie’s face twisted into an ugly, desperate mask. "Shut up! Shut your mouth!"
"You're done," I said, taking another step forward. The distance between us was down to eight feet. If she fired, she wouldn't miss, but I had to gamble on her hesitation. "The police are already at the hospital. Vance is drawing up the warrants. If you shoot me tonight, you don't get away with it. You just add first-degree murder to the sheet."
"I'll tell them you attacked me!" she shrieked, her composure fracturing completely. "I'll tell them you tried to kill me!"
"With what?" I asked, gesturing to my open jacket. "My hands are empty, Natalie. And Daniel is downstairs. You think he won't hear the gunshot? You think he won't see my body in his closet and finally realize what you really are?"
"Natalie?"
Daniel’s voice drifted up the stairwell, muffled and hesitant. "Honey? Is everything okay up there? I thought I heard voices."
Natalie’s eyes darted toward the bedroom door, her focus breaking for a fraction of a second.
That was the opening I needed.
I lunged forward, throwing my sixty-three-year-old body across the space between us with everything I had left. I grabbed her right wrist—the same wrist she had twisted on my granddaughter—and slammed it hard against the doorframe.
The gun went off.
The sound was deafening in the enclosed room, the muzzle flash blinding me for a split second. The bullet tore through the plaster ceiling, showering us in white dust.
Natalie screamed in fury, biting down on my forearm as she tried to bring the gun back to bear on my face. She was stronger than she looked, fueled by pure, survivalist adrenaline. We crashed into the mirrored vanity table, sending perfume bottles and crystal trays shattering across the floor.
I drove my weight into her chest, pinning her against the wall, my fingers locking around the cylinder of the gun, preventing the mechanism from cycling another round. With a violent twist, I ripped the weapon from her grip and tossed it across the floor, where it skittered under the bed.
Natalie fell to her knees, gasping for air, her hair tangled, her face smeared with sweat and plaster dust.
The bedroom door flew open. Daniel stood there, a glass of scotch shattered at his feet, his eyes wide with horror as he looked at the chaos, the bullet hole in the ceiling, and his father standing over his wife.
"Dad!" Daniel yelled, rushing forward. "What did you do? What did you do to her?!"
"Look at her, Daniel!" I roared, my chest heaving, the adrenaline turning my blood to fire. "Look at the woman you brought into your daughter's life!"
Natalie immediately collapsed against Daniel’s legs, grabbing his trousers, her voice rising in a theatrical, breathless wail. "Daniel! He broke in! He had a gun, he tried to kill me! He wanted the papers from the safe! He’s crazy, Daniel, call the police! Call them!"
Daniel looked up at me, his face torn between grief, anger, and absolute confusion. "Dad... why? Why are you doing this to us?"
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I reached into my inside pocket and pulled out the manila envelope. I threw it onto the floor at his feet, right into the puddle of spilled scotch.
"Open it, Daniel," I said, my voice shaking with a rage thirty years in the making. "Open it and read what your wife has been using to tell Lily that her mother committed suicide."
