Chapter 10: The Empty Coffin
Evelyn denied knowing anything about the uniform.
“It disappeared from my locker.”
Forensic testing revealed the blood did not belong to her.
It belonged to Thomas Hayes.
The uniform had been used to clean blood from an injury.
Margaret remembered the cut on Thomas’s forehead after Rachel’s crash.
The pieces aligned.
Thomas had used Evelyn’s uniform to destroy evidence and frame her if the crime was ever uncovered.
But one detail remained unexplained.
Why preserve the uniform inside an empty coffin?
Charles answered during his second interrogation.
“Insurance.”
Thomas and Charles had turned on each other after Rachel’s death.
Charles kept the tape.
Thomas kept evidence connecting Evelyn to the hospital.
Each man held enough proof to destroy the others.
For two decades, they survived through mutual blackmail.
Margaret sat across from Charles.
“You came to the wedding with the file.”
Charles nodded.
“Why that day?”
“Because Thomas left instructions.”
Emily stiffened.
“My father planned this?”
“Not exactly.”
Before his death, Thomas had written a sealed confession to be delivered if Nathan was ever found.
Charles had ignored it for six years.
Then Sophie discovered the file and threatened to expose him.
Charles decided the wedding would force everyone into the open.
“You knew Nathan was Margaret’s son before the ceremony,” Brooks said.
Charles looked down.
“Yes.”
Nathan lunged across the table.
Detectives held him back.
“You let me stand at the altar with my sister!”
“I planned to stop it before the vows.”
“You waited until her mother ripped my shirt open!”
Charles had gambled with their lives to stage his own partial redemption.
Nathan understood then that Charles had not brought truth.
He had brought theater.
That evening, Sophie visited him in jail.
Charles slid a key beneath the glass partition.
“There is a safe in my office.”
“What’s inside?”
“Thomas’s confession.”
Sophie did not take the key.
“Why should I help you?”
“Because the confession names someone else.”
“Who?”
Charles looked toward the guard.
Then lowered his voice.
“The person who chose Laura Reed.”
Sophie’s blood turned cold.
It had not been Evelyn.
May you like
It had not been Charles.
According to Thomas’s confession, the adoptive mother had been selected by Margaret’s own sister.
