Chapter 3: What Daniel Heard
Eleanor did not answer the call.
She pressed the phone against her side, screen down, and turned back toward the officers with a smile that had lost its steadiness.
"Shall we step into the sitting room?" she said.
"I'd prefer not to discuss family business in the foyer."
"We'll need to speak with everyone separately, ma'am," the officer said.
"Starting with the young woman."
"She's in shock," Eleanor said quickly.
"She's not in a state to give an accurate account of anything."
Arthur's voice came from across the foyer.
Quiet.
Flat.
"She seemed accurate enough to me."
Eleanor turned.
The two housemaids were still standing near the table.
Neither of them had moved toward the door.
Neither of them was pretending to polish anything anymore.
The officer stepped toward Sarah.
"Ma'am, can you tell me what happened?"
Sarah looked up.
Her hands were still pressed against her belly.
Her voice, when it came, was steadier than anyone expected.
"She pushed me.
She walked up behind me while I was reaching over the railing for the pieces of my ultrasound — the one she tore up — and she put both hands on my shoulders and shoved me."
"That is an outright lie," Eleanor said.
"There were witnesses," Sarah said.
She didn't raise her voice.
She didn't look away from the officer.
"Arthur caught me.
And the two maids were standing right there."
The officer turned toward the housemaids.
The younger one, a woman named Petra who had worked at the mansion for three years, looked at Eleanor.
Eleanor's expression did not change, but her chin lifted — a small, precise movement that everyone in that room understood.
Petra looked back at the officer.
"I saw it," she said.
The older maid, Rosa, pressed her lips together.
Then she nodded once.
"So did I."
The sound Eleanor made was not quite a laugh.
It was something thinner and colder than that.
"These women work for me," she said.
"They will say whatever keeps their positions."
"Mrs.
Vance." The second officer stepped forward.
He had been quiet until now, standing near the door with a notepad.
"We're going to need you to come with us to give a formal statement."
"I am not going anywhere," Eleanor said.
"I am in my own home.
My attorneys will be here within the hour, and I suggest you speak to them before you say another word to me."
Her phone buzzed again against her palm.
She looked down despite herself.
A text this time.
*Mom.
I know what you did.
I've known for weeks.
Don't say anything else to the police.
I'm already on my way.*
Eleanor read it twice.
Her son's name was Daniel.
He was thirty-four years old, the only child of her late husband Richard Vance, and the one person in the world she had always believed was entirely hers.
She had spent eight months working to remove Sarah from his life.
She had intercepted letters.
Cancelled appointments.
Told Daniel, carefully and repeatedly, that Sarah was unstable, manipulative, and interested only in the Vance fortune.
She had been so certain he believed her.
The phone screen went dark in her hand.
Across the foyer, Arthur was speaking quietly to the paramedic beside Sarah.
He glanced up once toward Eleanor.
May you like
His expression said nothing and everything at the same time.
Eleanor Vance, for the first time in longer than she could remember, did not know what was about to happen next.
