Chapter 8 - Victor’s Second Plan
Victor was released the next morning.
That was how Lena learned that an arrest was not the same thing as an ending.
Technically, he had not even been arrested on the attempted-murder charge yet. Police held him on a financial matter related to false records, questioned him with counsel present, then released him pending further review.
Tessa explained it twice.
Lena understood every word.
She still wanted to throw something.
“So he just goes home?”
“Not your home.”
“Our home.”
“Legally, that question is being handled.”
“My clothes are there.”
“We’ll arrange supervised retrieval.”
“My daughters’ nursery is there.”
“I know.”
“My grandmother’s photo is there.”
“I know.”
Lena pressed her palms against her eyes.
The hospital room smelled like sanitizer and formula.
Nothing belonged to her.
Not the bed.
Not the walls.
Not even the socks.
Victor still had the house.
The house where he had assembled two cribs.
The house where he had planned her funeral.
“I hate this.”
Tessa’s voice softened.
“I know.”
Mason did not tell Lena to be patient.
He did something better.
He asked what she needed.
“A place to stay when the girls are discharged.”
“Okay.”
“Not your house.”
“I didn’t offer.”
“Good.”
“A car?”
“I have one.”
“Safe phone?”
She hesitated.
Victor knew her number.
Her passwords.
Her habits.
“Yes.”
Mason nodded.
“Done.”
“I’ll pay you back.”
“No.”
“Mason.”
“This is not money. My company has secure phones for executives. I’m lending you one.”
“I’ll pay the monthly bill.”
“Fine.”
“Don’t sound pleased.”
“I enjoy negotiations I’m winning.”
“You are not winning.”
“See? You’re recovering.”
The phone arrived that afternoon.
Only six numbers were saved.
Tessa.
Detective Cole.
The hospital.
Lena’s sister Amy.
Mason.
Emergency services.
She stared at Mason’s name.
“You put yourself above 911.”
“Alphabetical.”
She checked.
It was not.
“You’re insufferable.”
“I missed you too.”
Two days later, Lena received a message on her old number.
A photograph.
Her front door.
Then another.
The twins’ nursery.
Then a third.
The rocking chair beside the window.
No words.
Lena stopped breathing.
Tessa told her not to respond.
Cole sent officers to document the house.
Victor was not there.
The photos could have been taken earlier.
“Why send them?”
Lena asked.
Cole answered honestly.
“To remind you he can reach places you consider safe.”
The tactic worked.
That night, Lena refused to sleep.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the freezer.
Now it was not cold.
It was the nursery.
The door closed.
The monitor went dark.
At three in the morning, Priya found Lena standing between the incubators.
“You need rest.”
“I’m resting.”
“You’re standing.”
“Technicality.”
Priya crossed her arms.
“Do I need to call Mason?”
Lena looked offended.
“Why would that work?”
“Because you listen to him when you’re too tired to argue effectively.”
“I never listen to Mason.”
Priya raised one eyebrow.
Lena sighed.
“Fine.”
Mason arrived forty minutes later wearing sweatpants beneath a wool coat.
Lena stared.
“I have never seen you dressed this badly.”
“I was asleep.”
“You sleep?”
“Rarely. You ruined it.”
He sat.
“What happened?”
She showed him the photographs.
His joking expression disappeared.
“Cole knows?”
“Yes.”
“Tessa?”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t answer?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“Everyone keeps saying ‘good’ when I do basic things.”
“Trauma lowers the grading curve.”
She almost smiled.
Then whispered, “I’m scared.”
Mason leaned forward.
“I know.”
“I hate saying that.”
“I know.”
“If Victor wanted money, why not take the trust and leave?”
“Because people like him don’t only want money.”
“What else?”
Mason thought.
“Control.”
Lena looked toward Sophie.
“When I stopped being easy to control…”
“He changed the problem.”
She nodded.
The next morning, the hospital moved the babies’ information behind additional privacy protections after someone called pretending to be Lena’s cousin.
The caller asked when the twins would be discharged.
Cole traced the number to a prepaid phone.
Lena’s fear hardened again.
“This is not Victor improvising.”
“No,” Cole said.
“Someone is helping him.”
“That is one possibility.”
“Who?”
“We’re looking.”
Paige Holloway provided records the same day.
Buried among old invoices was Northline Advisory.
The shell company existed years before the freezer attack.
It had paid consultants, private investigators, and what appeared to be crisis-management firms.
One name appeared repeatedly.
Rachel Sloane.
Lena knew it.
She just could not place it.
Then Amy called.
“Rachel?”
“Yes.”
“Victor’s college friend.”
Lena remembered.
Tall red-haired woman.
Perfect posture.
Always smiling slightly too late.
Rachel had attended their wedding.
She sent expensive baby gifts.
She had once told Lena that Victor “needed someone steady” because he became destructive under pressure.
“What does she do?”
“Public relations, I think.”
Mason, sitting across the room, looked up.
Lena put the call on speaker.
Amy continued.
“Crisis strategy. Reputation management. Rich people disasters.”
Mason’s expression changed.
“Ask if Rachel ever worked for Victor’s company.”
Amy answered before Lena asked.
“She did. Quietly. Two years ago, around that accountant situation.”
Paige.
Lena felt sick.
Victor did not merely destroy people.
He hired someone to shape the story afterward.
Tessa found Rachel’s company website.
One sentence on the homepage read:
When the facts are complicated, narrative is everything.
Lena laughed.
It sounded unhinged.
She did not care.
“That woman helped him call Paige a thief.”
“Maybe,” Tessa said.
“She helped him call me unstable.”
“Possibly.”
“She sent the nursery pictures.”
“We do not know that.”
Lena looked around the room.
“Does everyone in my life take a class on ruining dramatic moments with evidence?”
“Yes,” Mason said.
“Excellent.”
That afternoon, Rachel Sloane contacted Tessa.
Not Victor.
Not the police.
Tessa.
She wanted immunity.
The room went silent when Tessa delivered the message.
“Immunity for what?” Lena asked.
“She has not said.”
“Will prosecutors give it?”
“That depends on what she has.”
Detective Cole arranged the interview.
Rachel arrived with her own attorney and a hard drive.
She did not look guilty.
She looked tired.
“I never agreed to kill anyone,” she said.
Lena’s nails dug into her palm.
“Then what did you agree to?”
Rachel looked at her.
“To make sure that if something happened to you, the world believed Victor was a grieving husband.”
Nobody moved.
Lena heard the freezer door slam all over again.
Rachel continued.
“He gave me the story three months ago.”
“What story?”
“That your pregnancy had made you depressed. That you were taking risks. Wandering. Forgetting things.”
Lena stood.
Tessa touched her sleeve.
Rachel’s eyes filled.
“I thought he was planning a divorce.”
“You built my obituary.”
“I didn’t know.”
“You built it anyway.”
Rachel lowered her head.
Then she pushed the hard drive across the table.
“This contains every message he sent me.”
Cole reached for it.
Rachel did not let go.
“There’s more.”
Everyone waited.
“Victor had a second version of the plan.”
Lena’s skin went cold.
“If the freezer failed,” Rachel said, “he wanted people to believe Mason Reed tried to kill you.”
Mason’s face became completely still.
Lena turned toward him.
May you like
Victor had not only planned her death.
He had planned the man who would take the blame.
