Chapter 19 - THE WEDDING DAY
Saturday morning arrived bright, cold, and painfully beautiful.
The storm was gone.
White chairs still lined the south lawn.
Florists had built an arch of roses facing the sea.
Two hundred guests had been told the wedding was canceled due to “a private family emergency.”
By nine, half of Newport already knew there was more to it.
Dominic did not care.
He stood in the kitchen drinking coffee while Emma supervised breakfast.
“You know,” she said, “most canceled grooms sleep in.”
“I’ve had enough surprises before breakfast this week.”
Natalie entered in jeans and one of Catherine’s old sweaters.
Noah followed carrying his wooden sailboat.
“Uncle Dom?”
“Yes?”
“Can we take the chairs down?”
Dominic looked toward the windows.
Rows of white chairs sat empty under the morning sun.
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“All of them.”
Noah grinned for the first time in two days.
They spent the next hour helping the staff clear the lawn.
Dominic carried chairs.
Luca carried six at a time and pretended not to notice Noah counting.
Natalie removed flowers from the arch and placed them in vases around the house.
Emma made the caterers serve the unused wedding brunch to every employee, officer, contractor, and firefighter who had been on the property since Thursday.
At noon, Detective Ruiz returned.
Dominic met her in the library.
“Brooke formally gave a statement with counsel present this morning,” she said. “She repeated the core admissions.”
“And Adrian?”
“Denies everything.”
“Grant?”
“Talking enough to save himself twenty years of regret.”
Dominic almost smiled.
Ruiz placed a folder on the table.
“We recovered a significant portion of the warehouse records. Your mother’s trust appears to have been looted through Harbor Nine and related companies. Natalie’s signatures were forged. So were several of yours.”
Natalie, standing near the fireplace, exhaled slowly.
Ruiz continued. “The financial case will take time. Catherine’s death is being reopened.”
Silence.
Noah was outside with Luca.
Thank God.
Dominic asked, “What about Brooke’s last statement? Someone in my family?”
Ruiz looked at him.
“She gave us a name.”
“Who?”
“Randall Harrington.”
Dominic frowned. “That’s her father. Not my family.”
“That’s what we said.”
Ruiz opened the folder.
“Brooke claims Randall wasn’t the original source. He got access from a Mercer relative who had old authorization codes from your father’s era.”
Natalie’s face tightened.
“We don’t have Mercer relatives with access.”
Dominic did not answer.
He had one.
An uncle.
His father’s younger brother, Vincent Mercer, had vanished from family business after a feud seventeen years earlier.
Officially, Vincent lived in Florida and played golf.
Unofficially, nobody in the family spoke his name.
Ruiz watched Dominic’s face.
“You thought of someone.”
“No.”
“Bad lie.”
Emma, passing the open library door, muttered, “Runs in the house this week.”
Ruiz almost smiled.
Dominic changed the subject.
“I want the cottage trust fixed.”
“It was never legally transferred. The forged amendment has no force if the original is proven fraudulent.”
Natalie looked at him.
“So the cottage is still mine and Noah’s?”
Ruiz nodded. “Looks that way.”
Natalie started crying again.
She laughed at herself while she did it.
“I am so tired of crying.”
Dominic walked to her.
“I made Mom a promise,” he said. “You always have a home here.”
Natalie shook her head.
“No.”
He stiffened.
She smiled through tears.
“I don’t want a home here because you promised Mom. I want one because you’re my brother.”
Dominic looked away for a second.
“That’s worse.”
She laughed and hugged him.
At three that afternoon, the four of them walked to the burned cottage.
Only the front stone walls remained solid.
Noah stood in the doorway and looked at the damage.
“Can we build it back?”
Dominic put a hand on his shoulder.
“Better.”
“No.”
Dominic looked down.
Noah shook his head.
“The same.”
Natalie smiled.
“The same,” Dominic agreed.
Emma approached carrying the scorched metal cash box recovered from the fire.
“Workers found this under the desk debris.”
Dominic frowned. “We already emptied it.”
“Not all of it.”
She turned it upside down.
A false bottom slid loose.
Under it was a sealed envelope.
Catherine’s handwriting covered the front.
DOMINIC — OPEN ONLY AFTER THE WEDDING.
Noah looked at the empty lawn behind them.
“Well,” he said, “technically the wedding is over.”
Dominic stared at the envelope.
Then broke the seal.
—
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