Chapter 5: Renata Voss
Mr.
Miller agreed to stay with Lily without being asked twice.
He settled into the armchair near Lily's door with a paperback he didn't open, and when Clara leaned down to kiss Lily's forehead, the little girl was already asleep, the neon-green backpack tucked beside her like a second pillow.
Clara sat in the back of Detective Hale's car at 4:40 in the morning and watched the city pass in streaks of wet light.
"Tell me about Renata Voss," she said.
Hale kept his eyes on the road.
"What do you know about her?"
"Only what Ethan told me.
She joined the firm eighteen months ago.
He said she was exceptional — the best project manager he'd ever worked with.
The senior living complex was behind schedule when she came on.
Within six months it was back on track." Clara looked at the rain on the window.
"He talked about her the way you talk about someone who saved something important to you."
"Did you think they were involved?"
"I wondered.
I asked him once." She paused.
"He said no.
He looked me in the eye and said no.
I believed him." She was quiet for a moment.
"I still believe him.
But I think Beatrice saw something I didn't."
"What do you mean?"
"Beatrice started inviting Renata to family dinners about eight months ago.
At first I thought she was being territorial — keeping an eye on a woman she suspected.
But she wasn't cold to Renata.
She was warm.
Almost deliberately warm." Clara turned from the window.
"Beatrice doesn't do anything without a reason.
If she was building a relationship with Renata, she wanted something from her."
Hale pulled into the station parking lot and cut the engine.
He didn't get out immediately.
"Renata Voss has a sealed juvenile record," he said.
"We can't access the details, but the flag exists.
It's the kind of thing a very thorough background check would surface — the kind of check a family office might run on someone close to a major heir."
Clara absorbed that.
"Beatrice knew something about Renata's past."
"That's our working theory.
We think she used it."
"To do what?"
Hale looked at her.
"Renata's apartment was searched this morning by the precinct handling her missing persons case.
They found a burner phone.
The last outgoing message was sent three days ago, the night Ethan disappeared." He paused.
"The message said: *It's done.
He doesn't know.
The bag is in place.*"
The rain drummed on the car roof.
"She planted it," Clara said.
"Beatrice sent Renata into my apartment."
"We believe Beatrice used her relationship with Renata — and whatever leverage she had over her past — to get Renata to place the bag.
Then Beatrice came herself to place the plant, to make sure the bag would be found close to the baseboard and not accidentally disturbed."
"And Ethan?"
Hale was quiet for one beat too long.
"Renata's car was found this morning," he said.
"Parked at the edge of the Vance construction site.
The senior living complex." He opened his door.
May you like
"We have a team there now."
Clara was out of the car before he finished the sentence.
