Chapter 6: What Vanessa Was Really After
Naomi showed Ethan the message without comment.
He read it twice.
"She has your number."
"She has access to the household staff directory.
It's kept in the house manager's office." Naomi set the phone face-down.
"She's been in this house for months.
She had time."
"What does she want from you?"
"She wants me afraid." Naomi stood and carried her cold cup to the sink.
"She expected me to fall in that ballroom.
When I didn't, I became a problem she hadn't planned for.
Now she's trying to correct that."
"By threatening you."
"By reminding me that she knows who I am and where I am." She turned.
"It won't work.
But it tells us something.
She's rattled.
Rattled people make the next move too quickly."
Ethan nodded slowly.
He trusted her read.
She could see that he did, and it was a strange feeling — being trusted again in that particular way, by someone who had reason to.
They spent the next hour going through what Ethan knew.
Vanessa Sterling had entered his life fourteen months ago through a charity event his company had sponsored.
She was charming, socially fluent, and had presented herself as the daughter of a Connecticut family with modest but respectable money.
She had never asked for anything directly.
She had simply been present, consistently, until being present became being indispensable.
"Davis Holt," Naomi said.
"Tell me everything."
"Eleven years.
That's all I have from the wire transfer record.
My attorney is pulling more tonight."
"If she's known him eleven years and she met you fourteen months ago, he predates you significantly." Naomi sat back down.
"He's not a lover she's hiding.
He's a partner.
This was structured."
Ethan went still.
"You think she targeted me."
"I think someone looked at Whitmore Development, identified you as the heir, identified the estate's value, and built a plan around a marriage that would give access to the inheritance." She kept her voice even.
"The wire transfer was forty-six thousand.
That's not a personal expense.
That's a payment.
For research, for access, for legal consultation — or for all three."
"She was going to marry me for the estate."
"The codicil your grandfather added eight months ago would have blocked her.
She found out about it three months ago when he told her directly." Naomi looked at him.
"She's been working on a response ever since.
Tonight was part of it."
Ethan was quiet for a long time.
"My grandfather," he finally said.
"He told her about the codicil himself.
He must have suspected something."
"Or he wanted to see what she'd do."
Something moved across Ethan's face.
He picked up his phone and dialed.
The call connected on the second ring.
"Grandfather." A pause.
"I know it's late.
I need to ask you something directly." Another pause.
"Did you tell Vanessa about the codicil because you suspected her, or because you trusted her?"
Naomi watched his face as he listened.
His expression didn't change much.
But his hand tightened on the phone.
"I see," he said.
"Yes.
I'll come by tomorrow morning." He ended the call and set the phone on the table very carefully.
"He suspected her," Naomi said.
"He suspected her for four months.
He added the codicil specifically to protect the estate.
He told her about it deliberately — to watch her reaction." Ethan looked at the table.
"Her reaction was to smile and say she thought it was very sensible."
"And then she hired Davis Holt to find a way around it."
"Yes." He looked up.
"My grandfather said there's something else.
Something he didn't put in any document because he wasn't certain enough.
He wants to tell me in person."
The kitchen was very quiet.
"Then we go to him in the morning," Naomi said.
"We," Ethan said.
"If you want."
"I want," he said simply.
Naomi's phone lit up again on the table between them.
The same unknown number.
This time it was not four words.
It was a photograph.
Naomi picked it up.
The image was taken from outside — through a window, at an angle.
It showed the kitchen table, the laptop, the small drive, and two people sitting across from each other in the light.
May you like
It had been taken within the last hour.
Someone was still on the property.
