I looked up.
“Why didn’t you come to me?”
“I tried.”
“When?”
“The day after his funeral.”
I frowned.
“I don’t remember.”
“You weren’t supposed to.”
My blood went cold.
“What does that mean?”
Evelyn looked around.
“Your father’s death was investigated as an accident.”
“Yes.”
“It wasn’t.”
I stared at her.
She continued quietly.
“He found out that someone had been stealing money from a company he worked for. Millions.”
“Who?”
“He never told me the name.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because I saw what he found.”
She touched the metal box.
“Everything was inside this.”
I looked at it.
“Why is it here?”
“Because I was arrested for something I didn’t do.”
The corridor suddenly seemed colder.
“What were you arrested for?”
“Murder.”
I stared at her.
“Whose?”
She looked directly into my eyes.
“Your father’s.”
I couldn’t speak.
“My father died eleven years ago.”
“I know.”
“And you were arrested for killing him?”
“No.”
Her voice became barely audible.
“I was arrested eleven years after his death.”
I frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
“It will.”
Before I could ask another question, footsteps echoed down the corridor.
Mack.
She walked past us slowly.
She didn’t say anything.
But she looked at Evelyn.
Then at me.
Then she smiled.
That night I couldn’t sleep.
Around two in the morning, I heard something scrape beneath my cell door.
I got out of bed.
A small envelope lay on the floor.
No name.
No return address.
Inside was a photograph.
It showed my father standing outside a warehouse.
Beside him was Evelyn.
But there was someone else in the photograph.
A woman whose face had been scratched out.
On the back, someone had written:
SHE KNOWS WHY YOUR FATHER DIED.
I stared at it for a long time.
Then I heard a voice behind me.
“You should have stayed out of this.”
I turned.
Mack was standing at the end of the corridor.
She wasn’t alone.
And for the first time since I arrived at Westbridge, I realized something terrifying.
Mack hadn’t attacked Evelyn because she wanted her belongings.
She had attacked her because she wanted that metal box.
PART 3 — WHAT WAS INSIDE THE BOX
The next morning, Evelyn’s cell was empty.
I knew immediately something was wrong.
Her blanket was folded.
Her shoes were gone.
The metal box was gone too.
