Part 3: The Women He Planned to Bury
“He had one on me too.”
Rachel’s words seemed to stop the air inside the restaurant.
I stared at her.
“What?”
Her eyes remained fixed on Drew.
“A life insurance policy,” she said. “Three hundred thousand dollars. I found out after he disappeared.”
Drew shook his head violently.
“That was completely different.”
Rachel laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“You always say that when the lie changes.”
The two police officers were almost at our table now.
One of them, a tall woman with silver threaded through her dark hair, held up a hand.
“Everyone stay where you are.”
Drew immediately straightened his jacket.
It was almost impressive.
Less than a minute earlier, he had looked cornered.
Now he looked like the polite businessman I had married.
“Officer, thank God you’re here,” he said. “My wife is having some kind of emotional episode.”
I looked at him.
My wife.
He still had the nerve.
The officer glanced at me.
“Are you Natalie Cross?”
“Yes.”
“Did you call regarding someone inside your residence?”
“I didn’t. But someone should.”
Graham stepped forward.
“I contacted dispatch.”
Drew’s jaw tightened.
The officer looked between us.
“And you are?”
“Graham Holt. Licensed private investigator.”
That finally answered the question I had asked when this nightmare began.
The officer nodded toward the security footage still frozen on my phone.
“Can I see that?”
I handed it to her.
Drew reached toward me.
“Natalie, we should handle this privately.”
I stepped away.
“There is nothing private left.”
The officer watched the footage of Drew’s mother entering my office and carrying out the red folder.
“Does this woman have permission to be inside your home?”
“No.”
Drew interrupted.
“She has a key.”
The officer looked at him.
“That wasn’t the question.”
He went silent.
I said, “I never gave her permission to enter tonight. I didn’t even know she had a key.”
The officer spoke briefly into her radio.
“Units are already headed to the residence.”
Drew’s face tightened.
“You don’t need to send anyone there.”
I looked at him.
“Why not?”
“My mother is probably just picking up some things.”
“From my locked house?”
“It’s my house too.”
“That red folder belongs to me?”
He hesitated.
I felt Graham watching him.
“Does it?”
Drew glanced toward the doors.
The second officer quietly moved closer to them.
Rachel noticed.
So did I.
Drew did not have an exit anymore.
Madison sat down slowly.
One hand pressed against her stomach.
Celeste crouched beside her.
Malcolm stood behind them with both hands clenched.
The little boy had been led toward the lobby by a restaurant employee, thankfully far enough away that he could no longer hear us.
Rachel stepped closer to me.
“When I found my policy, Drew said it was normal.”
I looked at her.
“When?”
“About six months before he disappeared.”
Drew snapped, “We had a child together. Life insurance is normal.”
Rachel turned toward him.
“Yes. On yourself.”
Drew’s face hardened.
Rachel continued.
“You insured me.”
“I paid the bills.”
“You were the beneficiary.”
“Because we were married.”
“And I never signed the paperwork.”
The female officer looked up sharply.
“You never signed it?”
“No.”
“Did you report that?”
Rachel swallowed.
“No.”
Drew smiled for the first time.
It was small and ugly.
“Because there was nothing to report.”
Rachel looked ashamed.
“I thought maybe I had forgotten signing something.”
My chest tightened.
Of course she had.
That was what Drew did.
He did not merely lie.
He made you doubt your memory until his version felt safer than your own.
I knew because I had lived there for three years.
The officer turned toward me.
“Mrs. Cross, do you recognize the signature on the policy Mr. Holt showed you?”
“It looks like mine.”
“Did you sign it?”
“No.”
“Did you authorize your husband to sign it?”
“No.”
Drew exhaled dramatically.
“This is getting ridiculous.”
The officer faced him.
“Then I suggest you stop talking until we understand exactly what happened.”
He did not.
“Anyone can buy insurance on a spouse.”
Graham answered calmly.
“Not by forging medical consent documents.”
Drew’s face changed.
There it was again.
That flicker.
Fear.
The officer noticed.
“What medical documents?”
Graham reached into his folder.
“This policy required a health questionnaire and medical authorization. Natalie’s signature appears on both.”
I stared at him.
“How did you get those?”
“Malcolm’s attorney obtained them this afternoon after we discovered the loan documents.”
“This afternoon?”
I looked toward Malcolm.
“You knew before tonight?”
He nodded.
“We knew enough to be worried.”
My voice rose.
“So instead of telling me, you let me sit here and watch my husband propose to your daughter?”
Malcolm looked genuinely ashamed.
“I needed Madison to see him do it.”
I stared at him.
“That was more important than warning me?”
“No.”
His answer came immediately.
“But my daughter has defended him every time I tried to show her something. She believed I hated him because he wasn’t wealthy.”
Madison lowered her eyes.
Malcolm continued quietly.
“I needed proof she couldn’t explain away.”
I wanted to scream at him.
Part of me did.
But when I looked at Madison, pale and pregnant beside her mother, I understood something terrible.
Drew had not just fooled one woman.
He had created different versions of himself for all of us.
For Rachel, he had been a struggling young husband trying to build a future.
For me, a successful businessman working too hard.
For Madison, a grieving widower ready to love again.
Every woman had been given exactly the man she was most likely to trust.
Graham seemed to read my thoughts.
“We think there are others.”
I turned to him.
“What?”
Drew went still.
Rachel whispered, “Others?”
Graham took out his phone.
“This investigation started with Madison’s missing money. Once we found your marriage, Natalie, we looked deeper.”
He swiped across the screen.
“Drew has used at least four different residential addresses over the last eleven years.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Drew said.
“Three different middle initials.”
My eyes snapped toward Drew.
“And two Social Security numbers.”
Silence.
The female officer looked at Graham.
“You have documentation?”
“Yes.”
Drew’s voice sharpened.
“This man is stalking me.”
Graham ignored him.
“We also found a civil case in Missouri under the name Andrew Crossman.”
Drew’s face lost all expression.
My stomach tightened.
“Andrew Crossman?”
Graham nodded.
“Same date of birth. Same photograph on an archived company profile.”
“What kind of case?”
“A woman sued him for money she claimed he borrowed while they were engaged.”
I looked at Madison.
She was crying silently now.
“How much?”
“One hundred and eighty thousand dollars.”
“What happened?”
“The case disappeared.”
“Settled?”
“No.”
Graham looked at Drew.
“The plaintiff died.”
Nobody moved.
Even the officers went quiet.
I heard a glass being placed on a table somewhere behind us.
“What was her name?” I asked.
“Caroline Mercer.”
“How did she die?”
Graham’s eyes stayed on mine.
“Car accident.”
The lie Drew told Madison about me.
I felt the floor shift beneath my feet.
Madison seemed to realize it at the same moment.
She looked at Drew with horror.
“You said Natalie died in a car accident.”
“That was a story.”
Rachel whispered, “Was Caroline insured?”
Graham looked at her.
“We don’t know yet.”
Drew suddenly laughed.
It was too loud.
“This is insane.”
No one joined him.
“You’re talking about something that happened years ago. I barely knew Caroline.”
Graham’s expression hardened.
“You were listed as her fiancé in the obituary.”
Drew’s laugh stopped.
I felt cold all over.
“Did you get money when she died?”
His eyes met mine.
“Natalie, don’t start.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
Graham said, “We found a payment.”
Drew spun toward him.
“You have no right—”
“Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Rachel covered her mouth.
Malcolm swore under his breath.
Madison stared at Drew.
I could barely speak.
“Insurance?”
Graham nodded.
“A policy taken out approximately fourteen months before Caroline’s death.”
Drew stepped toward him.
“You don’t know what that money was.”
The second officer moved between them.
“Sir, back up.”
“I’m being accused of murder in a restaurant.”
Graham’s voice remained calm.
“I did not accuse you of murder.”
“You practically did.”
“No.”
Graham slipped his phone into his jacket.
“I said a woman you were engaged to died while you were the beneficiary of a policy on her life.”
Drew pointed at him.
“You’re twisting everything.”
Graham did not blink.
“You’re doing a good enough job of that yourself.”
My phone rang.
The sound startled me so badly I almost dropped it.
Unknown number.
I answered.
“Hello?”
“This is Officer Bennett with city police. Are you Natalie Cross?”
“Yes.”
“We’re at your residence.”
My eyes went to Drew.
His face was unreadable.
“Did you find his mother?”
A pause.
“No, ma’am.”
I looked toward the door.
“She was there.”
“We can see signs someone recently left through the rear entrance.”
“Did she take the folder?”
“We don’t know yet.”
I swallowed.
“Please check the office.”
Another pause.
“We’re standing in the office now.”
“And?”
“There appears to be some damage.”
“What kind of damage?”
“A filing cabinet has been emptied. Several drawers are open. There are papers on the floor.”
My heart hammered.
“Is anything else missing?”
“We’ll need you to identify what belongs there.”
Then I heard another officer speaking in the background.
Officer Bennett said, “Hold on.”
I waited.
Drew watched me.
Thirty seconds passed.
Then Officer Bennett returned.
“Mrs. Cross?”
“Yes?”
“We found something underneath the desk.”
“What?”
“A second phone.”
Drew closed his eyes.
That was all I needed to see.
“Whose phone?” I asked.
“We don’t know.”
“Turn it on.”
“We can’t search its contents without proper authorization.”
“It’s in my house.”
“That may help, but we still have procedures to follow.”
Drew exhaled.
Relief.
Small.
But visible.
Graham noticed too.
He moved beside me and whispered, “Ask them what kind.”
“What kind of phone is it?”
“Black smartphone. Older model. Screen is cracked.”
Graham’s expression changed.
“What?” I whispered.
He did not answer.
Officer Bennett continued.
“There’s also what looks like dried blood on the case.”
My stomach dropped.
Drew moved.
Not toward the door.
Toward his jacket pocket.
The female officer reacted immediately.
“Hands where I can see them.”
“I’m getting my keys.”
“Hands up.”
He slowly raised them.
I stared at him.
“Blood?”
Graham took my phone gently.
“Officer, this is Graham Holt. I’m working with the family. Please secure the device exactly where you found it. Don’t move anything else in that room.”
“Understood.”
He handed the phone back.
I disconnected.
“What do you know?”
Graham looked uneasy.
It was the first time all night I had seen him hesitate.
“Tell me.”
“There was something about Caroline’s case that bothered me.”
Drew said, “Shut up.”
Everyone looked at him.
Graham continued.
“Her phone was never recovered after the accident.”
Rachel whispered, “You think that’s hers?”
“I don’t know.”
Drew laughed again.
“This is unbelievable. An old phone under a desk is suddenly evidence in some twelve-year-old accident?”
Graham looked at him.
“You didn’t live in that house twelve years ago.”
Drew went silent.
I looked between them.
“What does that mean?”
“The phone could not have been sitting under that desk since Caroline died.”
I understood.
Someone had brought it there.
Recently.
I looked at Drew.
His face had turned gray.
The female officer touched her radio.
“Dispatch, I need a unit to contact detectives regarding a possible connection to an older death investigation.”
Drew shook his head.
“You’re all making a huge mistake.”
Then Rachel said something that made him stop.
“Caroline wasn’t the first.”
Graham stared at her.
“What did you say?”
Rachel’s hands trembled.
“When Drew and I were married, I found a photograph.”
Drew whispered, “Rachel.”
She ignored him.
“A woman I didn’t know.”
“Where?”
“In his wallet.”
“Rachel.”
She looked directly at him.
“You told me she was your cousin.”
Drew’s eyes filled with warning.
Rachel’s voice grew stronger.
“She wasn’t your cousin, was she?”
Graham stepped closer.
“Do you remember her name?”
“No. But there was writing on the back of the picture.”
“What did it say?”
Rachel closed her eyes.
“I love you forever, A.”
Graham took out his phone.
“Describe her.”
“Dark curly hair. Maybe late twenties. Green eyes.”
He typed something.
Drew suddenly rushed him.
The officer caught Drew by the arm and shoved him against the table.
Glasses crashed.
Madison screamed.
“Enough!” the officer shouted.
She pulled Drew’s arms behind him.
“What are you doing?” he yelled.
“Detaining you until we sort this out.”
“You can’t arrest me because my ex-wife saw a photograph!”
“I didn’t say you were under arrest.”
The handcuffs clicked around his wrists.
The sound made every person in the restaurant silent.
Drew looked at me.
“Natalie.”
I felt nothing.
Not yet.
Maybe everything inside me had overloaded.
Maybe grief could only absorb so much before becoming numb.
Then Graham’s phone buzzed.
He looked at the screen.
His face went completely still.
“What?” I asked.
He turned the phone toward Rachel.
“Is this her?”
The screen showed a photograph from an old missing-person article.
Rachel stared at it.
Her lips parted.
“Yes.”
Graham looked at Drew.
The officer holding him seemed to sense the change.
“Who is she?” I asked.
Graham read from the article.
“Amelia Grant. Twenty-eight years old. Disappeared eleven years ago.”
Rachel whispered, “That’s her.”
“Are you certain?”
“I’m certain.”
My mouth went dry.
“What happened to her?”
“No body was ever found.”
I looked at Drew.
He stared at the floor.
Graham scrolled.
“She disappeared from Kansas City.”
Rachel frowned.
“That’s where Drew lived before we met.”
Graham nodded.
“And according to this article, police believed Amelia left voluntarily because she emptied part of her savings account before disappearing.”
“How much?”
“Nearly ninety thousand dollars.”
Malcolm asked, “Who received it?”
“They never determined that.”
Drew muttered, “Because it had nothing to do with me.”
Graham looked at him.
“How did you know there was no connection?”
Drew’s face twitched.
“You just said they never determined where it went.”
“I said police never determined where it went.”
Graham stepped closer.
“I didn’t say we hadn’t.”
Drew stopped breathing for half a second.
That half second told all of us everything.
Graham opened another document.
“The money was transferred through three accounts.”
He looked at Drew.
“The final account belonged to Andrew C. Lawson.”
Rachel whispered, “Andrew.”
Graham nodded.
“Same first name he used in Missouri.”
The female officer spoke into her radio again.
This time her tone was different.
Sharper.
More urgent.
Drew finally stopped fighting.
I watched his shoulders sink.
But I knew him well enough to understand that surrender was never surrender.
It was calculation.
He was already trying to find the next lie.
My phone vibrated.
A text message.
Unknown number.
I opened it.
STOP TALKING TO THEM.
I froze.
A second message arrived.
YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOUR HUSBAND IS CAPABLE OF.
I looked at Drew.
His hands were cuffed behind his back.
His phone had been placed on the table.
He could not have sent it.
“Graham.”
He read the message.
His face hardened.
“Don’t respond.”
Another message appeared.
THE RED FOLDER IS GONE.
Then another.
IF YOU WANT TO STAY ALIVE, LEAVE THE REST BURIED.
My fingers went numb.
Rachel leaned over and read it.
“Who is that?”
“I don’t know.”
Drew smiled.
It was barely there.
But I saw it.
So did Graham.
I walked toward him.
“Who is sending these?”
He looked at me with something almost like pity.
“Natalie, you should have thrown the wine.”
My skin crawled.
“What does that mean?”
He leaned closer despite the officer holding him.
“You think tonight is about me cheating on you?”
His voice dropped.
“It’s not.”
I stared at him.
“Then what is it about?”
He smiled again.
“You.”
The officer pulled him backward.
I followed.
“What about me?”
Drew said nothing.
“What about me?”
Graham stepped between us.
“Natalie, stop.”
“No.”
I tried to move around him.
“Three years. He has lied to me for three years. I want him to say it.”
Drew looked over Graham’s shoulder.
His eyes met mine.
And suddenly I saw the man beneath every version of him.
No charm.
No embarrassment.
No fear.
Just coldness.
“You still don’t understand why I married you.”
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“For my house?”
He smiled.
“No.”
“My money?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
The smile disappeared.
“Ask your father.”
The restaurant vanished around me.
“My father is dead.”
Drew’s eyes stayed locked on mine.
“I know.”
My mouth went dry.
My father had died four years earlier.
One year before I met Drew.
Heart attack.
Fifty-eight years old.
Healthy until the morning he collapsed inside his office.
“What does my father have to do with you?”
Drew said nothing.
Graham turned toward me.
“Natalie, did your father know a woman named Amelia Grant?”
I shook my head.
“I don’t know.”
“Did he ever work in Kansas City?”
My breath caught.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Years ago.”
“How many?”
I searched my memory.
“He had an engineering contract there when I was in college.”
Rachel whispered, “Eleven years ago?”
I looked at her.
Then at Graham.
“Yes.”
Graham immediately began typing.
I felt sick.
“No. My father had nothing to do with Drew.”
Drew laughed softly.
I turned toward him.
“What?”
“You really believed we met by accident?”
My entire body went cold.
We had met in a coffee shop.
He spilled coffee near my laptop.
Bought me another drink.
Asked me out three days later.
I had told that story at our wedding.
Everyone had laughed about fate.
Drew watched the realization spread across my face.
“That coffee shop,” I whispered.
“You knew who I was.”
He said nothing.
“You knew who I was before you walked in.”
Still nothing.
The female officer began guiding him toward the door.
I followed.
“Why?”
He glanced back.
“Ask what your father kept in the blue safe.”
I stopped walking.
Nobody else understood.
But Drew saw my face.
And smiled.
Because there had been a blue safe.
When Dad died, it had been built into the wall behind a painting in his study.
The police never found the key.
Six months later, someone broke into the house.
Nothing expensive was taken.
Only the safe.
The police called it strange.
I had forgotten about it.
Until now.
Graham stepped toward me.
“What blue safe?”
Before I could answer, my phone rang again.
This time the caller ID made my heart stop.
DAD
I stared at the screen.
My father’s old number.
Disconnected four years ago.
The phone continued ringing.
Rachel whispered, “Natalie?”
I could not move.
Graham saw the name.
“Don’t answer.”
But I already had.
I pressed the phone to my ear.
For two seconds there was only static.
Then a man spoke.
His voice was low.
Distorted.
“Your father should have burned what he found.”
My throat closed.
“Who is this?”
The voice ignored me.
“Drew was supposed to retrieve it.”
I looked toward the restaurant doors.
The officers were walking Drew toward a patrol car.
He turned.
Even from across the room, he seemed to know exactly who was calling me.
“What did my father find?”
Silence.
Then:
“Proof.”
“Proof of what?”
The line crackled.
“Of what happened to Amelia.”
My knees weakened.
Graham grabbed my arm.
“Put it on speaker.”
I did.
“Where is the proof?” I demanded.
The voice laughed softly.
“You already have it.”
“What?”
“Your father made sure of that.”
The call disconnected.
I stared at the phone.
Graham immediately said, “Did your father leave you anything unusual?”
“The house. Some investments. Personal things.”
“Documents?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Boxes?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“A lot. Most are still in storage.”
His expression sharpened.
“Where?”
I gave him the name of the storage facility.
He went completely still.
“What?”
Graham showed me the screen of his phone.
It was an address pulled from the documents he had been researching.
The same storage facility.
A unit had been rented there eleven years earlier.
Not by my father.
By Amelia Grant.
I stared at the address.
“That’s impossible.”
“No.”
Graham looked toward Drew through the restaurant window.
“It may be the reason he married you.”
My blood turned cold.
Then my phone buzzed with one final message.
This time there was a photograph attached.
It showed a storage-unit door.
My storage-unit door.
The lock had been cut.
The door was half open.
And underneath the photograph were six words:
WE FOUND THE BOX BEFORE YOU DID…………….
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 4…
