Chapter 5 - The Eulogy of a Murderer
The Cathedral of St. Vincent was draped in black velvet.
Three hundred of Manhattan’s elite filled the mahogany pews, a sea of bespoke suits, diamond earrings, and calculated murmurs. Rain lashed against the towering stained-glass windows, setting a grim, operatic tone for the memorial service of Claire Hayes and her unborn child.
At the front of the altar rested a polished mahogany casket, draped in white lilies.
It was empty.
Two miles away, in a secure surveillance van parked in an alley behind the municipal library, I sat in a wheelchair, hooked to an IV drip. Marcus had rigged a live, closed-circuit camera feed directly into the church's audio-visual console.
On the high-definition monitor in front of me, Daniel took the pulpit.
He wore a tailored Charcoal Tom Ford suit—the one I had bought him for our trip to Milan. A black silk tie was knotted perfectly at his collar. His hair was slightly disheveled, just enough to convey sleepless agony, but his skin was clean, rested.
Beside the pulpit, sitting in the front row reserved for family, sat Victoria. She wore a black veil, but beneath the lace, her posture was erect, regal. Around her wrist, catching the cathedral candlelight, was a platinum tennis bracelet.
My mother’s bracelet.
A strangled gasp caught in my crushed throat. Daniel had stolen it from my jewelry safe before the police even cordoned off the house. He had given it to her like a trophy.
"Friends... family..." Daniel began, his voice breaking on the first syllable. He stepped away from the microphone, took a ragged breath, and pressed a clean handkerchief to his eyes.
The crowd sighed in collective, sympathetic heartbreak.
"Claire was my compass," Daniel whispered, leaning back into the mic. "When I met her five years ago, I was just a man searching for purpose. She gave me that purpose. She gave me love, generosity, and the promise of a future."
In the van, Marcus clamped a heavy hand on my shoulder as the heart monitor taped to my chest began to beep erratically. "Easy, Claire. Look at his hands."
I forced my eyes onto Daniel’s hands gripping the wooden edges of the pulpit.
His left thumb was rhythmically tapping against the wood. One, two, three, four. A habit he had whenever he closed a multimillion-dollar merger. A habit of victory.
"She carried our child," Daniel continued, looking down at the empty casket with tear-filled eyes. "A son we were going to name Alexander. A boy who will never see the sun, never take his first steps, never know how deeply his father loved him."
*Alexander.* The bastard didn't even use the name we had chosen. He was rewriting every single detail of my life, scrubbing away my identity to fit his tragic narrative.
"Whoever took them from me did not just commit murder," Daniel's voice rose, vibrating with righteous, theatrical fury. "They tore the soul out of my chest. But I swear here, before God and before all of you, that every dollar of Claire’s legacy will be used to hunt down the monster responsible. I will not rest. I will not stop until justice is served."
Applause broke out—muted, solemn, but real. People were weeping in the pews. Old society women were dabbing their eyes with lace handkerchiefs.
Victoria rose from the front pew, walked gracefully up the altar steps, and placed a hand on Daniel’s shoulder. Daniel turned and buried his face in her neck, clinging to her as if she were the only raft in an endless ocean.
To the room, it was a devastated widower seeking solace from his wife’s best friend.
To me, watching through the lens of a forty-millimeter surveillance camera, it was something else entirely.
As Daniel pulled Victoria close, his lips brushed against her ear. And on the screen, zoomed in to maximum resolution, I saw Victoria’s mouth curl into a sharp, venomous smile.
Beneath the shadow of Daniel’s jacket, Victoria’s hand slid down his hip, slipping a small, brass key into his trousers pocket.
The key to my grandfather’s private safety deposit box at JP Morgan Chase.
I reached out, my trembling fingers pressing against the glass of the monitor, covering Daniel’s smiling face. I looked up at Marcus. I didn't need the legal pad.
I opened my mouth, forcing air through the scarred, bleeding tissues of my vocal cords. The sound that came out was raw, cracked, and cold as a winter grave:
"Kill... him."
May you like
Marcus met my gaze, his jaw tightening into steel. "Not with a bullet, Claire. We're going to strip him down to nothing. We take his money, his freedom, and his mind. First, we let him walk into the bank."
***
