Chapter 15 #2
Victor sighed. “Many of those pictures are of her family in France. She kept them on her nightstand and her little writing desk in the corner of the bedroom. I knew they were missing, but thought she’d taken them with her too.”
“You said her family didn’t approve of her marrying an American and definitely didn’t approve of her moving to the United States,” Abby said. “What if she was leaving you and returning to France, but someone in the family didn’t want her to come back?”
“I know all of her close family members. They loved her too much to hurt her, so I don’t have a clue who would want to keep her away.”
“Was she in line to inherit property or money in France?”
“I don’t think so. She has two older brothers who would inherit the family’s estate and other properties. Though I do believe her father would’ve left one of their six homes to her.”
Burke carefully placed the dresses on the couch. As he moved the ball gown, polaroid pictures fell out of the folds and fluttered to the floor at Victor’s feet.
He tried to snatch them up, but he was having trouble with hands that seemed stiff.
“Let me.” She dropped to the floor to gather them together, then returned to her seat next to him. Burke moved behind them.
The first photo showed Estelle in front of the mansion. She held the crown in her hands, posing with it as a model might do when displaying something for sale. A broad smile beamed from her face.
Victor gasped. “She knew about the crown. Even took it outside. But how? When? And who took the picture?”
“Let’s check the others out.” Abby shifted the top one to the back, revealing another shot of Estelle. She wore the same dress, once again with the crown in her hands, but in a different pose. Abby continued to the next one, and the next. Each one a different pose, but still featuring the crown.
“I don’t understand this.” Victor collapsed against the back of the sofa. “It just doesn’t make sense. If she knew about the crown, why didn’t she tell me? Or why didn’t she ask questions about it?”
Abby was equally as baffled. Maybe they missed something. She flipped through the photos again.
“Wait,” Burke said. “Is there something written on the back?”
Abby turned it over. “A date. September 28, the year before she disappeared.”
“Does that day mean anything to you, Victor?” Burke asked.
Victor shook his head. “Absolutely nothing, except it was the fall before she disappeared. But that’s her handwriting. I’d recognize her scrolling S anywhere.”
Abby flipped every picture over. None of the others held a date. “I don’t see why the dated one is more unique than the others. But the way she’s displaying the crown is almost like she’s holding something out for sale, like an item on eBay.”
“I don’t know what this eBay is, but how could she even be thinking about selling such a valuable part of my past?” Victor sorrowfully swung his head side to side.
“That would assume the photos were taken to give to someone else,” Burke said. “If so, why did she still have them?”
“Maybe they took more,” Abby suggested. “Then gave the better ones to whoever they were taking them for, and she kept these as a memory of the day.”
“Such an event doesn’t seem very special,” Burke said.
“It doesn’t, does it?” Abby let thoughts race around her head and finally settle. “Could it be because of who took the pictures?”
Victor shot her a horrified look. “Are you thinking Estelle was having an affair with the person who took these pictures?”
“Does that seem possible to you?” Abby asked.
“No. No.” Victor shook his head so hard she imagined his brain rattling inside. “Absolutely not.”
Burke perched on the sofa arm beside Abby, his attention remaining fixed on Victor. “I’m sure Orman asked you the same question.”
“Repeatedly.” Victor spit the word out as if it were poison in his mouth. “But each time I told him it wasn’t true.”
“Yet he’d heard the rumor about an affair from several sources.” Burke’s intense gaze didn’t waver. “So, humor me. Pretend she was having an affair. What man might it have been with?”
Victor crossed his arms. “I don’t even want to go there.”
“I know you can’t believe your wife could’ve been unfaithful,” Abby said gently. “You could very well be right. But if you provide us with names, we can look into them and might locate other information to help us find out what happened to her.”
“Fine. I have a twin brother.”
Abby gasped and waited for her shock to settle down before she could speak. Something he’d withheld from them this entire time. Something big! “Why didn’t you ever mention him?”
Victor’s mouth tightened. “His name is Vincent. He lived in Paris, but frequently stayed with us here. We had a falling out, and I haven’t heard from him since.
He was paying too much attention to Estelle.
Always flirting with her, asking her to do the things with him she enjoyed doing and I didn’t.
It’d been going on for years, getting progressively worse, until he crossed a line I felt he shouldn’t cross.
” He paused and gnawed on his lip. “I didn’t like it and was extremely jealous. I asked him to leave.”
“When was the last time you saw him?” Burke asked.
He rubbed his brow, as if trying to remember. “Christmas the year before she disappeared. He sent a few letters to Estelle after that. I intercepted and destroyed them. He was trying to get her to leave me and move back to France. Eventually, he stopped writing.”
“Did she seem receptive to his advances?” Burke asked.
“I could tell she was flattered, but she would never have entertained cheating on me. I know that as much as I know my own name.”
“Did you talk to him after Estelle went missing?” Abby asked.
He grimaced. “I tried. Left messages on his home phone. He never returned my calls. If he was still bitter about our falling out, he may have been more interested in taking it out on me than he was in hearing about what happened to Estelle.”
Burke cast Victor a sympathetic look. Did he believe Estelle had indeed cheated on Victor? Had he experienced what Victor was going through? Maybe that was the reason for his trust issues, causing him to control everything around him.
He stood and shoved his hands into his pockets. “You said after Estelle went missing you had a private investigator look into Dominique. Did you also ask the PI to check on Vincent?”
Victor nodded. “He discovered my brother was simply traveling a lot and ignoring me. He found zero indication Estelle had gone to live with him.”
Burke turned to Abby. “Any more questions?”
“No.” Her heart had grown so heavy with everything Victor had gone through, but all she could do was offer a quick prayer for him.
“Okay, then,” Burke said, returning his attention to Victor. “If you want to touch anything in this trunk, be sure you wear gloves so you don’t disturb any evidence.”
“You can put it all back and close it as far as I’m concerned.” His eyes were glassy. “Estelle might not have cheated on me, but she clearly kept her knowledge of the crown a secret. And I can’t help but believe the pictures indicate she was hoping to somehow gain from it.”
Abby agreed. What else could be the point of the pictures? Maybe Estelle simply took them as souvenirs of having found it, but honestly, such a thought didn’t make any sense.
No, when it came to the crown, Abby had to believe Estelle was up to no good, and it could very well be the reason for her disappearance or murder.