I was ransacking my sister’s room like a clumsy novice thief. There was no diary, of course. Nothing was ever that easy. But it wasn’t a challenge to plunder her cavernous walk-in closet with its ball gown wardrobe. I found a Bible under a shoe shelf. Inside were slips of paper. I grabbed them like winning lottery tickets. In my family, if it was important, it went into the Bible. The one on top was a gold-banded white card written in elegant cursive:

“The glamour of inexperience is over your eyes,” Mr. Rochester answered; “and you see it through a charmed medium: you cannot discern that the gilding is slime and the silk draperies cobwebs; that the marble is sordid slate, and the polished woods mere refuse chips and scaly bark.”

By making the choice to stay you are participating in a crime.

I recognized the quotation from Jane Eyre, because my sister had forced me to read that book. The line underneath it was what took my breath away. It was unsigned and undated, but I assumed it had to have been from Theo. The spreadsheets Caro had sent me made it clear something was wrong with the family business. Ben had told me the Thraxtons were laundering money. Was that what Theo meant by a crime? Was he the only person in the family who wasn’t involved?

“You looking for it, Auntie Dee?” Teddy called out.

“For what?”

“The hiding place.”

“Mama had a hiding place?”

I set the Bible back in place and realized there was a small leather box behind it. Cartier was embossed on top, and inside was a pair of platinum earrings, panther faces glittering with diamonds, each with slitted emerald eyes that looked surprisingly fierce. A small strip of paper, no larger than a fortune cookie message, was tucked inside. The handwriting was different from the other note, cramped and spidery:

Caroline, I know you hate extravagance, but I couldn’t resist. I am so proud of you and everything you’ve accomplished. Our family’s luckiest day was the one when you joined us. Ever fondly, Theodore

Teddy bounded into the closet, and I instinctively snapped the box shut and shoved it back on the shelf. “You find it?”

I looked around. Amid the dresses and shoes and hatboxes, I wondered if there was a secret alcove. “Where?”

“There.” He pointed at the chest of drawers in the closet.

“In the drawer?”

“No.” Teddy sounded exasperated. “Behind it.”

The chest of drawers seemed too heavy to move. “I don’t understand, Teddy.”

“Pull it.” He reached for the top drawer but was too tiny to reach it. “Pull.”

I pulled it open.

“All the way,” Teddy said.

I slid the drawer out.

“See?” Teddy said.

I peered inside. There was no back on the chest of drawers. Instead, I saw a wall safe.