“Before I interviewed Natalie Ratcliff, I bought a couple of her books so I could skim through them. One of them, Baggage, hooked me and I read the whole thing. When I met with Emma Kind a second time, she pulled a bunch of old boxes out of her attic. They were filled with things from Victoria’s childhood, and I planned to sort through the boxes to see if any of those things were useful for the documentary. To see if any of those items would help me paint a fuller picture of Victoria Ford. In one of the boxes, I found the flash drive that contained Victoria’s manuscripts. As soon as I started reading the first one, I noticed the similarities to Natalie Ratcliff’s first novel. I went back to the bookstore and purchased Natalie’s entire backlist and started skimming them.”

Avery pointed to the bed where a Natalie Ratcliff novel rested on top of each of Victoria Ford’s manuscripts.

“According to Emma, Victoria wrote five manuscripts. Each of those manuscripts ended up becoming a Natalie Ratcliff novel. Not just a similar storyline, but a verbatim text. It was in Victoria Ford’s lost manuscripts that Peg Perugo was born.”

“Couldn’t the explanation be that Victoria shared her manuscripts with Natalie Ratcliff at some point before her death? Maybe to get a friend’s feedback? Then, after her friend died, Ratcliff took the manuscripts as her own? And, out of all this”—Christine pointed at the bed—“the only crime committed was plagiarism?”

“Except that Emma Kind swears Victoria didn’t share her manuscripts with anyone. Like I said, not even her husband.”

“Okay,” Christine said. “You’ve hooked me. Let’s take Victoria Ford’s sister at her word. No one ever saw Victoria’s manuscripts. That explains the first five Ratcliff books, which represent the five manuscripts Victoria wrote before 9/11. Where did the next ten Ratcliff books come from?”

Avery took a deep breath. “What if Victoria survived the morning of 9/11? She made it out of the North Tower just like thousands of others. She was injured in the process and sought the help of her best friend, who was a physician. Then, as the enormity of events materialized that morning, a thought came to her. What if, in addition to watching one of the most infamous events in American history unfold, Victoria Ford was also watching the opportunity to make her impossible situation go away? She’d already made the calls to Emma. The recordings were proof that she was in the North Tower. Then she asked Natalie, not just for help with whatever injuries she sustained, but to help her disappear. Wherever Victoria is today, she’s still writing manuscripts and sharing them with Natalie Ratcliff.”