Chapter 5 - HAROLD WYNN
“Harold.”
Maisie sat on the library sofa wrapped in a blanket.
“What about Harold?” I asked gently.
“That’s what the man called the other man.”
My heart stopped.
“Two men?”
She nodded.
“One grabbed Mom. One stayed by the car.”
“Did your mother know them?”
“She yelled, ‘Harold, don’t.’”
Daniel and I looked at each other.
Harold Wynn.
My private investigator.
The man who supposedly spent six weeks searching for Amelia before Reed Family Office terminated his work.
I kept my voice calm for Maisie.
“Do you remember what Harold looked like?”
“Old.”
Daniel nearly smiled despite himself.
“Anything else?”
“Gray hair. Big nose.”
Wynn would be sixty-four now.
Gray hair fit.
Big nose definitely fit.
I had sat across from it dozens of times.
Child investigators later repeated the questions properly so Maisie’s memory was not shaped by mine.
Her description stayed essentially the same.
Harold Wynn had become our first link between the eight-year-old disappearance and whatever happened to Amelia three nights earlier.
Finding him took less than a day.
He had not hidden.
He lived in Rhode Island and still held a private investigator’s license.
Daniel advised me not to call.
I wanted to anyway.
For once, I listened.
Detectives approached Wynn first.
He voluntarily agreed to an interview.
His lawyer joined halfway through.
That told us enough to take him seriously.
Wynn denied grabbing Amelia.
Denied seeing her recently.
Denied knowing she was alive.
Then investigators asked why his original search ended.
“Mr. Reed’s office terminated it.”
“Who specifically?”
“I don’t remember.”
They showed him the authorization.
Veronica Hayes.
Wynn’s face changed.
Only slightly.
Then they showed him the $75,000 payment to Vincent Cole.
He said he knew nothing about it.
Finally they asked about Meridian Outreach.
He requested his lawyer.
Interview over.
No confession.
No handcuffs.
But the pattern tightened.
Daniel’s team dug into Wynn’s old invoices.
One invoice from eight years ago stood out.
Surveillance consultation — Hayes private matter.
$18,500.
Paid personally by Veronica one week before Amelia vanished.
I felt physically ill.
“She hired the investigator I later hired to find Amelia.”
Daniel nodded.
“Before Amelia disappeared.”
That changed everything.
Wynn had not entered our story after the accident.
He was already inside it.
I called Veronica downstairs.
Her lawyer came with her.
I placed the invoice on the table.
“What was the private matter?”
Her attorney answered.
“My client will not discuss historical private security without context.”
I looked directly at Veronica.
“You hired Harold Wynn before Amelia vanished.”
She stared back.
“I hired many investigators over the years.”
“For what?”
“Due diligence.”
“On my daughter?”
Silence.
I felt anger rising, but Maisie was upstairs.
I would not become careless now.
Then Veronica finally said, “Amelia was threatening us.”
“Us?”
“The company. You.”
“No. She was threatening you.”
Her expression sharpened.
That slip was small.
But real.
Before her attorney ended the conversation, Daniel asked one final question.
“Did you know Amelia was pregnant?”
Veronica did not answer.
She did not need to.
Her eyes had already moved toward the ceiling.
May you like
Toward Maisie.
📖 Veronica’s reaction suggested she knew about Amelia’s pregnancy, and the next financial record proved the search for my daughter had secretly become surveillance of her unborn child. 👇
