PART 5 — EMMA’S FILE
I couldn’t say a word.
The officer stood there as if he already knew I had recognized him.
He was the one who had come to our house.
The one who had told me Emma was probably driving too fast.
The one who had said the road was slippery.
The one who had held my shoulder when I broke down in tears.
“You…”
My voice cracked.
“You were there.”
The officer looked at me.
“Ma’am, please go home.”
I laughed in disbelief.
“Go home?”
My hands started shaking.
“My daughter is lying in the ground, and you’re telling me to go home?”
He took one step closer.
“This isn’t safe.”
“For who?”
He didn’t answer.
Thomas said:
“For everyone who wants the truth.”
The officer looked at him angrily.
“You shouldn’t have come here.”
Thomas smiled bitterly.
“And you should have spoken twenty years ago.”
The officer clenched his fists.
I looked at the USB drive.
“What’s on this?”
The officer said nothing.
“What is on it?”
“A confession.”
Everyone froze.
The principal looked at him.
“What are you doing?”
The officer looked at me.
“Emma recorded it.”
“Who confessed?”
He swallowed.
“The person responsible for Laura’s death.”
I felt my legs becoming weak.
“Who?”
The officer looked at the principal.
The principal closed his eyes.
Thomas whispered:
“Him.”
The silence that followed was unbearable.
I stared at the principal.
“You?”
He didn’t answer.
“You killed Laura?”
“No.”
His voice sounded broken.
“I didn’t kill her.”
Thomas shouted:
“But you made her disappear!”
The principal covered his face with his hands.
“She had evidence.”
“Evidence of what?”
“Fraud.”
“And because of that?”
He looked at Thomas.
“She threatened to expose everything.”
Thomas stepped forward.
“And then you locked her away.”
The principal shook his head.
“I never intended for her to die.”
A cold shiver ran through me.
“Where did she die?”
He didn’t answer.
Thomas whispered:
“Under the old gym.”
I looked at him.
“What?”
“There used to be a basement there.”
“Is it still there?”
The principal answered quietly:
“It was sealed years ago.”
“Why?”
He said nothing.
Then the officer took out his phone.
“Because something is still there.”
Everyone looked at him.
“What?”
“Laura’s belongings.”
Thomas began to cry.
“After twenty years…”
The officer nodded.
“Emma forced me to look.”
I stared at him.
“When?”
“A week before her accident.”
I looked at him in disbelief.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I was afraid.”
“Of who?”
He looked at the principal.
“Of him.”
The principal sank into a chair.
“You don’t understand.”
I walked toward him.
“Then explain it.”
He looked at me.
“It didn’t start with Laura.”
My heart started beating faster.
“How many students?”
He didn’t answer.
Thomas said:
“Three.”
I looked at him.
“Three?”
“Three students who discovered something.”
“And all three of them died?”
Thomas nodded.
“But Emma was the fourth.”
Tears rolled down my face.
“Why my daughter?”
The officer answered:
“Because Emma wasn’t afraid.”
He looked at the USB drive.
“She knew that if she made the evidence public, everything would collapse.”
“What do you mean by everything?”
“The school.”
“Only the school?”
He shook his head.
“The school. Several wealthy families. Some government officials. And people who had been making money from selling diplomas for years.”
I felt sick.
“So my daughter discovered a network?”
“Yes.”
“And that’s why she was killed?”
The officer looked down.
“Most likely.”
I wanted to open the USB drive.
But Thomas grabbed my hand.
“Not here.”
“Why?”
“Because we don’t know if the principal is alone.”
I looked around.
The hall was almost empty.
But then I heard something.
A door slammed shut.
Everyone turned.
Daniel ran toward the window.
“There’s someone outside.”
The officer grabbed his phone.
“Who?”
Daniel pointed toward the parking lot.
A black car was slowly driving away.
I didn’t recognize the license plate.
But there was something on the back window.
A red clown nose.
I felt a wave of ice-cold fear.
“They know we have the drive.”
Thomas grabbed my arm.
“We need to leave.”
“Where?”
He looked at me.
“To Emma’s house.”
“Why?”
“Because Emma would never keep all her evidence in one place.”
I thought about her room.
Her desk.
Her jewelry box.
The note I had found that morning.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“She wrote that I had to come to the graduation ceremony.”
Thomas nodded.
“That wasn’t only because she wanted you to experience her special day.”
“Then why?”
“She wanted you to find something.”
I felt my heart pounding.
“What?”
Thomas looked at my hands.
“The graduation cap.”
I looked down at Emma’s cap.
“What about it?”
“She made it herself.”
I turned it over.
Inside the cap, I felt something hard.
A small stitch.
I pulled at it.
The lining came loose.
Underneath was a thin piece of paper.
My fingers trembled as I unfolded it.
There was only one sentence.
MOM, IF YOU’RE READING THIS, GO HOME AND OPEN THE ROOM I ALWAYS KEPT LOCKED.
I looked at Thomas.
“Which room?”
He didn’t answer.
Daniel did.
“Emma’s music room.”
I looked at him in confusion.
“But that room doesn’t exist anymore.”
Daniel shook his head.
“That’s exactly what everyone thinks.”
He took my hand.
“But Emma never destroyed it.”
