Chapter 4
Silence filled the security room.
Julian did not lower his weapon.
“My father died of a heart attack.”
Michael shook his head.
“Your father discovered Senator Whitmore was using Mercer ports to traffic weapons. He planned to expose the arrangement. Three days later, he collapsed during dinner.”
Claire looked at Julian.
“Is it true?”
“My father was sick.”
“The hospital report was signed by a doctor paid through Whitmore Shipping,” Michael said. “The same doctor disappeared a week later.”
Julian stepped toward him.
“You had access to my family accounts. You could create any trail you wanted.”
“Then open the archive and prove me wrong.”
Emma clutched her elephant more tightly.
Claire moved between the men.
“No one is opening anything until my daughter is safe.”
An alarm sounded.
One of the monitors activated, showing the hallway outside the security room.
Thomas Vale and four armed men were approaching.
Julian checked his ammunition.
“There is an exit behind the west cabinet.”
Michael stared at him.
“Where does it lead?”
“The old chapel.”
“That passage was sealed.”
“I reopened it when Vanessa began asking questions about the house.”
Claire looked at him.
“You suspected her.”
“For three months.”
“And you still planned to marry her?”
“Keeping her close was safer than letting her disappear.”
Claire almost laughed.
“You build relationships like prisons.”
Julian pulled the cabinet aside.
Before they entered, Emma tugged on Claire’s sleeve.
“Mommy, the elephant has a song.”
“What song?”
Emma pressed the toy’s ear.
A faint melody played from inside it.
Claire recognized it as the lullaby Michael used to hum when Emma was a baby.
Michael looked confused.
“I never recorded that.”
Julian examined the toy.
“The melody is a signal.”
“To what?” Claire asked.
The security monitors flickered.
A new image appeared.
It showed the old wine cellar.
A woman was tied to a chair beneath a hanging light. Her silver hair covered part of her face.
Claire stopped breathing.
The woman lifted her head.
“Mom?”
Helen Dawson had vanished fourteen years earlier.
Claire had been told her mother abandoned the family after accumulating gambling debts. Her father refused to speak about her again.
Now Helen was alive inside Julian’s mansion.
Vanessa stepped into view behind her.
“Your mother was the first person to discover what our families were building,” she said through the monitor.
Claire pressed one hand against the screen.
“Mom.”
Helen stared directly into the camera.
“Claire, do not bring Emma here.”
Vanessa grabbed her hair and pulled her head back.
Julian’s face became unreadable.
“You knew she was alive too?” Claire asked.
“No.”
Michael looked terrified.
Vanessa smiled.
“Seven minutes, Julian. Then my father begins with the judges and ends with the child’s grandmother.”
The screen went black.
Claire turned toward the hidden passage.
“We are going to the cellar.”
Julian blocked her path.
“That is what Vanessa wants.”
“She has my mother.”
“She wants you emotional.”
“I have spent half my life believing my mother chose to leave me. I will not abandon her because you think emotion is weakness.”
Julian studied Claire’s face.
Then he handed her a small pistol.
“Do you know how to use this?”
“No.”
“Keep your finger away from the trigger until you decide someone deserves to die.”
Michael stared at Julian.
“You’re taking her?”
“I am not taking her anywhere.”
Julian stepped aside.
“She has made her choice.”
Claire held Emma with one arm and the weapon with the other.
For the first time since entering Mercer Mansion, she did not feel like an employee.
May you like
She felt like the only person in the house who had nothing left to lose.
Continue to the next part: Inside the old chapel, Claire discovers that her mother once worked for the Mercer family.
