Chapter 9 - The Room Hidden Behind the Library
We returned to Chicago with more questions than answers.
Vincent Cross.
A man dead twelve years.
Possibly alive.
Possibly controlling Marcus Vale.
Possibly responsible for Evan’s murder and Adrian’s disappearance.
Stellan refused to believe it.
Not fully.
But disbelief did not stop him from investigating.
By evening, Darius had assembled every photograph containing Vincent’s handwriting.
Birthday cards.
Business notes.
Letters.
Contracts.
Experts compared them to the message sent to Adrian.
The result came back the following morning.
High probability of common authorship.
Stellan read the report once.
Then placed it down.
“Either my father is alive or someone has spent years learning to imitate him.”
Neither possibility was comforting.
Mrs. Thornbury returned to the estate.
Stellan did not forgive her.
He allowed her to stay because Fern smiled when she saw her.
I suspected that mattered more than he admitted.
Helena became unusually quiet after hearing Vincent might be alive.
Too quiet.
I found her in the library that afternoon.
“You knew.”
She looked up.
“About what?”
“Your husband.”
Her expression barely moved.
“I watched Vincent deteriorate for two years.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No.”
“You knew he might have survived.”
Helena closed the book in her hands.
“I suspected.”
“For twelve years?”
“For six.”
“Why?”
“A bank transfer.”
She stood.
“Six years after Vincent died, money moved from one account only he and I knew existed.”
“Where?”
“Switzerland.”
“Did you tell Stellan?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because by then Evan was already dead.”
I stared at her.
“You thought Vincent killed him.”
“I thought Marcus did.”
“But you weren’t sure.”
“No.”
“And Adrian?”
“I helped Adrian because I began to suspect the threat was larger than Marcus.”
“Why not tell your sons?”
Helena looked toward the doorway.
“Because Stellan was becoming exactly like his father.”
I felt defensive before realizing she might be right.
“Meaning?”
“Powerful. Suspicious. Controlling. Angry.”
“He was grieving.”
“So was Vincent when his brother died. Grief became his excuse for everything afterward.”
She looked at me.
“I feared that if Stellan learned Vincent might be alive, he would abandon whatever humanity remained in him and spend the rest of his life hunting a ghost.”
I thought about Stellan holding Fern.
The way his hands had trembled when she first fell asleep against him.
Maybe Helena saw it too.
“Fern changed something,” she said.
I looked at her.
“You noticed.”
“I’m his mother.”
“You left twelve years ago.”
“He is still my son.”
Before I could answer, Fern began laughing from across the room.
Stellan had entered.
She was sitting on the carpet with wooden blocks.
The moment she saw him, she lifted both arms.
Stellan stopped.
Helena smiled faintly.
“See?”
He looked suspicious.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
Fern made an impatient noise.
Stellan surrendered.
He picked her up.
She immediately grabbed his collar.
I had stopped finding their connection strange.
It felt natural now.
Maybe because Stellan looked less frightening when Fern was pulling his hair.
Darius entered.
“We found something.”
Stellan carried Fern toward the desk.
“What?”
“Architectural plans.”
“For?”
“The estate.”
Darius placed them down.
“One room doesn’t match.”
We gathered around.
Behind the library was a narrow rectangular space.
No door marked.
No current access.
Stellan frowned.
“There’s nothing there.”
“According to the original plans, there is.”
We searched the library.
Shelves.
Panels.
Fireplace.
Nothing.
Fern solved it.
Stellan was holding her while examining bookshelves.
She grabbed a brass decoration shaped like a lion.
It moved.
A click sounded.
Everyone froze.
Part of the bookshelf released.
Stellan stared at Fern.
She smiled proudly.
“You’ve been here four days,” he said. “Already more useful than half my staff.”
We opened the hidden door.
Inside was a narrow room covered in dust.
A desk.
Old filing cabinets.
A telephone.
No windows.
Helena whispered, “Vincent’s private room.”
“You knew?”
“No.”
Stellan opened drawers.
Mostly empty.
Then I noticed scratches beneath the desk.
A panel.
We removed it.
Inside was a small safe.
Combination lock.
Stellan tried several numbers.
Nothing.
Helena approached.
“Try the boys’ birthdays.”
Still nothing.
Fern’s birthday?
No.
Then I looked at the old family photograph on the wall.
Three brothers.
Stellan.
Evan.
Adrian.
“What about the day your grandmother Fern died?”
Stellan looked at me.
“How would you—”
“Adrian chose her name for a reason.”
Helena gave him the date.
The lock opened.
Inside lay a blue leather book.
Nobody breathed.
The blue ledger.
After years of deaths and deception, it had been inside Stellan’s own house.
He opened it.
Names.
Dates.
Amounts.
Payments.
Politicians.
Police officers.
Judges.
Business owners.
And symbols we didn’t understand.
Then Stellan reached the final pages.
His face changed.
“What?”
He turned the book toward us.
One page contained three names.
EVAN CROSS.
ADRIAN CROSS.
STELLAN CROSS.
Beside Evan:
NONCOMPLIANT — REMOVE.
Beside Adrian:
NONCOMPLIANT — CONTAIN.
Beside Stellan:
SUCCESSOR — OBSERVE.
Helena sat down.
I felt sick.
Vincent Cross had apparently catalogued his own sons as assets.
Or threats.
Then Darius noticed something else.
The most recent notation was dated only four months earlier.
Long after Vincent’s supposed death.
A handwritten message appeared beneath Stellan’s name.
THE GIRL HAS ARRIVED.
Stellan looked at Fern.
I stopped breathing.
The entry had been made before I started working at the estate.
Someone knew I would come.
Someone knew Fern would come.
Nothing about my employment had been accidental.
I turned toward Mrs. Thornbury.
“You hired me.”
She looked genuinely confused.
“No.”
“You interviewed me.”
“Yes, after Human Resources selected you.”
Stellan’s expression changed.
“Who submitted her application?”
Darius began searching.
A minute later, his screen displayed the answer.
My application had never been submitted online.
It had been entered manually by an administrator.
Username:
JVALE.
Julian Vale.
I stared at the ledger.
Julian had not merely betrayed Stellan.
He had placed me inside the mansion.
Placed Fern near him.
Why?
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
Stellan motioned for silence.
I answered.
“Hello?”
A man spoke.
Calm.
Older.
“Selene Hart.”
My blood froze.
“Who is this?”
“You found the ledger.”
Stellan’s face changed.
The voice continued.
“Ask my son whether he remembers the promise he made beside Evan’s grave.”
I looked at Stellan.
“Your son?”
A quiet laugh.
Then:
“Put Stellan on.”
I handed him the phone.
He listened.
All color disappeared from his face.
Finally he whispered:
“Father?”
The call ended.
May you like
And the dead man we had been chasing had just spoken.
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