Chapter 2 - The Letter Inside the Piano
Dominic reacted before Anaëlle understood what was happening.
His entire body changed.
The controlled host disappeared.
In his place stood someone colder.
Alert.
Dangerously calm.
“Stay here.”
Anaëlle grabbed his sleeve.
“No.”
Dominic looked at her hand.
She released him immediately.
“You don’t get to tell me to stay anywhere after dropping something like that on me.”
Another voice came from downstairs.
“Mr. Vale!”
Dominic recognized it.
“Marco.”
A man appeared at the top of the stairs.
Broad shoulders.
Gray suit.
Approximately forty.
He stopped when he saw Anaëlle.
Something flashed across his face.
Surprise.
Then concern.
“We have a problem.”
Dominic glanced toward Anaëlle.
“Say it.”
Marco hesitated.
“Here?”
“Now.”
Marco lowered his voice.
“Someone accessed the east elevator.”
“That elevator is private.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“We’re finding out.”
Anaëlle folded her arms.
“Should I be worried?”
Dominic answered immediately.
“No.”
Marco looked less certain.
Dominic noticed.
“Marco.”
“Security is sweeping the building.”
Anaëlle grabbed her purse.
“I’m leaving.”
Dominic stepped between her and the staircase.
Not threatening.
Simply immovable.
“Five minutes.”
“You said I could leave whenever I wanted.”
“You can.”
“Then move.”
Dominic looked toward Marco.
“Take the service elevator. Drive her home.”
“No,” Anaëlle said.
Both men looked at her.
She pointed toward the piano.
“I’m not leaving without that letter.”
Dominic’s expression hardened.
“This isn’t the moment.”
“You created the moment.”
She stepped closer.
“You told me my father was alive six months after he supposedly vanished. You showed me a photograph. You told me people have been searching for me. Now someone mysteriously enters your private building and suddenly I’m supposed to go home and sleep?”
Dominic said nothing.
Anaëlle held out her hand.
“Give me the letter.”
A long silence passed.
Then Dominic opened the piano bench.
He removed the envelope.
Anaëlle snatched it.
Her hands trembled.
The paper was old.
The handwriting unmistakable.
She broke the seal.
Dominic looked away.
Anaëlle unfolded the letter.
My Annie,
Her vision blurred instantly.
If you are reading this, then I failed to come home.
Anaëlle stopped.
Dominic watched her carefully.
She continued.
You will hear terrible things about me. Some will be true. Most will not.
But there is one thing you must believe.
I never abandoned you.
Anaëlle pressed her lips together.
Twelve years of anger rose inside her.
Birthdays.
Graduations.
Her mother crying behind locked bathroom doors.
All the times Anaëlle had pretended she didn’t care.
She kept reading.
I became involved with men I believed I could outsmart. I was wrong.
I discovered something that could destroy families, companies, judges, police officers, and men powerful enough to erase anyone who stood against them.
Anaëlle glanced at Dominic.
He did not move.
One man tried to help me.
If Dominic Vale is the one who gives you this letter, listen before you judge him.
Anaëlle stared at Dominic.
“You knew this was in here?”
“No.”
“But you knew my father wrote something.”
“I knew he left instructions.”
Anaëlle returned to the letter.
Dominic was young when I met him. Too young to carry the weight his family placed on him.
He made mistakes.
So did I.
But when the moment came, he chose to protect you.
Anaëlle looked up.
“Protect me from what?”
Dominic’s jaw tightened.
“Finish.”
She continued.
The truth is hidden in music.
Seven intervals.
Seven questions.
Seven answers.
You already know the melody.
Anaëlle’s breath caught.
At the bottom of the letter were four words.
Play what I taught you.
That was all.
No explanation.
No goodbye.
No location.
Anaëlle read it twice.
Then a third time.
“This makes no sense.”
“It will.”
“How?”
Dominic nodded toward the piano.
“Play.”
Anaëlle nearly laughed.
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Your father built the mechanism.”
“What mechanism?”
Dominic reached beneath the piano’s rim and pressed a small brass catch.
Nothing happened.
“It requires the right sequence.”
Anaëlle looked at the seven engraved intervals.
Her father’s childhood game.
He used to call it Seven Doors.
He would play seven notes and ask Anaëlle to repeat them backward.
Then forward.
Then transposed.
She had forgotten about it for years.
Until now.
Anaëlle sat.
She played the sequence.
Nothing.
Again.
Nothing.
Marco remained near the staircase, speaking quietly into an earpiece.
Anaëlle closed her eyes.
You already know the melody.
Not intervals alone.
A melody.
Then she remembered.
A lullaby her father used to play every night.
Except one version had seven strange notes in the middle.
She had always assumed he improvised them.
Anaëlle played the lullaby.
When she reached the seventh altered note—
Click.
The piano bench shifted.
Anaëlle jumped.
A hidden panel beneath the keyboard opened half an inch.
Dominic’s face changed.
Even he had not expected it.
Anaëlle pulled the compartment open.
Inside was a small metal key.
And a photograph.
She lifted the photograph first.
A woman stood outside a country house.
Beside her was Anaëlle’s father.
Anaëlle stared.
The woman was her mother.
But not the mother she remembered.
She looked terrified.
Behind them stood another man.
Dominic leaned closer.
His face went pale.
Anaëlle noticed.
“You know him.”
Dominic did not answer.
“Who is he?”
Marco approached.
“Sir.”
Dominic handed him the photograph.
Marco’s reaction was immediate.
“Where did you get this?”
Anaëlle stood.
“Who is he?”
Dominic stared toward the windows.
“His name is Gabriel Vale.”
Anaëlle blinked.
“Vale?”
“My uncle.”
Something in his tone warned her.
“What does your uncle have to do with my parents?”
Dominic took the photograph back.
“Gabriel controlled most of the family business before I did.”
“Controlled?”
“He built an organization inside legitimate companies. Money laundering, blackmail, political bribery.”
Anaëlle stepped away.
“So the rumors about your family are true.”
“Some of them.”
“And you?”
Dominic met her eyes.
“I inherited a structure I’ve spent twelve years dismantling.”
Anaëlle laughed bitterly.
“Convenient explanation.”
“I don’t need you to believe me tonight.”
“Good.”
Marco interrupted.
“We found the elevator breach.”
Dominic turned.
“And?”
“No one entered.”
Anaëlle frowned.
“What?”
Marco removed a phone.
“The system was triggered remotely.”
“Why?”
Marco looked toward Anaëlle.
“Distraction.”
Dominic’s gaze snapped toward the piano.
The hidden compartment.
The key.
The photograph.
“Someone knew she was here.”
Anaëlle’s skin turned cold.
Dominic closed the compartment.
“Marco, lock the building.”
Anaëlle stepped back.
“No.”
Dominic ignored her.
“Get two cars downstairs.”
“I said no.”
He looked at her.
She held the metal key tightly.
“You are not locking me in.”
“I’m trying to keep you alive.”
“You told me I wasn’t in danger.”
“At the time, I believed that.”
“That was twenty minutes ago!”
“And now someone has confirmed that they know we opened the piano.”
Anaëlle’s mouth went dry.
“How could anyone know?”
Dominic looked toward the chandelier.
Then toward the windows.
Then toward the piano.
“Cameras.”
Marco began searching.
Within sixty seconds he found a tiny lens hidden inside a decorative flower arrangement.
Dominic stared at it.
Someone had installed surveillance inside his private penthouse.
Marco removed the device carefully.
“No transmitter.”
“Internal storage?”
“Yes.”
Dominic looked toward Anaëlle.
“That means someone planned to retrieve it.”
Anaëlle stared at the key in her palm.
“What does this open?”
Dominic shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“Yes.”
She examined it.
Small.
Steel.
Engraved with a number.
317.
Anaëlle suddenly stopped breathing.
Dominic noticed.
“What?”
She looked at him.
“I know this number.”
“From where?”
“My father used to take me to Grand Central when I was little. There were old storage lockers beneath one of the private railway clubs.”
Dominic stepped closer.
“And?”
“Our locker was 317.”
Marco cursed quietly.
Dominic held out his hand.
“Give me the key.”
Anaëlle closed her fist.
“No.”
“Anaëlle.”
“My father left it to me.”
“If Gabriel knows about this—”
“Your uncle may have destroyed my family.”
“And that is exactly why—”
“I’m going.”
“Absolutely not.”
Anaëlle stared at him.
“You said my father trusted you.”
“He did.”
“Then trust me.”
Dominic’s expression remained hard.
“You don’t understand what Gabriel is capable of.”
“Then explain it.”
Before Dominic could answer, the lights went out.
Complete darkness swallowed the penthouse.
Anaëlle gasped.
Somewhere downstairs, glass shattered.
Marco shouted into his radio.
Dominic grabbed Anaëlle’s wrist.
“This time you listen.”
Something moved beyond the staircase.
A shadow.
Then another.
Anaëlle’s pulse exploded.
Dominic pulled her behind the piano.
The emergency lights flickered on.
Red.
Dim.
Enough to reveal a figure standing at the far end of the room.
Not an attacker.
An elderly woman.
Small.
Silver-haired.
Wearing a dark coat.
Anaëlle stared.
Dominic released her wrist.
His expression showed something she had not seen before.
Shock.
The woman looked directly at Anaëlle.
Tears filled her eyes.
“My God,” she whispered.
Anaëlle stood slowly.
“Who are you?”
The woman’s lips trembled.
“I’ve waited twelve years to see you.”
Dominic went completely still.
“Celeste.”
Anaëlle looked between them.
The woman took one trembling step forward.
May you like
Then she said the words that changed everything.
“Your father is alive.”
