Chapter 3 - THE LOCKED WEST WING
The north gate had not opened in eighteen years.
That fact mattered because Alderwyn Estate had seven entrances.
Six were connected to the modern security system.
The seventh belonged to another era.
The north gate sat behind the abandoned carriage house, half-hidden beneath ivy and stone, on a narrow service road leading through three hundred acres of woodland.
Julian had been told it no longer worked.
Apparently, someone had lied.
Daniel pressed two fingers to his earpiece.
“Vehicle entered thirty seconds ago. No plate detected.”
“Where is it now?” Julian asked.
“Camera three lost it near the orchard.”
Malcolm leaned against the corridor wall.
“Perhaps one of your guards forgot to lock a gate.”
Daniel looked at him.
“The north gate uses a physical key.”
Malcolm shrugged.
“Then perhaps your mother’s ghost has returned.”
Julian took one step toward him.
Detective Ellis moved between them.
“Mr. Hawthorne.”
Julian stopped.
She looked at Malcolm.
“And you. Nobody goes anywhere until my officers understand what happened here.”
Malcolm’s expression became offended.
“I am a guest.”
“You are a person whose name appeared on a note hidden by a woman who died under suspicious circumstances.”
“Suspicious now only because a maid says so.”
Nora’s head lifted.
Detective Ellis’s expression hardened.
“Try that sentence again when I’m less patient.”
Malcolm said nothing.
Ellis turned toward an officer.
“Take Mr. Hawthorne downstairs. Separate him from Ms. Prescott.”
Camille’s voice echoed from the staircase.
“You have no right!”
She appeared between two officers, furious and still wearing the champagne-stained silver gown.
The ballroom glamour was gone.
One side of her hair had fallen loose.
Her mascara had begun to smudge.
“What did you do with my phone?”
Detective Ellis answered.
“We preserved it.”
“You stole it.”
“You attempted to send a message immediately before a room caught fire.”
“I sent nothing.”
Daniel held up the phone.
“You typed ‘burn.’”
Camille stared at him.
“I was messaging my stylist.”
Nobody spoke.
“My dress was ruined.”
Detective Ellis almost smiled.
“You text your stylist one word during a crime?”
Camille’s face reddened.
Malcolm interrupted.
“This is spiraling into hysteria.”
Julian looked at Daniel.
“Take Nora somewhere secure.”
“No,” Nora said.
Julian turned.
She pulled his jacket tighter around herself.
“I’m not sitting alone in a room while someone drives onto the property looking for evidence they already attacked me over.”
“You’re injured.”
“I’m also the only person here who remembers what happened.”
“That makes you the most important person to protect.”
“And the easiest person to silence if I’m separated from everyone.”
Julian opened his mouth.
Then closed it.
Detective Ellis nodded once.
“She stays with us.”
Nora looked surprised.
Ellis lowered her voice.
“You’ve spent eighteen years being afraid, Ms. Bennett. Tonight is not the night to start letting other people decide where you stand.”
Nora looked at Julian.
He nodded.
“All right.”
Daniel received another transmission.
“Vehicle found.”
“Where?”
“Carriage house.”
“Occupant?”
“Gone.”
Julian looked toward the dark windows.
“Search the grounds.”
“Already happening.”
Detective Ellis pointed toward the burned bedroom.
“Before anyone goes wandering through a dark estate, I want to know what somebody was willing to destroy.”
Julian led them inside.
Firefighters had extinguished the curtains. Smoke blackened one wall, but most of Helena’s bedroom remained intact.
Nora stood near the doorway.
For the first time since entering Alderwyn as an employee three months earlier, she looked directly into the room.
Julian noticed.
“You’ve never been inside?”
“Not until tonight.”
“But Camille said you entered it.”
“I entered the corridor.”
“Why?”
Nora hesitated.
“I heard music.”
Julian frowned.
“There hasn’t been electricity in this wing for months.”
“I know.”
“What music?”
Nora looked toward the far wall.
“A music box.”
Julian felt a chill.
His mother had owned one.
Dark mahogany.
Silver star painted on the lid.
It played a slow version of “Beautiful Dreamer.”
Helena used to wind it when Julian could not sleep.
He had not heard it since her funeral.
“It was coming from behind that wall,” Nora said.
Malcolm’s earlier glance toward the staircase returned to Julian’s mind.
“Daniel.”
Together they crossed the room.
A large portrait of Helena hung above a narrow writing table.
She had been thirty-nine when it was painted.
Dark hair.
Green eyes.
A calm expression that had always seemed almost amused.
Nora stopped in front of the painting.
“What?”
Julian asked.
“The photograph.”
“What photograph?”
“The one inside the locket.”
Nora opened it.
Helena and six-year-old Nora stood in the winter garden.
Behind them, partly obscured by leaves, was the same portrait.
But something was different.
Nora pointed.
“In the photograph, the painting is lower.”
Julian stared.
She was right.
By perhaps four inches.
Daniel stepped onto a chair and examined the frame.
“New hooks.”
“How new?”
“Few years, maybe.”
Julian looked around.
“Why move a painting four inches?”
Nora whispered, “Because something is behind it.”
Daniel lifted the frame.
A narrow brass panel appeared in the wall.
Julian had never seen it.
Detective Ellis put on gloves.
“Don’t touch.”
The panel had no visible lock.
Only three small metal wheels engraved with letters.
Nora stared.
“I know the code.”
Everyone looked at her.
“How?” Julian asked.
“My mother used to make me spell a word whenever I got scared.”
“What word?”
Nora stepped closer.
“BRAVE.”
There were only three wheels.
Julian looked at Helena’s portrait.
“Maybe not the whole word.”
Nora remembered something.
“My mother would ask, ‘What comes after fear?’”
“And?”
“I’d say, ‘Bravery.’ Then she’d say, ‘What comes before bravery?’”
Julian understood.
“Fear.”
Nora nodded.
Three letters.
F-E-A.
Daniel turned the wheels.
Nothing.
Nora shook her head.
“No. What comes before bravery?”
She looked at Julian.
“Truth.”
T-R-U.
The brass panel clicked.
Inside was a shallow compartment.
A music box rested there.
Beside it lay a blue ledger.
And beneath the ledger was a child’s red ribbon stained dark brown.
Nora made a sound Julian would remember for the rest of his life.
Not a scream.
Recognition.
“My mother wore that.”
She stumbled backward.
Julian caught her.
“You’re sure?”
“She tied red ribbons around my braids that night. When she left me with Mrs. Wren, one ribbon was missing.”
“Who is Mrs. Wren?”
Nora looked at him.
“Your housekeeper.”
Julian stared.
“Our head housekeeper when my mother died was Evelyn Wren.”
“Yes.”
“She told police she had gone home before midnight.”
Nora shook her head.
“No. She was here.”
Julian’s pulse accelerated.
“How do you know?”
“She hid me.”
Detective Ellis carefully lifted the ledger.
“Everyone stop talking for a second.”
She opened the cover.
Columns of numbers filled the pages.
Property transfers.
Loans.
Political donations.
Shell corporations.
Julian recognized several companies Hawthorne Holdings had acquired or dissolved during his childhood.
Then a name appeared repeatedly.
Prescott Development Group.
Another.
Meridian Municipal Consultants.
Another.
Northstar Charitable Trust.
And initials.
M.H.
R.P.
C.B.
Nora pointed.
“C.B.”
“Clara Bennett?” Ellis asked.
“My mother.”
Julian looked at the dates.
The entries stopped eighteen years ago.
Three days before Helena died.
Another page contained a handwritten note.
Clara copied the transfers. Malcolm knows. Richard wants her removed. If anything happens to Clara or me, the original authorizations are in the winter records.
Richard.
Camille’s father.
Richard Prescott.
Nora gripped the edge of the table.
“My mother died in a car accident two weeks before Helena.”
Julian looked at her.
“You never said that.”
“I was told she fell asleep driving.”
Detective Ellis’s gaze sharpened.
“Where?”
“Route 7. Near Ridgefield.”
“Any alcohol involved?”
“No.”
“Mechanical failure?”
“The brakes.”
Julian and Ellis exchanged a look.
Nora saw it.
“No.”
Her voice broke.
“No, no. Please don’t tell me—”
“We’re not telling you anything yet,” Ellis said. “We verify.”
But Nora had already understood.
Her mother had discovered financial crimes.
Two weeks later her brakes failed.
Helena took Nora into Alderwyn.
Then Helena fell from a balcony.
Julian touched the blue ledger.
“This is why my mother was killed.”
A crash sounded in the hallway.
Daniel drew his weapon.
Everyone turned.
An officer shouted.
“Stop!”
Footsteps ran toward the rear stairs.
Julian moved toward the door.
Daniel blocked him.
“Stay here.”
Nora suddenly looked at the open wall compartment.
“The music box.”
“What about it?”
“It’s missing something.”
Julian turned.
The mahogany box looked exactly as he remembered.
Except the silver star painted on the lid was gone.
A rectangular indentation showed where it had once been attached.
Nora closed her eyes.
“When your mother gave me the locket, she said something.”
“What?”
“I forgot it until now.”
Julian waited.
“She said, ‘The star opens what the truth cannot.’”
Daniel swore softly.
Detective Ellis looked around the room.
“Where’s the star?”
Nobody answered.
Then a gunshot exploded somewhere below them.
Camille screamed downstairs.
A second shot followed.
Daniel rushed into the corridor.
Julian went after him despite orders.
Nora followed.
They reached the staircase as two officers ran toward the ballroom.
A guard lay near the side entrance, clutching his shoulder.
The front doors stood open.
Rain blew across the marble floor.
Malcolm was gone.
So was Camille.
Detective Ellis ran to the wounded guard.
“Who fired?”
The man struggled to breathe.
“Masked man.”
“Where are Hawthorne and Prescott?”
“He took them.”
Julian stared into the storm.
A black SUV raced beyond the fountain.
Daniel spoke into his radio.
“Close the gates!”
The answer came immediately.
“Main gates locked.”
“Then how is he leaving?”
A distant engine roared.
Nora looked toward the north side of the estate.
“The old gate.”
Julian’s face hardened.
“They planned this.”
Detective Ellis stood.
“Maybe.”
Julian turned.
“What does that mean?”
She looked at the blood on the floor.
“If Malcolm wanted to escape, kidnapping Camille makes sense.”
“And if Camille wanted to escape?”
Ellis met his eyes.
“Then the kidnapping may be theater.”
Nora suddenly grabbed Julian’s arm.
“Look.”
She pointed toward the place where Malcolm had been standing earlier.
Something silver lay beneath a chair.
Julian picked it up carefully with a napkin.
A small metal star.
The missing piece from Helena’s music box.
On the back was a tiny engraved number.
Daniel frowned.
“Room number?”
Nora shook her head.
“A safe.”
Julian looked at her.
“How do you know?”
She stared at the star.
“Because my mother had one exactly like it.”
“Where?”
Nora’s eyes filled with fear.
“In the car when she died.”
Outside, lightning illuminated the west balcony.
For one terrible instant Julian imagined his mother falling again.
Then Daniel’s radio crackled.
“Sir, we found the SUV.”
“Where?”
“North road.”
“And Malcolm?”
“Gone.”
“Camille?”
A pause.
Then:
“She’s in the back seat.”
Julian exhaled.
“Alive?”
Another pause.
“Yes.”
May you like
The guard’s next words changed everything.
“But she says Malcolm was never in the vehicle.”
