Chapter 15 - the woman beyond the gates
The photograph had been taken two days earlier.
Vale House appeared in the background, its windows bright beneath the evening sky. A woman stood beyond the iron gates wearing a long brown coat and a silver crescent pendant.
Her hair was streaked with gray.
Her face resembled Eleanor’s.
On the back, someone had written:
Amelia came home. You were watching the wrong daughter.
Ethan placed the photograph beneath the desk lamp.
“That is impossible.”
Arthur did not answer.
Rosa stood beside him, reading the message again.
“Could she still be alive?”
“She would be sixty-one,” Arthur said.
“The woman in the photograph could be that age.”
Arthur examined the silver pendant.
“It is the same pendant from the portrait.”
Ethan looked toward the dark window.
“Why would she come to the gates and leave?”
“Perhaps she was checking whether Richard still controlled the house.”
“Richard is under guard.”
“Then perhaps she was checking whether Lily was here.”
Rosa’s expression changed.
“Why would Amelia care about Lily?”
Arthur looked at the unopened video file.
“The missing recording may explain that.”
They moved the computer onto the desk.
Before Ethan started the footage, Rosa checked Lily’s room. The child slept peacefully with Gray beneath her chin and one hand resting on a book Ethan had read twice that evening.
Rosa returned and closed the hidden door.
The video began where the earlier recording ended.
Amelia sat beneath a harsh light.
She looked frightened, but there were no visible injuries.
The unseen man behind the camera asked a question.
“Where is the child?”
Amelia stared at him.
“Somewhere you will never find her.”
“You cannot protect her.”
“I already did.”
“Eleanor will search.”
“That is what you are afraid of.”
A hand entered the frame and placed a document on the table.
Amelia looked down.
The top line was visible.
Certificate of Live Birth.
The name had been covered.
The man spoke again.
“If Richard learns the baby survived, everyone who helped you will disappear.”
Amelia looked directly into the camera.
“Richard already knows.”
The footage shifted.
A door opened behind her.
A younger Richard Vale entered the room.
He appeared nervous.
He looked toward the unseen man.
“You promised she would not be questioned here.”
The man laughed.
“You do not give me orders.”
Richard’s voice dropped.
“I paid you.”
“You paid me to remove a problem. You never asked what would replace it.”
Amelia looked at Richard.
“Tell Eleanor the truth.”
Richard refused to meet her eyes.
“She will lose everything.”
“No,” Amelia said. “You will.”
The unseen man stepped closer to the camera. His reflection appeared briefly in a metal cabinet.
Ethan paused the recording.
The image was blurred, but the face was recognizable.
Arthur sat down heavily.
Rosa looked from the screen to Ethan.
“Who is he?”
Ethan’s voice was barely audible.
“My grandfather.”
Eleanor’s father.
The founder of the Vale empire.
A man who had officially died before Ethan was born.
Arthur removed his glasses.
“This recording was made four years after his funeral.”
Rosa felt the room become colder.
Ethan resumed the video.
Amelia lifted her head.
“You cannot hide two daughters forever.”
Richard stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
Amelia smiled for the first time.
“You never understood why Eleanor changed the trust.”
The man behind the camera moved abruptly.
The image shook.
Before the recording ended, Amelia shouted one final sentence.
“The first child was never Ethan’s.”
The screen went black.
No one spoke.
Rosa looked toward Lily’s room beyond the hidden walls.
“What first child?”
Arthur stood slowly.
“I need to access Eleanor’s original records.”
“You said everything was in this room,” Ethan replied.
“I was wrong.”
A soft sound came from the west corridor.
Three piano notes.
Then a fourth.
Eleanor’s unfinished melody.
Rosa reached for the door.
Ethan stopped her.
“Lily is upstairs.”
The melody began again.
Four notes played by someone inside the dark ballroom.
Ethan opened the hidden door.
The west corridor was empty.
They walked toward the ballroom together.
Moonlight covered the grand piano.
A woman in a brown coat sat on the bench with her back to them.
The silver crescent pendant rested against her neck.
Ethan stopped several feet away.
“Amelia?”
The woman’s hands became still.
For a moment, she did not turn.
Then she spoke in a voice that sounded painfully similar to Eleanor’s.
“You have your mother’s courage,” she said.
She slowly faced them.
“And your real father’s eyes.”
Before Ethan could answer, the lights throughout Vale House went out.
Beyond the gates, several black vehicles approached without headlights.
Amelia rose from the piano.
“They found us sooner than I expected.”
Rosa’s heart pounded.
“Who found us?”
May you like
Amelia looked toward the staircase leading to Lily’s room.
“The people Victoria was trying to protect your daughter from.”
