Chapter 7 - THE SONG FOR TWO DAUGHTERS
Margaret survived surgery but remained unconscious.
Vanessa returned to the manor shortly after the ambulance left. She entered the destroyed study, stared at the blood on the carpet, and accused Amelia of bringing danger into the house.
“Someone attacked her because you started asking questions.”
Amelia faced her across the room.
“Someone attacked her because she knew the answers.”
Vanessa looked at Sabrina.
“Go upstairs.”
Sabrina did not move.
“Mother, did you tell me Amelia was dead?”
Vanessa’s expression remained calm.
“This is not the time.”
“You showed me a letter.”
“You were grieving.”
“So it was false?”
Vanessa turned to Amelia.
“Look what you are doing to your sister.”
Amelia stepped between them.
“Answer her.”
Vanessa’s control slipped.
“I did what was necessary.”
Sabrina recoiled.
“You made me mourn her.”
“I protected this family.”
“From what?”
Vanessa looked toward the shattered window.
“From your father’s enemies.”
Amelia’s voice lowered.
“Did you steal the trust?”
Vanessa smiled bitterly.
“Your father stole first.”
“From whom?”
“Ask the government you worship.”
“What happened during Glass Harbor?”
For the first time, Vanessa looked truly surprised.
“Where did you hear that name?”
Amelia did not answer.
Vanessa took a step back.
“You found the storage unit.”
The room went silent.
Sabrina stared at her mother.
Amelia said, “How did you know about it?”
Vanessa’s eyes moved toward the pistol beneath Amelia’s jacket.
“Because Robert told me everything before he died.”
“He told me you didn’t know why the trust existed.”
“Robert lied to everyone.”
“Did you send Marcus Reed after me?”
Vanessa gave no response.
Amelia moved closer.
“If you threaten me again, I will not handle this privately.”
Vanessa laughed softly.
“You still think this is about stolen money.”
“What is it about?”
“Survival.”
“Whose?”
Vanessa looked at both daughters.
“All of ours.”
She left the study.
Sabrina sank into her father’s chair.
“She admitted it.”
“She admitted only what she wanted us to hear.”
Sabrina covered her face.
“I helped her.”
“You were manipulated.”
“You don’t know that.”
Amelia did not argue.
They searched the study until after midnight.
A song.
Margaret had said the ledger was a song.
Robert had loved classical music. He played piano badly but enthusiastically. When Amelia and Sabrina were children, he wrote a short melody for them called Two Daughters.
The sheet music had hung in the family music room for years.
They ran there.
The frame above the piano was empty.
Sabrina stared at the pale rectangle on the wallpaper.
“It was here last week.”
“Who removed it?”
“I don’t know.”
Amelia examined the piano.
Dust covered the lid except for one clean line near the back.
Something had been moved recently.
She opened the bench.
Inside were old recital programs, tuning tools, and a small digital recording device.
Amelia pressed play.
Robert’s voice filled the room.
“For Amelia and Sabrina. Play together, because the melody is incomplete without both parts.”
A piano began.
The left-hand notes were simple.
The right-hand notes followed with irregular pauses.
Amelia listened three times.
“It’s encoded.”
“How?”
“The pauses. Dad taught me basic signal patterns when I was a kid.”
“He taught me number substitution.”
Amelia looked at her.
“Two parts.”
They replayed the music.
Amelia recorded the intervals between notes.
Sabrina converted each interval into numbers.
After an hour, they had a sequence.
4-19-7-2-11-31-8-14.
“A bank box?” Sabrina asked.
“Possibly.”
“There are too many numbers.”
Amelia studied the pattern.
“Dad said the melody was incomplete without both parts.”
Sabrina looked at the piano keys.
She began playing the song from memory.
Halfway through, she stopped.
“The original melody had a final note.”
“The recording doesn’t.”
Sabrina pressed the highest C key.
A mechanical click sounded inside the piano.
They looked at each other.
Amelia removed the front panel.
A narrow compartment opened beneath the strings.
Inside was a wedding invitation.
Sabrina pulled it out.
It was not her invitation.
It was Vanessa and Robert’s, dated thirty-six years earlier.
On the back, Robert had written:
The first lie was spoken on our wedding day.
Beneath the message was a safe-deposit box number.
Vale Continental Bank.
Box 419.
Sabrina sat down.
“Mother’s wedding day?”
Amelia examined the invitation.
“There’s something else.”
A name had been written beneath Vanessa’s maiden name.
Then crossed out.
Sabrina held it beneath the lamp.
The original name became visible.
Vanessa Reed.
But their mother’s maiden name was Vanessa Cole.
Amelia thought of Marcus Reed.
The man who had followed her to Fort Reed.
“Reed isn’t just Mother’s security chief,” Sabrina whispered.
The music room door slammed shut.
May you like
The lock turned from the outside.
Smoke began pouring through the ventilation grate.
