Chapter 15 - the fifth chair
By morning, Richard’s financial authority had been removed.
Hale Holdings announced an independent investigation.
The children’s medical fund received an emergency transfer of $8 million from previously frozen accounts.
Chelsea filed the recordings of Richard’s custody threats with the court. Owen agreed to support her petition, and Sophie returned to her mother’s care.
Diane left Hale House with one suitcase.
For the first time in decades, she entered a home where Richard did not know the security code.
The immediate battle was over.
Maisie had been given the silver-ribboned chair.
She had carried it away from the dining table herself and placed it beside the Christmas tree.
“This isn’t Sophie’s chair or mine,” she said. “It belongs to whoever needs a seat.”
Leah thought Elias would have approved.
Yet Richard remained missing.
So did Daniel.
And the sealed page had not been recovered.
At ten in the morning, Margaret gathered Leah, Chelsea and Diane in Elias’s old study.
Charles joined by video call from the company offices.
“We have located the vehicle used during Richard’s escape,” Margaret said. “It was abandoned near the northern train line.”
“Any sign of them?” Leah asked.
“No.”
“Was Richard taken willingly?”
“The camera image suggests he was not restrained.”
Chelsea folded her arms.
“So he went with Daniel.”
“Possibly.”
“Why would Daniel help the man responsible for Rose’s death?”
Margaret looked toward the window.
“I do not know.”
Leah had stopped accepting those words.
She opened Elias’s desk and removed every drawer. The bottom drawer appeared too shallow.
Using the second silver key from Box 214, she unlocked a hidden panel.
Inside was a ledger, five photographs and a map of the Hale lake property.
The photographs showed Elias with five children at different stages of his life.
Richard was one.
Leah recognized Margaret in another.
Rose appeared in the third.
The fourth child was a boy identified as Thomas Vale.
The fifth photograph had been removed, leaving only four damaged corners.
Chelsea opened the ledger.
“Grandpa made annual payments to all of them.”
Margaret read the names.
“These were not charity payments. They came from Elias’s personal account.”
“Who was Thomas Vale?” Leah asked.
Diane answered.
“Richard’s biological father.”
Margaret looked stunned.
“You knew?”
“Richard told me shortly after we married. Thomas died before Leah was born.”
Leah examined the payment dates.
The transfers continued for six years after Thomas’s supposed death.
“Either Thomas was alive,” she said, “or someone else received the money.”
Chelsea pointed to an address.
The final transfer had gone to a property near the northern train line where Richard’s vehicle was found.
Charles enlarged the scanned map.
“There is a structure on that land.”
“Hale property?” Leah asked.
“No. It belongs to Mercer Development.”
Rose’s company.
Margaret moved toward the door.
“We should contact the authorities.”
Leah closed the ledger.
“Not until we understand who they would be walking into.”
Her phone rang.
The number was blocked.
She answered on speaker.
A man breathed on the other end.
“Leah.”
She recognized Richard’s voice.
“Where are you?”
“Listen carefully.”
“Is Daniel with you?”
Richard ignored the question.
“The sealed page is open.”
Everyone in the study became still.
“What does it say?” Leah asked.
Richard’s breathing grew uneven.
“The four words are not about Maisie.”
“What are they about?”
“Elias knew who betrayed Rose.”
“Who?”
Richard lowered his voice.
“The person is in the room with you.”
Leah looked at Margaret.
Then at Diane.
Then at Chelsea.
Charles’s face remained visible on the screen.
“Give me the name,” Leah said.
A second voice spoke behind Richard.
Daniel.
“Don’t tell her yet.”
There was a struggle.
The call ended.
At that exact moment, the old grandfather clock began to ring, though its mechanism had been broken for three years.
One chime.
Two.
Three.
On the fifth chime, a hidden panel opened behind Elias’s bookshelf.
A narrow passage appeared.
Cold air moved from the darkness.
Maisie stood in the doorway of the study.
She was holding the wooden sparrow in one hand and a folded piece of paper in the other.
“Mom,” she said, “this fell out of the clock.”
Leah took the paper.
It was a seating chart for a Christmas dinner held nine years earlier.
Richard.
Diane.
Margaret.
Rose.
Daniel.
Five names had been written around the table.
But the chart showed six chairs.
On the empty chair, Elias had written one sentence.
The person who betrayed Rose always sits here.
May you like
A floorboard creaked inside the hidden passage.
Someone was already in the house.
