Chapter 10 - Mother Was Gone
We reached the mansion in three hours.
I barely remember the drive.
Leo met us at the front steps.
"Tell me everything."
"At ten twelve, Mrs. Hale asked for tea. At ten eighteen, the nurse found the bedroom empty. Wheelchair gone. West service elevator used. Camera looped for six minutes."
"Gate?"
"No vehicle exit."
Clara looked around. "Then she's still here."
We searched the estate wing by wing.
Bedrooms. Library. Conservatory. Pool house. Service tunnels built when the mansion was renovated.
Nothing.
I called Marcus.
Voicemail.
Again.
Voicemail.
My anger turned cold.
Clara walked into the music room and stopped.
"She said something yesterday."
"What?"
"About your father hiding things in places people ignored because they looked beautiful."
Her eyes moved to the old pipe organ built into the far wall.
Mother had hated that organ.
Father had loved it.
We crossed the room.
Behind the carved bench, Clara found fresh scratches on the floor.
We pulled it aside.
A narrow panel had been opened.
Behind it, a service passage.
"Mother?"
No answer.
We followed the passage twenty yards until it opened into a storage room beneath the chapel.
Mother sat in her wheelchair beside a metal cabinet.
Alive.
Furious.
"Took you long enough."
I almost laughed from relief.
Clara ran to her.
"Why would you disappear like that?"
"Because every room with a camera is compromised."
Mother held up a small envelope.
"I remembered where Henry hid the duplicate."
My breath caught.
"Where?"
"Inside the organ bench."
She gave me the envelope.
It contained six notarized pages.
Henry Hale's signature.
Samuel Price's signature.
June Mercer's signature.
And the amendment naming Clara Reed.
We had it.
Real proof.
Mother smiled faintly.
Then a phone began ringing.
Not mine.
Not Clara's.
A phone on the shelf behind us.
Old. Cheap. Prepaid.
None of us had seen it before.
I answered.
Marcus spoke immediately.
"Now that you've found the paper, Bennett, we can stop pretending this is about family."
My jaw tightened.
"Where are you?"
"Close enough."
"You changed Mother's medication."
"Careful."
"You sent men after June."
"Again, careful."
"What do you want?"
His voice went flat.
"Bring me the codicil by midnight. Or tomorrow morning the board will receive documents proving Clara Reed stole from Eleanor Hale for nine months."
Clara stared at me.
May you like
Marcus continued.
"And unlike your precious family secret, those documents will look very real."
