Chapter 1 - The Broken Portrait
Leo Mercer swung the fireplace poker before anyone could stop him.
The iron head smashed into the old family portrait with a crack that silenced the entire room.
Glass burst across the floor. Aunt Vanessa screamed. Uncle Richard shot out of his chair so fast his whiskey spilled down the front of his shirt.
“Leo!” his mother shouted. “What are you doing?”
Leo did not answer.
He hit the portrait again.
The painted face of Grandpa Henry split from forehead to chin.
“You little brat!” Richard lunged forward. “That painting is worth more than—”
“Than Grandpa?” Leo snapped.
The words stopped him.
For the past hour, everyone had been talking about Henry Mercer’s fortune as if Henry himself were already dirt in the ground.
The family lawyer, Martin Pike, had spread papers across the dining table. Richard wanted the company voting shares. Vanessa wanted the lake house. Cousin Grant wanted cash. Even people who had barely visited Grandpa in years suddenly remembered how much they had “loved” him.
Henry had been missing for twenty-three days after his empty car was found near Blackwater Bridge.
No body had ever been recovered.
But that afternoon Martin had arrived with a court petition to have Henry declared legally dead as soon as possible.
Leo hated every word of it.
Because Grandpa was not dead.
He did not know how he knew. He just knew.
Three nights earlier, Leo had heard footsteps above the sealed west wing.
Yesterday, he had found fresh cigar ash in Grandpa’s greenhouse.
And that morning, someone had moved the old portrait two inches to the left.
Grandpa hated crooked pictures.
Leo dropped the poker and grabbed the torn canvas with both hands.
“Stop him!” Vanessa yelled.
But Leo ripped the painting from the frame.
Something small fell from the back and struck the hardwood floor.
A brass key.
Then a black digital recorder wrapped in yellowed newspaper.
And a folded note with one word written across the front in Grandpa Henry’s blocky handwriting.
LEO.
His mother went pale.
Richard stopped breathing for a second.
Leo unfolded the note.
If they tell you I am dead, do not believe them.
Do not trust Martin Pike.
Do not let Richard open the blue room.
Leo looked up slowly.
Uncle Richard was no longer angry.
May you like
He was terrified.
Then the family lawyer reached inside his coat and said, “Give me that recorder.”
