Chapter 5 - THE COFFIN
The photograph showed me standing beside Victor.
It had been taken less than an hour earlier.
Nobody outside should have known where we were.
Victor stared at it.
His expression became colder than I had ever seen.
“Lock everything down.”
His men moved instantly.
I couldn't stop staring at the coffin.
“Is that for me?”
Victor stepped between me and it.
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if they wanted you dead, you wouldn't be standing here.”
That answer did not comfort me.
Inside the coffin was a single envelope.
Victor opened it.
A newspaper clipping fell out.
It was twenty years old.
The headline read:
LOCAL WOMAN AND CHILD DISAPPEAR AFTER HOUSE FIRE
Underneath was a photograph of my mother.
Beside her was my grandmother.
And beside them—
me.
I stared.
“I remember that night.”
Victor looked at me.
“What do you remember?”
“Smoke.”
He waited.
“Someone carrying me.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
“Anything else?”
I closed my eyes.
A memory surfaced.
A man's voice.
Don't look back, Lily.
I opened my eyes.
“I remember a ring.”
“What kind?”
“Black.”
Victor went still.
“Black stone?”
“Yes.”
He exchanged a glance with Gabriel.
“Why?”
Gabriel said quietly:
“That ring belonged to Elena's lawyer.”
“Who was he?”
Victor answered.
“Samuel Cross.”
I looked at him.
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
Again.
Everyone connected to my childhood seemed to be dead.
But suddenly Gabriel shook his head.
“No.”
Victor looked at him.
“No what?”
“I saw Cross three weeks ago.”
Silence.
Victor's eyes narrowed.
“Where?”
“Outside the old courthouse.”
The room changed instantly.
Victor ordered the cars.
We drove through the rain.
The courthouse was abandoned.
Inside, we found an old records room.
Dust covered everything.
Gabriel found a hidden drawer.
Inside was a file.
The label read:
ELENA VALE — PROTECTED ASSET
I opened it.
The first page contained my mother's signature.
The second contained mine.
But I had never signed it.
Victor leaned over my shoulder.
“What is this?”
I read the words.
Beneficiary: Lily Elena Carter Vale.
Underneath:
Assets to be transferred upon her twenty-third birthday.
My birthday was three days away.
I stared at Victor.
“What assets?”
He didn't answer.
Gabriel turned the page.
The amount was written there.
I read it once.
Then again.
I thought I had misunderstood.
Estimated value: $380,000,000.
My knees nearly gave out.
“No.”
Victor looked at me.
“That's why they found you.”
I shook my head.
“I don't want any of this.”
“You don't get to choose whether you're involved anymore.”
A sound came from the hallway.
Footsteps.
Victor drew his weapon.
The footsteps stopped.
Then a man's voice echoed through the darkness.
“Lily.”
I froze.
I knew that voice.
Not from memory.
From somewhere deeper.
Something inside me recognized it.
Victor stepped forward.
“Come out.”
A man appeared.
Older.
Gray hair.
Black ring.
Samuel Cross.
He smiled.
“Hello, little girl.”
My blood ran cold.
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“Where is my mother?”
His expression changed.
“She has been waiting for you.”
“Where?”
He looked at Victor.
“Your brother is not the person you should fear.”
Victor's hand tightened around his weapon.
“Then who?”
Samuel looked directly at me.
“Your father.”
I couldn't breathe.
“My father is dead.”
Samuel smiled.
“No.”
He stepped backward into the darkness.
“Your father has been alive all these years.”
Then the lights went out.
When they returned, Samuel was gone.
May you like
And on the floor was a note.
COME ALONE TO THE RIVER AT MIDNIGHT.
