Chapter 3 - THE CHILD'S DRAWING
I stared at the blood on the floorboards, my breath catching in my throat.
“No,” Arthur gasped from behind us, seeing the dark crimson stain. The old man’s legs gave out. Vincent caught him before he hit the ground, lowering him gently against the wall.
“Arthur, breathe,” Vincent commanded, his voice tight but steady. “We don’t know whose blood this is. Keep it together. I need you.”
I knelt beside the silver rosary. I didn't touch it. My hands were shaking too badly.
“Mr. Salvatore,” I whispered, pointing to the trail of drops. “It leads out the window.”
The bedroom window had been smashed outward. Cold wind howled through the broken glass, catching the floral curtains.
Vincent didn't hesitate. He climbed through the jagged frame, his dress shoes crunching on the frost-covered grass outside.
I turned to Arthur. “Stay here, Mr. Bennett. We will find them.”
I hoisted my skirt and climbed through the window after Vincent. The New York winter air bit into my skin, but the adrenaline rushing through my veins kept me warm.
The backyard of the cottage led directly into dense, overgrown woods. Vincent was shining a tactical flashlight into the trees, following the faint, red droplets on the frozen leaves.
“Catherine!” Vincent yelled. “Leo!”
Only the wind answered.
“They couldn't have gone far,” I said, my teeth chattering. “Catherine uses a wheelchair. If they took her—”
“The wheelchair was still in the living room, overturned,” Vincent said grimly. “Whoever took them carried her.”
We pushed deeper into the trees. The trail of blood was growing thinner. My heart pounded against my ribs. What if we were too late? What if Judge Vance’s men had already done the unthinkable?
Suddenly, I heard a sound.
A tiny, muffled whimper.
I stopped. “Wait. Turn off the light.”
Vincent clicked the flashlight off. The darkness was absolute.
We stood in perfect silence. The wind rustled the dead branches.
Then, I heard it again. A soft rustling coming from beneath a large, uprooted oak tree to our left. The roots had torn out of the earth, creating a small, muddy hollow beneath the trunk.
I crept forward, my heart in my throat.
“Leo?” I whispered softly. “Leo, it’s Emily from the big house.”
The rustling stopped.
I knelt in the freezing mud, peering into the dark hollow.
A pair of wide, terrified eyes stared back at me.
It was Leo. The ten-year-old boy was covered in dirt and shivering violently, clutching a heavy iron fireplace poker in his small hands.
And lying behind him, breathing heavily, was Catherine.
“Leo!” I gasped, reaching my hands out.
The boy didn't move. He pointed the iron poker at me, his hands shaking. “Don’t touch my mom! I hit one of them! I’ll hit you too!”
“Leo, it’s me,” Vincent said, stepping beside me. He dropped his gun in the mud and held up both his empty hands. “It’s Vincent. Your grandfather’s friend. You’re safe now.”
Hearing about his grandfather broke the boy’s brave facade. Leo dropped the poker and burst into tears.
Vincent reached into the hollow and gently pulled the boy out, wrapping his expensive suit jacket around Leo’s shivering shoulders.
I crawled inside to Catherine. Her leg was bleeding heavily from a deep gash, but she was conscious.
“Emily,” Catherine winced, clutching my arm. “The men... they broke in.”
“I know. We’re getting you out of here,” I said, pressing my apron against her leg to stop the bleeding.
Vincent carried Catherine back to the cottage, while I carried Leo.
By the time we got them inside, Vincent’s security team had arrived from the main estate, securing the perimeter. Paramedics were wrapping Catherine’s leg. Arthur was weeping, holding his grandson so tightly the boy was practically buried in his coat.
Vincent stood by the shattered door, his face a mask of cold fury.
“What did they want, Catherine?” Vincent asked gently. “Why did Judge Vance’s men attack you?”
Catherine winced as the medic stitched her leg.
“They weren't just trying to evict us,” she said, her voice shaking. “They were tearing the house apart. Pulling up floorboards. Smashing the walls. They kept screaming at me, asking where Joseph hid it.”
Vincent frowned. “Hid what?”
“A ledger,” Catherine replied. “One of the men said Joseph Salvatore left a black ledger in this cottage before he died. A book that could send Judge Vance to prison for the rest of his life.”
Arthur looked up, stunned. “Mr. Joseph never gave me a ledger.”
“They didn't find it,” Catherine said. “Leo hit one of them with the poker, and they chased us out the window. But they swore they’d come back and burn the cottage down to find it.”
Vincent looked at the ruined living room. “If my father hid something here, he didn't tell anyone. Not even me.”
“He had to have left a clue,” I said, looking around the wreckage.
My eyes landed on the far wall. Amidst the smashed picture frames and broken china, one thing remained perfectly intact.
It was a framed drawing. Done in crayon.
I walked over to it. “Arthur, who drew this?”
Arthur wiped his eyes. “Vincent did. When he was eight years old. He used to sit at our kitchen table while Eleanor baked.”
Vincent walked up beside me. He stared at his own childhood drawing. It was a crude picture of the cottage. The apple trees. The sun.
But there was something strange about it.
The chimney on the roof was colored entirely in bright, heavy red crayon. And at the bottom of the fireplace, Vincent had drawn a massive black ‘X’.
Vincent stared at it, his breathing shallow.
“I didn't draw that ‘X’,” Vincent whispered.
He turned slowly toward the actual stone fireplace in the cottage living room.
“My father visited Eleanor the day before he died,” Vincent said, his voice dropping. “He stood right by that fireplace for an hour. I remember because he wouldn't let me come near it.”
Vincent walked to the hearth. He grabbed the iron poker Leo had dropped earlier.
He swung it hard into the center stone.
The stone cracked.
He swung again. And again. The mortar crumbled, and the heavy rock fell forward onto the floor, revealing a dark, hollow cavity in the chimney.
Vincent reached inside.
He didn't pull out a ledger.
He pulled out a small, rusted metal lockbox.
The room went dead silent. Vincent set the box on the table and smashed the cheap lock with the poker.
He opened the lid.
Inside was a single brass key.
And sitting beneath the key was an old, faded train ticket.
“Grand Central Station,” Vincent read, looking at the faded ink. “Locker 412.”
“He hid the ledger at the train station,” I breathed.
But Vincent wasn't looking at the ticket anymore. His eyes were locked on something else at the bottom of the box.
He reached in and pulled out a faded photograph.
It was a picture taken at night, outside a restaurant.
It showed Judge Thomas Vance holding a smoking gun.
May you like
And standing next to him, kissing his cheek in celebration, was Vivian Whitmore. Margaret’s mother.
And lying dead on the pavement at their feet… was Vincent’s mother, Maria.
