Chapter 2 - THE GHOST IN THE ROOM
Nobody breathed.
The silence in the sitting room was so absolute I could hear the faint ticking of the grandfather clock in the hallway.
Vincent didn't look at his fiancée.
He didn't look at the wealthy guests holding their champagne glasses in frozen shock.
He looked only at the elderly piano teacher.
“My father,” Vincent repeated. The words were barely a whisper, yet they carried a weight that made the air in the room feel heavy. “You’re saying my mother wasn’t having an affair with Sinclair. She was trying to protect Lily from my father.”
Ruth nodded, tears spilling over her wrinkled cheeks.
“Teresa knew your father was growing paranoid. He thought everyone was trying to steal his empire. But most of all, he thought Lily wasn’t his.”
Natalie stepped forward, her face flushed with panic.
“Vincent, this is insane. This woman is senile. My father was a respected security contractor!”
Vincent finally turned to her.
The grief in his eyes had vanished, replaced by something cold and terrifying. The mafia boss Chicago feared was suddenly standing in the room.
“Your father locked the east stairwell,” Vincent said quietly. “My mother paid him to bypass the security system, to leave a safe exit for her and Lily to run away. But your father took my mother’s money, and then he took my father’s money to lock them in.”
Natalie’s hands shook. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was a child when the fire happened!”
“But you knew,” Vincent said. He pointed at the cassette player. “You knew about the stairwell. That’s why you wanted this machine thrown in the garbage.”
Natalie’s composure snapped. She pointed a manicured finger at me.
“This is her fault! If this little tramp hadn’t let this crazy old woman inside, none of this would be happening! Fire her, Vincent! Fire her right now, or I’m walking out that door!”
I instinctively pulled my shoulders back. I thought of Tyler’s asthma medication. I thought of our rent.
But Vincent didn’t look at me.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out the three-carat diamond engagement ring Natalie had taken off to wash her hands earlier, and dropped it onto the glass coffee table.
It landed with a sharp clack.
“Walk,” Vincent said.
Natalie stared at the ring. “Vincent…”
“Get out of my house, Natalie. And pray I don’t find proof that you helped hide this.”
She let out a choked sob, grabbed her purse, and ran from the room. The remaining guests quickly, silently, shuffled out behind her.
Within two minutes, the grand sitting room was empty.
Just Vincent, Ruth, and me.
My heart hammered against my ribs. I turned to leave, to give them privacy, but Vincent’s voice stopped me.
“Stay, Olivia.”
I froze. “Sir, I should get back to the kitchen—”
“You didn’t let fear stop you from doing the right thing tonight,” he said, his voice softening. “Please. Stay.”
I nodded, standing quietly by the doorway.
Vincent knelt in front of Ruth. “Mrs. Jensen. If my mother knew my father was planning something, why didn’t she just take Lily and run?”
Ruth wiped her eyes with a lace handkerchief.
“Because she didn’t have the key,” she whispered.
Vincent frowned. “The key to what?”
Ruth opened her worn handbag again. Her trembling fingers reached into the side pocket.
“Three days before the fire, your mother came to my house. She looked terrified. She told me she had secured something important. Something that would guarantee you and Lily could start a new life, far away from the syndicate.”
She pulled her hand out of the bag.
Resting on her palm was a heavy, antique silver key. The bow was shaped like a lion’s head.
“She made me swear to give this to you when you were old enough to understand,” Ruth said. “But then the fire happened. And your father’s men started watching my house. I was terrified. I hid it for twenty-two years.”
Vincent took the key. His thumb brushed over the lion’s head.
“Answer one question, open two more,” Vincent muttered, staring at the silver object.
“I know what that goes to,” I said, before I could stop myself.
Vincent’s head snapped toward me. “What?”
I swallowed hard. “I’m sorry, sir. But I polish the antiques on Tuesdays. That key… it belongs to the old wooden music box in your private study. The one you brought from the old estate.”
Vincent stood up immediately. “Show me.”
We left Ruth resting on the sofa and hurried down the long hallway toward the west wing.
My pulse raced. For two years, I had been an invisible ghost in this house. Now, I was running down the corridor beside the most powerful man in the city.
Vincent unlocked his study. The room was dark, smelling of leather and expensive scotch.
He turned on the desk lamp.
“It’s on the bottom shelf,” I said, pointing to the corner bookcase.
Vincent knelt and pulled out a beautifully carved mahogany music box. It was heavy, adorned with brass fittings. He inserted the silver key into the lock.
It fit perfectly.
He turned it. A sharp click echoed in the quiet room.
Vincent opened the lid.
I held my breath, waiting to see what his mother had sacrificed her life to hide.
But as the lid lifted, Vincent’s face drained of color.
The velvet interior of the box was completely empty.
“Someone’s been in here,” Vincent breathed.
I looked closer. Resting on the red velvet was a single, fresh flake of cigar ash.
Someone hadn’t just broken in. They had done it tonight. During the party.
Then I looked down at the Persian rug beneath the bookshelf.
Something was glittering in the lamplight.
I bent down and picked it up. It was a custom-made diamond cufflink. Shaped like a silver dagger.
Vincent stared at it in my palm.
“That’s Daniel’s,” he whispered, his voice cracking with betrayal.
Daniel. Vincent’s second-in-command. The man who had guarded his life for a decade.
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Before Vincent could say another word, the heavy oak door of the study slammed shut, and the lock clicked from the outside.
TITLE: THE TRAITOR IN THE WALLS
