Chapter 5 - The Dead Woman’s Room
Arthur went alone.
Or appeared to.
Wyatt followed from six blocks back despite orders not to.
Arthur knew he would.
Kora directed him by text to an abandoned rehabilitation hospital on Crescent City's eastern edge.
Room 314.
Arthur entered carrying no visible weapon.
The room was empty.
But someone had lived there.
Cinnamon soap sat beside the sink.
Wildflower hand cream rested on a table.
Arthur touched the bottle.
Kora.
On the wall were photographs of him.
Hundreds.
Arthur leaving restaurants.
Arthur at funerals.
Arthur entering his office.
Arthur standing beside Kora’s grave.
Five years of his life documented by someone.
One photograph had been taken only three months after Kora disappeared.
Arthur knelt beside her grave.
On the back were words in Kora’s handwriting.
I WAS ACROSS THE STREET.
Arthur closed his eyes.
She had been there.
Alive.
Watching him mourn.
“Why?”
The word escaped him.
A floorboard creaked.
Arthur turned.
Kora stood in the doorway.
No gray coat.
Black pants.
White sweater.
Bandage around her hand.
Arthur did not move toward her.
“You can speak.”
She touched her throat.
“Some.”
Her voice was rough and painful.
“Why did you leave?”
“To keep Silas alive.”
“He took you.”
“He helped me escape.”
Arthur stared.
“From whom?”
“My mother?”
Kora's eyes lowered.
“Yes.”
The answer hurt in a way Arthur had not prepared for.
“Tell me.”
Kora sat.
Five years of truth came slowly.
After the staged death, Conrad and Elias had imprisoned her.
Silas helped her escape six months later.
But Evelyn found her.
Arthur’s mother had built a hidden network after faking her own death.
She believed the old families had poisoned Crescent City.
She wanted the ledger vault opened.
Kora knew part of the access sequence because Arthur’s father had secretly entrusted information to Kora’s father years earlier.
“Why didn't you come home?”
Kora cried silently.
“Because Evelyn showed me what would happen.”
“What?”
“Everyone around you would die.”
Arthur shook his head.
“She threatened you.”
“She proved it.”
Kora explained that every time she attempted contact, someone near Arthur was attacked.
A driver.
An accountant.
A guard.
Then Wyatt.
“Me?” Wyatt said from the doorway.
Arthur turned furiously.
Kora almost smiled.
“You were never good at following orders.”
Wyatt stepped inside.
Kora pointed to a scar near his temple.
“Car accident. Four years ago.”
Wyatt’s face changed.
“That wasn't an accident?”
“No.”
Arthur sat opposite Kora.
“You should have trusted me.”
“I wanted to.”
“Then why didn't you?”
“Because you were becoming exactly what Evelyn needed.”
Arthur went still.
“What?”
“A king.”
Kora's damaged voice weakened.
“She needed you to control the families before she exposed them. Your wedding to Beatrice would have completed it.”
Arthur understood.
The alliance.
The docks.
The politicians.
Every major power gathered under one roof.
His wedding had not been Conrad’s final move.
It had been Evelyn’s.
Kora whispered, “The blood on the veil was intentional.”
Arthur stared.
“You cut yourself.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I needed you to stop the wedding.”
Arthur almost laughed.
“You could have sent a note.”
“They watch everything.”
“But you knew I'd recognize the scent.”
Tears appeared in her green eyes.
“I hoped you would.”
Arthur looked down.
For five years, she had remembered the same tiny things he had.
He reached toward her.
Stopped.
Kora crossed the remaining distance.
Her fingers touched his.
Arthur closed his hand around hers.
No speeches.
No promises.
Just warmth.
Proof.
Alive.
Then Wyatt found a locked cabinet.
Inside were medical files.
Kora Hastings.
Evelyn Pendleton.
And one bearing Arthur’s name.
Arthur opened his.
Blood tests.
Childhood records.
DNA analysis.
At the bottom was a document signed by a physician.
PATERNITY EXCLUSION.
Arthur read it twice.
His father, Richard Pendleton, was not his biological father.
Kora whispered, “Arthur…”
Another page listed a probable biological father.
The name had been blacked out.
But the signature approving the test remained visible.
Dr. Malcolm Voss.
The same doctor who had signed Kora Hastings’s death certificate five years earlier.
Arthur looked at Wyatt.
“Find him.”
Wyatt already had his phone out.
Thirty seconds later, he looked up.
“We have a problem.”
“What?”
“Voss died this morning.”
Arthur's jaw tightened.
Wyatt turned the screen.
A photograph from the police scene showed Voss’s apartment.
Written across the wall in blood were four words.
ARTHUR IS NOT A PENDLETON.
Then Kora noticed something reflected in the photograph’s mirror.
A man standing behind the police photographer.
She grabbed Arthur’s wrist.
“That’s him.”
“Who?”
Her face drained of color.
“The man who kept me underground.”
Arthur enlarged the image.
The man's face became clear.
Wyatt stopped breathing.
May you like
Because the man standing at the murder scene was his supposedly dead father, Elias Miller.
And Elias was looking directly into the camera...
