Chapter 4 - The Woman in the Winter House
By sunrise, Elara had become Chicago’s easiest person to blame.
Sebastian Crane was dead.
Her name had been left beside the body.
Her apartment had been searched.
Her father’s connection to Gabriel Vane had surfaced.
And she was wearing Julian’s ring.
Julian knew exactly what that looked like.
A setup.
Unfortunately, setups worked because appearances mattered more than truth.
He took Elara to a penthouse above Lake Michigan.
It had no family photographs.
No decorations.
No sign anyone actually lived there.
“You live here?” she asked.
“Sometimes.”
“That explains the personality.”
Julian looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
“You own six couches and not one blanket.”
Marcus almost smiled.
Julian did not.
But some of the tension left the room.
For an hour, they reviewed everything.
Sebastian had contacted Julian.
Sebastian claimed Gabriel was alive.
Sebastian brought a recent photograph.
Sebastian warned the vehicles outside the lounge were not his.
Then Sebastian died at Julian’s childhood home before Gabriel appeared.
Someone wanted Julian to distrust Gabriel.
Or wanted Gabriel to distrust Julian.
Maybe both.
Elara sat at the kitchen island.
“What if Sebastian was trying to help?”
Julian leaned against the window.
“Then someone killed him for it.”
“And wrote my name because they want you to think I did it.”
“No.”
She looked at him.
“No?”
“Nobody expects me to believe you personally killed Sebastian.”
“Comforting.”
“They want others to believe I’m protecting his killer.”
Elara understood.
“So this damages you.”
“It damages both of us.”
Marcus entered.
“Police found the body.”
Julian nodded.
“And?”
“Detective Nolan is handling it.”
Julian’s expression soured.
Elara asked, “Friend?”
“Not remotely.”
Marcus placed a tablet on the counter.
“A security camera caught someone leaving the property.”
Video played.
A hooded figure.
Tall.
Male.
No visible face.
But he limped slightly.
Julian paused the footage.
“Gabriel.”
Marcus looked at him.
“You’re sure?”
“My brother broke his left leg when he was sixteen. It never healed correctly.”
Elara stared at the screen.
“So Gabriel was there.”
“Maybe.”
Julian straightened.
“We go to Wisconsin.”
The winter house sat two hours north.
A narrow road cut through frozen woods.
Elara rode beside Julian.
“What was your mother like?”
He looked out the window.
“Kind.”
She waited.
“That’s all?”
“She played piano badly. Burned everything she cooked. Read detective novels. Hated my father’s business.”
“You loved her.”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“Cancer.”
His answer was short.
Elara stopped pressing.
After a while, Julian said, “She wanted Gabriel and me out.”
“Out of what?”
“Everything.”
He looked at his hands.
“My father called the organization an inheritance.”
“What did your mother call it?”
“A curse.”
The winter house appeared beyond the trees.
White siding.
Green shutters.
A frozen lake behind it.
Marcus inspected the property before they entered.
Inside smelled of cedar.
Julian stopped in the doorway.
Memories were visible across his face.
“My mother’s piano.”
It still stood near the window.
Elara walked slowly.
Photographs remained on shelves.
Julian at ten.
Gabriel at thirteen.
Their mother between them.
Their father rarely appeared.
Elara noticed one thing.
In every Christmas photograph, their mother wore the same silver necklace.
A raven.
“Julian.”
He followed her gaze.
“She wore it constantly.”
“The initials on the picture. E.M.V.”
“Evelyn Marie Vane.”
Elara approached the piano.
A silver raven had been carved into the wood.
She touched it.
Click.
A hidden compartment opened.
Julian stared.
Inside lay an envelope.
For my sons.
He did not move.
Elara stepped back.
“This is yours.”
Julian opened it.
Two pages.
He read silently.
Then handed them to Elara.
Julian, Gabriel,
If you are reading this together, I succeeded.
If you are reading separately, Victor failed us.
Your father made terrible choices. But the Cranes gave him fewer choices than either of you knew.
The evidence is divided because no single person should control it.
Gabriel has the names.
Julian has the accounts.
Together, you can destroy the system that trapped our family.
Elara frowned.
“Julian has the accounts?”
“I don’t.”
Marcus looked around.
“Maybe you do.”
They searched.
Thirty minutes.
Nothing.
Elara returned to the piano.
Accounts.
Music.
Numbers.
She opened the bench.
Sheet music filled it.
One book stood out.
Bach.
Inside, handwritten numbers covered the margins.
Marcus photographed pages.
Julian understood first.
“Bank accounts.”
Dozens.
Offshore.
Shell companies.
Dates.
Payment codes.
Enough to expose powerful people.
Elara whispered, “Your mother hid the financial half inside piano music.”
Julian looked at her.
“She knew nobody in my family would voluntarily play Bach.”
Elara laughed.
It was the first real laugh either of them had heard since Christmas Eve.
Julian smiled.
For one second, the feared man disappeared.
Then glass shattered.
Marcus pulled Elara down.
A bullet struck the wall.
Julian moved behind the piano.
“Positions!”
More shots hit the house.
Elara’s breath came fast.
Julian crawled toward her.
“Stay low.”
“I’m trying.”
Marcus pointed toward the basement.
“Exit tunnel.”
Julian nodded.
They moved.
The basement contained an old wine cellar.
Behind a shelf was a narrow concrete passage leading toward the lake.
They emerged near a boathouse.
Marcus’s men returned fire from cover.
Julian pulled Elara behind a stone wall.
“You okay?”
“Yes.”
Blood ran down his sleeve.
She grabbed his arm.
“You’re hit.”
“Scratch.”
“It’s bleeding.”
“Still a scratch.”
Footsteps approached from the trees.
Julian pushed Elara behind him.
A man appeared.
He carried no weapon.
Scar across his face.
Limp in his left leg.
Julian stopped breathing.
Gabriel.
The brothers stared at each other across twenty feet of snow.
Neither moved.
Gabriel looked older.
Tired.
But unmistakably Vane.
Julian whispered, “Gabe.”
Gabriel’s eyes filled with something impossible to name.
“You shouldn’t have come.”
Julian stepped forward.
“I thought you were dead.”
“You were supposed to.”
“Why?”
Gabriel looked toward Elara.
“Because your father chose you.”
Julian flinched.
“That’s not true.”
“It is.”
Elara said quietly, “Gabriel, Sebastian is dead.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
“I know.”
“Were you there?”
“Yes.”
Julian’s expression hardened.
“Did you kill him?”
Gabriel looked at his brother.
“No.”
“Then who did?”
Gabriel opened his mouth.
A shot cracked.
He fell.
Julian shouted.
Elara screamed.
Marcus fired toward the trees.
Julian reached Gabriel.
Blood spread across his coat.
Gabriel grabbed Julian’s wrist.
“They know about her.”
“Who?”
Gabriel struggled to breathe.
“Elara.”
Julian leaned closer.
“What about Elara?”
Gabriel looked directly at her.
“Her father didn’t die in an accident.”
Elara froze.
Gabriel’s grip tightened.
“He was killed because he discovered the last name in the ledger.”
Julian whispered, “Whose?”
Gabriel tried to answer.
Then headlights appeared beyond the trees.
Three black vehicles.
Marcus shouted, “We need to move!”
Gabriel stared at Elara.
His lips formed one word.
“Marcus.”
May you like
Elara’s blood turned cold.
Because behind her, Marcus had just raised his gun.
