Chapter 10 - The Man Behind the Voice
My blood froze.
Because the voice belonged to someone standing only a few feet away from us.
I turned slowly.
At first, I didn't want to believe what my eyes were showing me.
But then I saw him.
Standing near the entrance of the ballroom.
Calm.
Unhurried.
Like he had been there the entire time.
Like he had been watching everything unfold.
Admiral Thomas Reed.
No.
Not Reed.
The voice from the speakers.
The person who had been controlling the building.
The person who knew exactly where we were.
My eyes moved from the man in front of me to the security monitor.
The feed showed him standing in the same place.
Two images.
One person.
A live feed.
A recording.
A trap.
The captain immediately stepped forward.
"Don't move."
Reed raised his hands slightly.
"I know how this looks."
I almost laughed.
Everyone said that.
Everyone who had betrayed me.
Everyone who had hidden the truth.
They always started with the same sentence.
I know how this looks.
But nobody ever explained why it looked that way.
I held up the photograph.
"My father wrote that someone failed to stop him."
Reed looked at the picture.
His expression changed.
Only for a second.
But I saw it.
Fear.
Not guilt.
Fear.
"You weren't supposed to find that."
The room went silent.
Because those words were not a denial.
They were confirmation.
The captain noticed it too.
"Admiral."
Reed looked at him.
"You don't understand what you're dealing with."
The captain stepped closer.
"Then explain."
Reed looked around the room.
At Graham.
At Claire.
At me.
Then he said:
"The person you are looking for isn't me."
Nobody moved.
The emergency lights continued flashing.
The alarms continued outside.
But inside that room, everything depended on his next words.
I stared at him.
"You expect me to believe that?"
Reed looked directly at me.
"No."
The answer surprised me.
"I expect you to verify it."
He reached into his jacket.
The captain immediately raised his weapon.
But Reed slowly removed a small device.
Not a weapon.
A recorder.
He placed it on the table.
"Your mother recorded everything."
Claire looked at the device.
"Where did you get that?"
Reed looked at her.
"You know where."
Claire's face changed.
And that scared me.
Because Claire had always been the person who seemed to have answers.
But now she looked lost.
Reed pressed the button.
A recording started.
My mother's voice filled the room.
"Thomas, if you are hearing this, then Elena has found the truth."
I closed my eyes.
Another message.
Another secret.
Another piece of a life I had never been allowed to know.
My mother's voice continued.
"You were right. The threat was closer than we thought."
Reed looked down.
Claire looked away.
"Do not trust the person who appears innocent."
The recording paused.
Then my mother continued.
"The person behind the network is not someone who hides in the shadows."
My heart began beating faster.
"That person stands where everyone can see them."
The audio distorted.
Then another voice appeared.
A man's voice.
A voice I recognized.
My entire body went cold.
Because it was my father's voice.
"Elena."
I looked at the recorder.
"I need you to listen carefully."
My father's voice sounded tired.
Broken.
But alive.
"If you are hearing this, then the people around you have already started telling you their version of the truth."
I looked at everyone.
Graham.
Claire.
Reed.
The captain.
My father continued.
"Some of them are lying."
A pause.
"Some of them are protecting you."
I felt tears forming.
Because even after all these years, my father was still trying to protect me.
"But there is one person who has been controlling everything from the beginning."
The room became completely silent.
My father said the words slowly.
"That person is the reason your mother died."
The recording stopped.
Nobody breathed.
Then the device displayed one final message.
"Continue playback?"
The captain pressed the button.
The screen went black.
Then a new audio file appeared.
Created one hour after my mother's death.
My father's voice returned.
But this time, he wasn't alone.
Someone else was in the room with him.
A woman.
Claire immediately stepped back.
"No."
I looked at her.
She shook her head.
"No, that's not possible."
The audio continued.
My father's voice said:
"You have to tell Elena the truth."
The woman answered:
"If she knows, everything falls apart."
I froze.
Because I knew that voice.
I had heard it my entire childhood.
I had heard it at my mother's funeral.
I had heard it every time someone told me they understood my pain.
Claire.
The recording continued.
My father whispered:
"She deserves to know."
Claire's voice became colder.
"No. She deserves a chance to live."
The audio ended.
Nobody spoke.
I looked at Claire.
The woman who held my hand when my mother died.
The woman who told me I was not alone.
The woman who now stood in front of me with tears in her eyes.
"You knew."
Claire couldn't answer.
"You knew my father was alive."
Her lips trembled.
"Elena..."
"No."
My voice broke.
"You knew."
She closed her eyes.
And finally whispered:
"Yes."
The truth hurt differently than I expected.
Not like a sudden wound.
Like something slowly breaking.
A piece at a time.
The captain looked at Claire.
"Why?"
Claire looked at me.
"Because your mother asked me to."
I shook my head.
"My mother asked you to lie to me?"
"No."
Claire stepped closer.
"Your mother asked me to keep you alive."
I wanted to believe her.
I hated that I wanted to believe her.
Because part of me still remembered the woman who sat beside me after my mother's funeral.
The woman who cried with me.
The woman who felt like family.
"What happened that night?"
Claire looked at Reed.
Then Graham.
Then me.
And I knew.
She was finally going to tell me everything.
"The night your mother died..."
She stopped.
The ballroom doors suddenly shook.
Everyone turned.
A loud impact echoed from outside.
The captain reached for his radio.
Static.
Again.
The same blocked signal.
The lights flickered.
Then every screen in the room turned on.
A live camera feed appeared.
Not from the ballroom.
Not from the security office.
From somewhere else.
A hidden room.
A room filled with files.
Photos.
Documents.
And in the center of the room was someone sitting in a chair.
Someone watching us.
Someone who had been behind every message.
Every secret.
Every lie.
The camera moved closer.
The person's face slowly appeared.
And Claire whispered:
May you like
"That's impossible..."
Because the person on the screen was the one person nobody expected to see.
