Chapter 6 - The Woman Behind the Invitation
They reached Michael's house shortly after midnight.
The front door was still open.
Nothing appeared stolen.
Nothing appeared damaged.
That frightened Elena more.
The photograph from her twelfth birthday was gone.
Michael stood before the empty space on the mantel.
"Someone knew exactly what they wanted."
Daniel examined the frame marks.
"No forced entry."
Michael looked toward his security chief.
"Who has access?"
"Family. House staff. Senior security."
Elena thought about her mother's recording.
Someone Michael trusted completely.
A sound came from upstairs.
Everyone froze.
Footsteps.
Slow.
Descending.
Michael moved in front of Elena.
A woman appeared.
Red dress gone.
Dark coat.
Victoria Sloane.
Elena recognized her immediately.
"Vicky."
Victoria stopped.
For the first time all evening, she looked less like an enemy than someone exhausted by carrying a secret.
"You remembered."
"Some of it."
Michael's voice hardened.
"Where is the photograph?"
"Safe."
"You broke into my home."
"No."
Victoria held up a key.
"Your wife gave my mother this."
Michael stared.
Victoria descended the remaining steps.
"My mother died six months ago. Before she died, she gave me a box of things your wife had entrusted to her."
Elena's anger rose.
"So you decided to pay Chase to humiliate me?"
Victoria looked ashamed.
"I needed Michael to react publicly."
"You poured wine on her?" Michael demanded.
"No. I told Chase to provoke a confrontation."
Elena shook her head.
"You don't get to separate yourself from what happened."
Victoria accepted that.
"You're right."
"Why?"
"Because Michael wouldn't answer my calls."
Michael frowned.
"You never called."
"I did. Your office blocked me."
"Who?"
"That's what I needed to know."
She removed a photograph.
Elena's twelfth birthday.
Her mother stood behind her.
Michael beside Sarah.
Richard Hale near the edge.
Victor Sloane.
Several employees.
Daniel leaned closer.
"Who are we looking for?"
Victoria pointed.
A man stood directly behind Michael.
Younger then.
Smiling.
Michael's face went empty.
"No."
Elena recognized him.
"Uncle Thomas?"
Thomas Vale wasn't her uncle by blood.
He was Michael's oldest friend.
The man who sent Elena birthday cards.
The man who sat beside Michael at her mother's funeral.
The man who had helped Michael raise her.
Victoria nodded.
"My father wasn't working alone."
Michael shook his head.
"Thomas found Victor's fraud."
"Because he helped create it."
"That's impossible."
Victoria handed him another document.
Bank transfers.
Signatures.
Dates.
Michael sat down.
Elena watched another foundation of her childhood crack.
"Where is Thomas now?"
Michael looked at his watch.
"He was supposed to be at the gala."
"But he wasn't," Daniel said.
Michael called.
Voicemail.
Elena's phone rang.
Thomas Vale.
Everyone stared.
She answered.
"Uncle Thomas?"
A warm familiar voice responded.
"Ellie."
Nobody else called her that.
Her chest tightened.
"Where are you?"
"Somewhere we can finally stop lying to each other."
"Did you know about Mom?"
Silence.
Then:
"Bring the photograph."
"Why?"
"Because your mother wrote something on the back that nobody else has noticed."
Elena flipped it over.
Nothing.
Victoria took a lamp and angled the photograph beneath the light.
Indented writing appeared.
Not ink.
Pressure marks.
Daniel shaded them with a pencil on paper.
Letters emerged.
T.V.
Then numbers.
614-2.
Michael stared.
"A second box."
Elena remembered the wall.
They had opened one compartment.
There could have been another.
Thomas spoke through the phone.
"You have thirty minutes."
"Where?"
"The Bellweather."
"We just left."
"Not the hotel."
Elena frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"The original Bellweather house."
Michael's face changed.
He knew the place.
Thomas continued.
"Come alone, Ellie."
The line went dead.
Elena looked at her father.
"Where is it?"
Michael didn't answer.
She stepped closer.
"No more silence."
He finally spoke.
"Your mother grew up there."
Elena stared.
The Bellweather wasn't just a hotel name.
It belonged to her mother's family.
And suddenly Elena understood that the gala invitation had never been random.
The hotel.
Room 614.
Her mother.
The old house.
Everything led backward.
Not toward Michael Carter.
Toward Sarah.
Victoria unfolded another document from her mother's box.
"I think you need to see this before we go anywhere."
Elena read the heading.
LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF SARAH BELLWEATHER CARTER.
May you like
Her mother had left a second will.
And the first line named Elena as the sole heir to something no one had ever told her existed.
