Chapter 15 - WHAT WAS LOST

I drove straight to the police station.

I told them everything. The house. The names. The shots fired.

They arrived at the mansion twenty minutes later.

It was too late.

Silas was gone.

Clara was gone.

Vanessa was gone.

Only blood on the floor remained. And the ashes of two letters.

Days passed. Then weeks.

No sign of Clara. No sign of Silas. No sign of Vanessa.

I slept with my door locked. My gun beneath my pillow. Emma cried in her sleep. Olivia stopped speaking.

The police called it a feud. A family war. They said Silas had likely taken Clara and fled. That Vanessa had either fled with them or been killed.

But I knew.

Vanessa shot Silas. Clara would not leave him. She would stay. She would try to save him. Which meant… Vanessa had them both.

I had failed them.

I ran. I saved my daughter. And I left the people who risked everything for us in the hands of a monster.

One evening, I sat alone in the shattered nursery. Repairing the window.

Something caught my eye.

Taped beneath the windowsill. A small, folded note.

Clara’s handwriting.

> If you are reading this, we are alive. She took us. She is keeping us somewhere quiet. Far away. She needs Silas alive to sign papers. She needs me to make sure he cooperates. She will not hurt us… until she has everything she wants. Find Arthur. He knows where her family lived. That is where she will hide us. I love him. Even now. But I will help you end this. Come soon. Before she decides we are no longer useful.

My hands shook.

She was alive.

They were both alive.

And Vanessa was holding them prisoner.

I grabbed my phone. Called Arthur.

“Arthur. I found a note. Clara is alive. Vanessa has them.”

Arthur was silent a moment.

“I feared this. I have been looking into Vanessa’s past. She grew up in an isolated farmhouse outside the county. Her parents died there. She hates the place. Which means… it is the last place anyone will look.”

“Address,” I said. “Send it to me. Now.”

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“Adrian,” Arthur said, his voice serious. “Do not go alone. She is desperate. She has nothing left to lose.”

“I am not going alone,” I said. “I am bringing the war to her door.”