Chapter 10 - THE MIDNIGHT MEETING (Continued)
Adrian stood frozen at the water’s edge, the words striking him harder than any blow. “She’s where Elena died.”
Julian’s boat cut across the dark water, growing smaller beneath the moon, his laughter echoing back until it was swallowed by the wind. The police boats roared after him, lights strobing across the surface, but for that moment, Adrian did not move. He stood staring at the empty black water, his face drained of all color, as if the very ground beneath him had dissolved.
“Adrian!” I grabbed his arm, my voice cracking. “What does he mean? Where is she?”
He turned slowly to look at me. His eyes were wide, haunted, filled with a horror I had never seen before.
“The studio,” he whispered. “He said… check the studio.”
We ran. Back across the lawn, up the stone steps, through the silent corridors of the mansion. We didn’t wait for the others. We didn’t call out. We just ran—Adrian leading the way, his long legs eating up the distance, his face set in a mask of terrible, burning purpose.
We burst into the west wing studio. The room was exactly as we had left it—shattered windows, dust dancing in the moonlight, Elena’s portrait still standing on the easel, the word MURDERED seeming to pulse in the dim light.
“Emma!” Adrian called, his voice tearing through the room. “Emma!”
Silence answered him.
Adrian began tearing at the walls. He ran his hands over the paneling, knocking, pressing, searching for a seam, a hollow space, anything.
“Where did she die?” I asked, breathless, spinning in circles. “Tell me exactly where she was!”
“Right here,” Adrian said, his voice trembling as he stopped before the far wall. “She was lying right here on this sofa. When Julian found her. When he told me she’d slipped away peacefully in her sleep.”
He pressed his palms against the wall. Then he froze. His fingers had found a faint line, almost invisible beneath the old wallpaper. A door. A panel.
“Help me,” he gasped.
We pulled together. The panel gave way with a low, grinding screech. It swung inward, revealing a narrow, dark closet built deep into the foundation. Cold air rushed out. And from within—
A tiny, muffled whimper.
Adrian scrambled inside on his hands and knees. “Emma! Oh God—Emma!”
I followed close behind.
In the back of the hidden niche, wrapped in Elena’s own cream-colored shawl, lay Emma. She was unharmed. Unhurt. But she was crying softly, her little face streaked with tears, her tiny hands bound loosely with soft silk ribbon—so it would not hurt her skin, Julian had made sure of that—gagged gently with a fold of cloth so she could breathe but not cry loud enough to be heard.
Adrian tore the ribbons away with shaking hands, lifted her into his arms, and held her so tightly I thought he might crush her. Emma sobbed against his chest, clutching his shirt with desperate little fists, and Adrian wept with her—great, heaving sobs that shook his entire body, tears streaming down his face as he whispered over and over, “I’ve got you. I’ve got you. You’re safe. Daddy has you.”
I sank to my knees beside them, pressing my hands to my face, the breath rushing in and out of my lungs in ragged gasps. She was alive. She was whole. He had left her there—alive. Just as he had said he would.
But he had also left something else.
Pinned to the shawl with a silver pin was a single folded note. I reached for it, my fingers trembling, and unfolded it in the dim light of Adrian’s phone.
*“She is safe. Just as Elena was safe. Until she wasn’t. I did not kill her. I only gave her what she deserved. And now you will spend the rest of your life wondering… what else I buried within these walls.”*
Adrian read the words over my shoulder. He went rigid. He looked down at the floor of the hidden niche, then back up at the portrait of Elena standing silently in the moonlight.
“He didn’t just hide her here,” Adrian said, his voice dropping to a horrified whisper. “He buried her within these walls. And he told me to check.”
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He looked at the solid stone floor beneath our knees.
“Elena didn’t die on the sofa,” Adrian said, each word heavy and terrible. “She died right here. In this hole. And then he built the wall back up… and told me she had passed away peacefully in the next room.”
