Chapter 4 - THE WEST WING SECRET
I waited exactly ten seconds. Then I stood up, placed Emma gently in the center of the bed, surrounded by pillows, and wrote on a piece of paper: Stay. Don’t move. Stupid, I knew. She couldn’t read. But I needed to say it anyway.
I unlocked the door and stepped into the hallway.
“Adrian?” I called softly.
No answer.
I walked toward the west wing entrance, my heart hammering against my ribs. The double doors stood partially open. Darkness spilled out from inside. No lights. Adrian had not turned them on.
I stepped through and closed the door behind me. Dust hung in the air. The floorboards creaked under my feet. This part of the mansion had been closed off since Elena died. Adrian had never touched it. Had never allowed anyone inside.
“Adrian?” I whispered again, moving slowly along the corridor.
A light flickered ahead. Dim. Shaking. Someone holding a phone flashlight.
I ran.
I found him standing in the largest room at the end of the hall—the room that had been Elena’s art studio. The windows were shattered. Glass littered the floor. Cold night air swept in.
Adrian stood in the center of the room, staring at something on the easel near the broken window. He didn’t turn when I entered.
“Adrian,” I said, rushing forward. “Are you hurt?”
He held up a hand to stop me. His voice was barely audible.
“Look at this, Clara.”
I stepped beside him and looked.
On the easel, covered in dust but otherwise untouched, was a painting. A portrait. Elena. Painted from life. She looked beautiful, gentle, her eyes bright and warm. But that wasn’t what made my breath catch.
In the corner of the canvas, in the handwriting Adrian had shown me on the note—sharp, angry, unmistakable—was a single word painted in dark red: MURDERED.
Adrian touched the word with trembling fingers.
“She didn’t die naturally,” he said. “She knew. She painted this… and she knew she was going to die.”
We stood there in silence, the wind blowing through the broken glass, swirling dust around us.
“Who wrote this?” I asked quietly.
Adrian reached out and picked something up from the floor near the shattered window. A wallet. Leather. Expensive. He opened it slowly.
Inside was a driver’s license. A photograph. A name.
Julian Mercer.
Adrian went pale. His fingers crumpled the edge of the wallet.
“Julian?” I whispered. “Who is he?”
Adrian turned to look at me, his face stricken.
“Elena’s brother. Her only family. He was also her business manager. And he was the one who told me she died peacefully in her sleep.”
He gripped the wallet until his knuckles turned white.
“He told me she died in childbirth. And I believed him. I buried her. I mourned her. And all this time… he has been hiding the truth.”
A cold realization settled over me.
“He’s the one who posted bail for Vanessa,” I said. “He’s the one who wrote the note. He’s the one standing in the window.”
Adrian nodded slowly. “And he’s been here. In this room. Tonight. Watching this house. Watching us.”
He walked to the broken window and looked down into the dark courtyard.
“He didn’t leave,” Adrian said quietly. “He’s still out there. And he knows we found the note. He knows we know.”
Adrian turned back to me, his expression hardening into something terrible and determined.
“Go back to Emma. Lock the door. Call the police. Tell them everything—Julian, the note, the painting, the broken window. Tell them Elena didn’t die by accident.”
“And you?”
“I’m going to find him before he finds you. Before he finds Emma.”
He reached out and squeezed my shoulder, his grip firm and desperate.
“Keep my daughter safe, Clara. That is all I ask. Keep her safe until I come back.”
He left through the broken window, dropping silently into the dark garden below.
I stood there alone in the dusty studio, the painting watching me, the word MURDERED burning into my mind.
I turned to leave—
And froze.
Standing in the doorway, blocking my way, was Vanessa.
May you like
She looked disheveled. Her hair wild. Her clothes wrinkled. But her eyes—they burned with a terrifying, triumphant madness.
“Too late,” she whispered. “Everything is already too late.”
