I had made excuses for his cruelty.
I had confused endurance with devotion.
Now the final illusion collapsed.
He had not fallen out of love with me. He had decided my death was more profitable than my life.
Sirens sounded in the distance.
Julian looked toward the stairs.
Marian smiled faintly.
“I called the authorities before we entered.”
Panic sharpened his face.
He shoved the nearest security officer and bolted up the steps.
Harold followed.
Beatrice tried to run, but Elena grabbed her by the sleeve.
“You were going to kill me too!”
Beatrice slapped her.
Elena tackled her against the table.
Ledgers scattered across the floor. Cassette tapes rolled beneath cabinets. The old brass key slipped from Adrian’s neck when Beatrice clawed at him, and it struck the stone with a bright metallic ring.
Then a deeper sound answered from behind the far wall.
A lock released.
A concealed panel opened.
Beyond it stood a smaller room.
Inside was a steel trunk, a reel-to-reel recorder, and a chair.
On the chair sat a human skeleton.
A single bullet hole marked the center of its skull.
Harold stopped halfway up the stairs.
He turned and stared.
Adrian’s face changed.
“Daniel,” he whispered.
Daniel Vale had been Adrian’s younger brother.
My uncle.
Officially, he had vanished two weeks after the aircraft crash.
Beatrice’s struggle ceased.
Harold’s knees buckled.
And Julian, standing at the top of the stairs, looked down at his father.
“You told me he ran away.”
Harold began to cry.
Not softly.
Not with remorse.
He cried like a man whose buried crimes had finally learned how to breathe.
“Your mother pulled the trigger,” he said.
PART 6 — THE FAMILY THAT BUILT ITS FORTUNE ON A BODY
Beatrice did not deny it.
She straightened her torn blouse, wiped blood from the corner of her mouth, and looked at the skeleton with irritation rather than horror.
“He was going to expose us.”
Adrian moved so quickly that the security officers barely stopped him.
His hands reached for her throat.
I caught his sleeve.
“Don’t.”
He turned toward me, eyes burning.
“She murdered my brother.”
“And she will live long enough to be convicted for it.”
For several seconds, I felt the violence shaking through him.
Then he stepped back.
Above us, police flooded the house.
Julian did not escape. Officers found him in the garage attempting to open the gate with a key fob that had already been deactivated.
Harold confessed before noon.
Once he began, he could not stop.
He told investigators everything.
