Chapter 2 - The Desk That Had Been Locked for Six Years
Roman folded the note before anyone else could read it.
“Daniel.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Graham stays here.”
Graham gave a humorless laugh.
“You cannot seriously believe I have something to do with a four-year-old finding an old key.”
Roman stared at him.
“I haven’t said what I believe.”
“That look says enough.”
Roman slipped the note into his inside pocket.
“Then you know me well.”
“I’ve known you since you were sixteen.”
“That’s exactly what concerns me.”
The room went silent again.
Roman left with Megan and Sadie.
The staircase to the second floor curved beneath an enormous crystal chandelier. Portraits of generations of Vales lined the paneled walls.
Sadie climbed two steps for every one of Roman’s.
Halfway up, she stopped.
“There.”
She pointed.
A portrait of Margaret Vale hung above the landing.
Margaret had been sixty-eight when the portrait was painted. She wore a navy dress and the pearl necklace Roman’s father had given her on their twentieth anniversary.
“That’s the grandma lady,” Sadie said.
Megan stared at her daughter.
“You saw her picture before?”
Sadie nodded.
“Upstairs.”
Roman said nothing.
He continued walking.
Margaret’s bedroom was at the end of the east corridor.
The door was open.
Roman stopped several feet away.
It had been closed that morning.
Daniel arrived behind them.
“Sir.”
“The cameras?”
Daniel’s face troubled him.
“There’s a problem.”
“What problem?”
“The east hallway camera went offline at 9:17.”
Roman checked his watch.
9:46.
“When did it come back?”
“It hasn’t.”
Roman looked at Megan.
She shook her head.
“I didn’t touch anything.”
“I know.”
He entered the room.
Nothing appeared disturbed.
Margaret’s bed remained perfectly made. Her reading chair stood beside the window. A pair of slippers still rested beneath the small bench where she had left them six years earlier.
And against the far wall stood the secretary desk.
Its front panel was open.
Roman froze.
He crossed the room.
The tiny brass lock showed no damage.
The drawers appeared untouched.
But the desk was open.
He turned toward Sadie.
“Did you do this?”
She nodded.
“With the bow key.”
Roman looked at the key in his palm.
Of course.
Sadie had apparently found it somewhere else, used it here, and later dropped it beneath the dining table.
But that explanation created a bigger problem.
The key had been inside Roman’s study.
“How did you get the key?”
Sadie walked to the desk.
“It was here.”
“No. Before that.”
She frowned.
Roman tried again.
“When you came upstairs, where did you first see it?”
Sadie pointed toward the desk.
“Right there.”
Roman’s stomach tightened.
“Already in the lock?”
She nodded.
That was impossible.
He had personally placed it on the silver tray downstairs.
Roman opened the first drawer.
Stationery.
The second contained Margaret’s fountain pens.
The third held photographs.
Then he saw something inside the desk’s central compartment.
An empty rectangular space outlined in dust.
Something had been removed recently.
Roman touched the clean wood.
“Daniel.”
The security officer stepped closer.
“Someone was here.”
Daniel examined the dust.
Roman looked toward Sadie.
“What was here when you opened it?”
“A box.”
“What kind?”
“Blue.”
“What happened to it?”
Sadie pointed toward the doorway.
“The man took it.”
Megan’s hand flew to her mouth.
Roman crouched.
“What man?”
Sadie’s face became serious.
“The angry one.”
“Did he see you?”
“No. I hid.”
Roman felt his pulse accelerate.
“Where?”
Sadie crawled beneath Margaret’s bed.
Megan nearly cried.
“Sadie!”
The little girl backed out.
“Like that.”
Roman’s voice became very quiet.
“What did the man look like?”
“Black clothes.”
“That could be anyone in this house.”
Sadie thought.
“He had a shiny thing.”
“Watch?”
She nodded.
“What color?”
“Gold.”
Roman and Daniel exchanged a look.
Roman knew only three men inside the estate wearing gold watches that morning.
One was Roman himself.
One was Graham Pierce.
The third was Victor Dane, Roman’s chief financial officer.
Roman stood.
“Find Victor.”
Daniel spoke into his radio.
Roman returned to the desk.
Inside the drawer where the blue box had apparently been was another folded note.
He opened it.
Margaret’s handwriting.
Roman, if you are reading this, then I was right to be afraid.
His throat tightened.
He continued.
There are things about your father’s death that you were never told. I kept records because memory can be challenged, but paper cannot. Do not trust the person who insists most strongly that the past should remain buried.
Roman stopped.
His father, Anthony Vale, had died twenty-two years earlier in what police ruled a boating accident.
Roman had been twenty.
Graham had helped him survive the aftermath.
Graham had taught him the businesses.
Graham had stood beside Margaret at the funeral.
Roman read the final sentence.
The blue box contains the beginning. The ledger contains the proof.
But the blue box was gone.
His phone vibrated.
Daniel answered his radio first.
“Victor Dane has left the property.”
Roman looked up.
“When?”
“Security says nine twenty-two.”
Five minutes after the camera failed.
Roman folded Margaret’s note.
Megan stared at him.
“Mr. Vale, what is happening?”
Roman looked at Sadie.
The little girl had picked up a framed photograph from Margaret’s desk.
She held it toward him.
“That man.”
Roman took the photograph.
It showed Roman at sixteen, standing beside his mother and father at a charity gala.
Behind them stood several employees.
Graham Pierce.
A younger Victor Dane.
And one more man Roman had not thought about in years.
Sadie tapped him with her finger.
“That’s the angry man.”
Roman’s blood ran cold.
May you like
Because the man Sadie was pointing to had supposedly been dead for seventeen years.
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