Chapter 3 - What Peter Ames Burned
Julian grabbed Mara’s hand as the house plunged into darkness.
“Stay behind me.”
“I’m pregnant, not helpless.”
“I know. I’m asking you to stay behind me anyway.”
The distinction mattered. He was not ordering her to obey. He was frightened, and the fear in his voice made her move closer rather than argue. Something struck the sitting-room door.
The handle jerked once, twice. Peter whispered,
“There is a service passage behind the bookcase.”
“You know the way,” Julian said.
“I know every way through this house.”
Peter crossed the room in the dark. A hinge groaned, wood scraped stone, and a narrow opening appeared behind the shelves. Rain hissed through the broken window. Somewhere in the main hall, Charles shouted for the guards.
Mara followed Julian into the passage. The walls were so tight her shoulder brushed his. His limp made his steps uneven, but he refused to let go of her hand.
“Who is outside?” she whispered.
“Not guards,” Peter said ahead of them.
“Charles dismissed the estate staff an hour ago.”
“Then who?”
Peter did not answer. They emerged in a coal cellar beneath the kitchen. A single emergency lamp glowed red above a steel door. Peter pushed it open, and cold air swept over them.
The kitchen was empty. Copper pans hung motionless above the island, and the long windows showed only rain. Julian eased the door shut.
“Why did you bring us here?”
Peter faced him. In the red light, his features looked carved from old wax.
“Because I should have done it five months ago.”
Mara folded her arms over her belly.
“You should have opened the gate.”
“Yes.”
“You should have given Julian my letters.”
“Yes.”
“You should have told us about the crash.”
Peter closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Julian’s voice became dangerously calm.
“Then start.”
Peter looked toward the kitchen entrance.
“The east wing is watched. Charles keeps the letter in his private office, but he is not there now. He will be searching the lower rooms.”
“You said there was a name.”
“There is more than a name.”
Peter went to a cabinet and pulled a ring of keys from beneath a drawer. His hand trembled as he selected a small black key.
“Five months ago, Mr. Julian discovered irregular payments from the Hartwell Foundation. The money was being routed through Vale Meridian, then transferred to accounts controlled by Charles.”
Julian’s jaw tightened.
“Why didn’t I remember that?”
“Because the crash damaged your memory. Because your mother asked the doctors to keep visitors away. Because Charles told everyone that Ms. Hart was part of the theft.”
Mara stepped closer.
“And you believed him?”
Peter looked at her.
“I believed the man who paid my daughter’s medical bills.”
The answer silenced her.
“Your daughter?” Julian asked.
“Lila has leukemia. Charles knew the treatment was beyond anything I could afford. He said if I cooperated, she would receive care at a private clinic. If I refused, he would make sure the clinic stopped accepting her insurance.”
Mara’s anger did not disappear, but it changed shape. Peter had not been innocent. He had been cornered, then chosen the direction that kept his child alive.
“What exactly did you do?” she asked.
“I logged your letters, sealed them in the east-wing archive, and told you Mr. Hartwell wanted no contact. When the letter mentioning the pregnancy arrived, Charles read it himself.”
Julian’s face went rigid.
“You knew,” he said.
Peter’s eyes filled with shame.
“Yes.”
Julian turned away. His hands curled into fists. Mara expected him to shout. Instead, he said,
“Give me the key.”
Peter placed it in his palm. The three of them crossed the kitchen and slipped into a corridor lined with portraits. At the far end, a staircase rose toward the east wing. Every step Julian took seemed to cost him, but he did not stop.
Halfway up, Mara caught sight of a dark smear on the banister.
“That’s blood.”
Peter looked up sharply. Below them, the kitchen door opened. Charles entered with a pistol in his hand.
“Peter,” he called.
“You have made a very expensive mistake.”
Julian pushed Mara behind him.
“Go.”
Peter stood frozen. Charles lifted the gun.
“I will not ask twice.”
Mara noticed the antique service bell mounted beside the stairs. Its cord ran down through the wall. She remembered the old floor plan from her work cataloging the house’s historical renovations. The bell connected to the servants’ corridor, not the main hall.
She reached for it. Julian saw what she was doing and moved suddenly, slamming his shoulder into the wall. The impact shook the bell. A deep metallic clang rolled through the house.
Charles fired. The shot struck the portrait above Peter’s head. Glass exploded across the stairs. Mara yanked the bell cord again.
Somewhere below, a concealed alarm began to shriek. Charles cursed and ran toward them. Julian seized Mara’s wrist, and Peter shoved open a narrow door beneath the staircase. They fell into a cramped storage chamber as another shot cracked through the corridor.
Peter locked the door.
“He will find us,” Julian said.
“Not if we move.”
Mara saw a stack of old trunks against the rear wall. Behind them, the stonework was newer than the rest.
“There.”
Julian and Peter pushed the trunks aside. A square panel appeared, fitted with a brass lock. Peter used the black key. The panel opened onto a passage smelling of dust and paper.
They crawled through just as Charles reached the storage chamber. His hand struck the other side of the door.
“Julian,” he said.
“You are being manipulated again.”
Julian paused in the tunnel. Charles’s voice softened.
“Your father believed Mara’s father was responsible for his death. Ask her what Simon Hart did.”
Mara felt the blood leave her face. Her father had died when she was nineteen. The official story was a heart attack in a motel outside Tulsa. She had never heard Julian’s father mentioned in connection with him.
Charles laughed quietly.
“She never told you, did she?”
Julian looked back at Mara. The tunnel seemed to contract around them.
“What did your father do?” he asked.
Before Mara could answer, Peter pulled the panel shut. Charles’s fist struck the stone behind them. At the end of the passage, they entered the east-wing archive. Rows of locked cabinets filled the room.
In the center stood a metal waste bin, flames licking through a pile of papers. Peter rushed toward it. Mara caught his sleeve.
“What are you doing?”
May you like
“Saving what I can.”
He reached into the fire and withdrew a half-burned envelope. On its front, beneath Julian’s name, Mara saw her own handwriting. But the words written across the flap were not hers. They read: YOUR FATHER SIGNED THE ORDER.
