Chapter 6 - THE PRICE OF THE TRUTH
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Vincent wanted to hunt down whoever had taken Isabella.
I wanted to go straight to the theater.
We compromised by doing both.
Thomas was locked inside a secure room at the estate under constant guard. He refused to answer questions, but the evidence recovered from his phone revealed that he had been communicating with Vanessa for months.
One message was dated the night of the engagement party.
If she climbs, she falls. If she survives, the old story ends tonight.
Another had been sent minutes after I landed safely.
She wasn't supposed to survive that.
I read the words twice.
Vanessa hadn't merely wanted to humiliate me. She had expected my death.
Vincent stood behind my chair, his hands clenched at his sides.
“I should have recognized what she was capable of.”
“You aren't responsible for everything she does.”
“I brought her into my home.”
“And I walked into that ballroom wearing a maid's uniform. We both made choices with incomplete information.”
He looked down at me.
“You still defend me.”
“Don't confuse fairness with forgiveness.”
For the first time, a faint smile touched his mouth.
“Wouldn't dare.”
We found the theater just before dawn. It was an old building on the Lower East Side, scheduled for demolition, where I had performed my first aerial routine at fourteen.
The stage was covered in dust. Faded curtains hung in strips, and the rigging above the ceiling had long since been removed.
I walked to the center of the stage.
I remembered my mother's face in the front row, her hands pressed together as she watched me rise into the air. She had always said that fear was not the opposite of courage.
Fear was the thing courage carried.
I searched the old dressing room, then the orchestra pit. Nothing.
Vincent found a small metal plate beneath the stage, marked with the same symbol that appeared on the key Isabella had given me.
The key fit.
Inside the compartment was a sealed envelope and a tiny recording device.
The envelope contained a handwritten note from my mother.
My darling Grace, if you're reading this, the people who hurt you have finally come looking for what they failed to destroy. The truth is not money, and it is not revenge. It is the chance to stop another family from suffering what ours has suffered.
Beneath the note was a list of names, dates, and payments.
Vanessa's father appeared repeatedly.
So did Anthony Moretti.
And one name appeared beside a transfer dated the day after my birth.
ELIZABETH MITCHELL.
My mother.
The recording device crackled when Vincent pressed play.
A man's voice filled the room.
Anthony Moretti.
“If the child survives, keep her identity intact. We need a witness who doesn't know she's a witness. Elizabeth must never learn who the father is.”
Another voice responded.
“What about Isabella?”
Anthony answered coldly.
“She'll do what she's told.”
The recording ended.
I couldn't feel my hands.
“Who was my father?” I whispered.
Vincent shook his head.
“I don't know.”
But his face had changed.
He recognized something in Anthony's voice, perhaps a phrase or a name that had been cut off by static.
Before I could ask, a door slammed behind us.
Vanessa stood in the aisle wearing a black coat and carrying a pistol.
“You should have stayed in your room, Grace.”
Vincent stepped in front of me.
“Put it down.”
Vanessa laughed.
“You always did think you could protect everyone.”
“You tried to kill her.”
“I tried to solve a problem.”
“A woman is not a problem you get to solve.”
Her smile disappeared.
For a moment, I saw the frightened girl beneath her expensive makeup. Then she raised the gun.
“Give me the ledger.”
“No,” I said.
Her eyes snapped toward me.
“You have no idea what you've stumbled into.”
“Then explain it.”
She hesitated.
That hesitation told me more than her threats had.
“You were never supposed to be important,” she whispered. “Your mother was supposed to hand over the records, and Isabella was supposed to disappear. But Anthony became obsessed with keeping certain secrets inside the family.”
Vincent's expression sharpened.
“What secrets?”
Vanessa looked at him with sudden hatred.
“Ask your father what happened the night you were born.”
The words struck him like a physical blow.
I stared at her.
“What does Vincent's birth have to do with me?”
Vanessa backed toward the exit.
“Everything.”
Then the lights went out.
A gunshot echoed through the theater.
When the emergency lights flickered back on, Vanessa was gone.
Vincent was on one knee, blood spreading across his shirt.
I dropped beside him.
“Vincent!”
He pressed a hand to his side.
“I'm all right.”
“You're bleeding!”
His fingers closed around mine.
“Listen to me, Grace. If anything happens, don't let them take you to the Moretti hospital.”
“Why?”
His eyes searched mine.
May you like
“Because the doctor who signed Isabella's death certificate is the same man who delivered you.”
Then his head fell back, and his grip went slack.
