Chapter 4 - Lock Every DoorFelix Ashcroft did not realize he was speaking to a ballroom.
He did not know three hundred guests, two attorneys, six security guards, the mayor, and half the city’s society press were listening.
That made his next words even more devastating.
“Celeste, for God’s sake, tell me the maid is handled too.”
Elara’s blood went cold.
Damian’s gaze moved to her.
“The maid?” Damian said into the phone.
Silence.
Then Felix breathed, “Who is this?”
Damian’s voice was calm.
“Your cousin.”
The line clicked dead.
Celeste closed her eyes.
For one second, she looked almost relieved. Felix had stopped talking before he could destroy them completely.
Then Damian handed the phone to Marianne.
“Preserve that call.”
Marianne nodded.
“Already recorded by three journalists in the room, I’d imagine.”
At least twenty people lowered their phones in embarrassment.
Celeste saw them and snapped, “Delete those videos.”
No one moved.
That was when Celeste understood something new.
Power only worked when people still believed in it.
The room no longer believed in hers.
Damian turned to security.
“Seal the private wings. No one enters the east library, my mother’s suite, Celeste’s dressing room, or Felix’s office.”
Celeste’s head shot up.
“You have no right to search my dressing room.”
“This is my palace,” Damian said.
“You gave me authority over the gala.”
“The gala,” he replied. “Not my mother. Not my accounts. Not my family name.”
Helena touched his sleeve.
“Damian.”
He bent toward her.
“There is more,” she whispered.
His expression tightened. “How much more?”
Helena looked across the ballroom at Elara.
“Elara knows.”
Every eye returned to the maid.
Elara felt the floor tilt beneath her.
She had not wanted this. She had only wanted to keep an old woman safe until someone powerful enough would listen. But now the entire palace was looking at her as though she carried the key to a locked room.
Because she did.
Elara reached beneath her collar and pulled out a thin chain.
On it hung a small bronze key.
Celeste made a strangled sound.
“That is stolen.”
Helena said, “I gave it to her.”
Damian stared at the key.
“The chapel archive?”
Helena nodded.
Celeste’s panic sharpened into something dangerous.
“There is nothing in that archive except old family junk.”
Helena’s eyes did not leave her son.
“Your father kept records, Damian. Real records. Not the versions Felix filed. Not the versions Celeste planned to show you.”
Damian looked toward the far end of the hall, where tall doors opened into the corridor leading to the old chapel.
“When did you give Elara the key?”
“After Celeste told me I would not survive winter.”
The room erupted.
Celeste screamed over them. “She is lying!”
But no one believed her now.
Damian looked at Elara.
“Can you take us there?”
Elara nodded.
Then Celeste laughed.
It was sudden, bright, and wrong.
“You think you can just walk into the archive and expose me?” she said. “You think I came here unprepared?”
The lights flickered.
Once.
Twice.
A low electrical hum passed through the chandeliers.
Security reached for radios.
The ballroom doors remained locked, but somewhere deeper in the palace, an alarm began to beep.
Mr. Cole listened to his earpiece.
His face changed.
“Sir,” he said to Damian, “we have a breach in the east corridor.”
Damian’s eyes narrowed.
“Felix.”
Mr. Cole shook his head.
“No, sir.”
He looked at Celeste.
“Her private security team just entered through the service gate.”
Celeste’s fear transformed.
Not into confidence.
Into desperation.
She stepped backward slowly.
“You should have let me leave,” she whispered.
Then the chandeliers went out.
The Rose Hall plunged into darkness.
Guests screamed.
Glass shattered.
Elara felt Helena’s wheelchair jerk.
Someone had grabbed it.
Elara moved before thinking.
She threw herself toward the chair and caught the handle with both hands.
A man cursed in the dark.
Damian shouted, “Mother!”
Elara pulled hard.
The wheelchair rolled back toward her.
A hand seized Elara’s hair.
Pain flashed across her scalp.
She twisted, drove her elbow backward, and heard the attacker stumble.
Then emergency lights snapped on.
Red glow filled the ballroom.
Celeste was gone.
So was the bronze key from Elara’s neck.
And Helena Ashcroft’s blanket now had a torn piece of black leather on it.
Damian picked it up.
Stamped into the leather was a gold crest.
Not Celeste’s.
Not Felix’s.
Ashcroft.
May you like
Damian looked at his mother.
Helena whispered, “He came himself.”
Related Stories
