Chapter 7 - VICTORIA’S BLOODThe room went silent.
Not the shocked silence of gossip.
The dead silence of a family realizing the foundation beneath them had never been stone.
It had been bones.
Eleanor stared at the tape player.
Victoria’s face had gone white.
Clara looked from Charles’s portrait to Victoria, then to Eleanor.
“What does that mean?” she whispered.
No one answered.
The tape continued.
Henry Graves said, “If Eleanor discovers Clara is not yours, she’ll ask questions about Victoria too.”
Charles laughed softly.
“Eleanor believes what grief tells her to believe.”
Eleanor gripped the edge of the desk.
Victoria stood so fast the chair scraped backward.
“Turn it off.”
No one moved.
“Turn it off!” she screamed.
Andrew reached toward the player, but Eleanor stopped him.
“No.”
Victoria stared at her mother.
“Please.”
It was the first time all night she had used that word like she meant it.
Eleanor’s face twisted, but her hand remained raised.
The tape continued.
Charles spoke again.
“The infant Clara carries my brother’s blood, not mine. Eleanor betrayed me, so I will take the child she loves and leave her with the child she fears losing.”
Henry Graves answered carefully.
“And if she ever learns Victoria’s adoption papers were falsified?”
Victoria covered her mouth.
Clara felt the world tilt.
Eleanor whispered, “Adoption papers?”
The tape crackled.
Charles said, “She won’t. Victoria is useful. Clara is a reminder.”
Then the recording ended.
No one moved.
Victoria looked like the air had been taken from her body.
Eleanor turned toward her slowly.
“Victoria.”
Victoria shook her head.
“No.”
“Darling—”
“No!” Victoria backed away. “No. That’s not true. He was my father.”
Eleanor reached for her.
Victoria slapped her hand away.
“Don’t touch me.”
Clara’s chest tightened.
She had come looking for a mother and found a graveyard of lies.
“Who was my father?” Clara asked.
Eleanor did not look away from Victoria.
“My husband’s younger brother,” she whispered. “Thomas.”
Victoria laughed in disbelief.
“You had an affair?”
Eleanor flinched.
“It was before my marriage to Charles truly began. He knew I loved Thomas. He married me for my family’s money, and I was too young to understand the cage until it locked.”
Clara swallowed.
“And Thomas?”
Eleanor’s eyes filled.
“He died in a car accident before you were born.”
Detective Morales spoke quietly.
“Was it an accident?”
Eleanor looked at Charles’s portrait.
“I don’t know anymore.”
Victoria sank back into the chair.
“If I’m adopted,” she whispered, “who am I?”
For the first time, Clara saw the little girl inside her sister. Not the woman who slapped her. Not the heiress. Just a child whose entire life had been arranged by a monster.
Eleanor stepped toward her.
“You are Victoria. You are my daughter.”
Victoria looked up, eyes wet.
“Am I?”
Eleanor broke.
“Yes.”
Victoria’s lips trembled.
“You never loved me like her.”
Eleanor knelt in front of the chair.
“I was grieving a child I thought was dead. But that grief never meant I didn’t love you.”
Victoria looked at Clara.
Clara said nothing.
She did not know what forgiveness looked like yet.
Before anyone could speak again, Detective Morales’s radio crackled.
A male voice came through.
“Detective, we located Nora Rose’s apartment.”
Clara grabbed Andrew’s arm.
Morales replied, “Status?”
Static.
Then the officer said, “The place is destroyed. No sign of Nora.”
Clara’s face collapsed.
May you like
Another burst of static followed.
“But there’s blood on the kitchen floor.”
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