Chapter 2 - THE ROOM THAT HAD REMAINED LOCKED -Adrian took the stairs two at a time.
Lily followed while carrying Ethan against her chest.
The boy trembled with every shriek of the alarm.
Two security officers raced ahead of them through the west corridor.
Claire Blackwood’s bedroom stood at the end of the hall.
The carved walnut door had been forced open.
Splintered wood covered the carpet.
One guard entered with his weapon raised.
The room was empty.
Rain blew through an open balcony door.
White curtains twisted in the wind.
Drawers had been ripped out.
Claire’s jewelry cases lay overturned.
Her dresses had been dragged from the wardrobe.
The bed had been cut open from top to bottom.
Adrian stopped in the doorway.
For three years, he had preserved the room exactly as Claire had left it.
Now it looked as if someone had attacked her memory.
“Who did this?”
His voice sounded hollow.
The security chief, Marcus Reed, entered behind them.
“We’re reviewing the cameras.”
“The intruder may have climbed from the south terrace.”
Lily stared at the floor beside the fireplace.
A section of carpet had been folded back.
The loose floorboard had been removed.
The hiding place was empty.
Her stomach dropped.
“It’s gone.”
Adrian turned.
“What is gone?”
Lily lowered Ethan onto a velvet chair.
She crossed the room and knelt beside the exposed boards.
“There was an envelope here.”
“What envelope?”
“I found it last night.”
“You found it and left it?”
“I heard someone outside the room.”
“I was afraid I would be caught.”
Adrian’s anger flashed.
“You were trespassing in my wife’s private bedroom.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Ethan led me here.”
Adrian looked toward his son.
Ethan stared at the floor.
Lily continued carefully.
“He woke from a nightmare.”
“He kept saying his mother had hidden something beneath the birds.”
“I thought he was confused.”
“Then he showed me a drawing Claire had made for him.”
“It contained a fireplace, three blackbirds, and an arrow pointing toward the floor.”
Adrian’s expression tightened.
Claire had loved puzzles.
She often created treasure hunts for Ethan when he was a toddler.
Lily reached into her pocket and removed a photograph.
“I took this from the envelope before I heard footsteps.”
She handed it to Adrian.
The photograph showed Claire standing outside a private medical clinic.
Beside her stood Vanessa Crane.
The date printed in the lower corner was six weeks before Claire’s death.
Adrian stared at it.
“That’s impossible.”
“Vanessa told me she never met Claire.”
“She lied.”
“What was written on the back?”
Lily hesitated.
Then she told him.
Adrian looked toward the silver crane brooch resting in an open jewelry box.
Vanessa must have dropped it during the search.
The security chief’s radio crackled.
“We found movement on the west cameras.”
Marcus opened the security footage on his tablet.
The video showed a figure wearing a dark hood entering Claire’s corridor.
The intruder kept his face turned away.
He used an access card to disable the electronic lock.
Adrian studied the screen.
“Who has access to this floor?”
“Only you, me, and Mrs. Crane.”
Marcus paused.
“And selected household staff.”
Lily understood the implication.
“Which staff?”
Marcus pulled up the access record.
His eyebrows drew together.
“The card used belongs to Lily Carter.”
Adrian looked at her.
Ethan gasped.
Lily shook her head.
“My card is in my room.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes.”
Marcus spoke into his radio.
“Search Miss Carter’s quarters.”
Adrian stepped between Lily and the security chief.
“No one touches her belongings without me present.”
They moved quickly toward the staff wing.
Lily’s room was small but neat.
A narrow bed stood beneath the window.
Ethan’s drawings covered one wall.
A guard opened the top drawer of her dresser.
Inside lay Lily’s security card.
Marcus scanned it.
“The system says this is active.”
“Then someone copied it,” Lily said.
The guard reached deeper into the drawer.
His hand stopped.
He removed a small glass bottle.
The label contained Claire Blackwood’s name.
Adrian took it from him.
It was a prescription sedative.
The date was from the month Claire died.
Lily stared at it.
“I have never seen that before.”
Marcus searched beneath her mattress.
He found a folded page from Claire’s medical records.
The report described unusually high concentrations of the same medication in her bloodstream.
Adrian’s face hardened.
“What is this doing in your room?”
“I don’t know.”
Lily sounded desperate.
“Someone planted it.”
Marcus’s expression remained guarded.
“Mr. Blackwood, we need to contact the police.”
Ethan jumped from the bed.
“No!”
He wrapped both arms around Lily.
“She didn’t hurt Mommy.”
Adrian looked down at him.
“What did you say?”
Ethan began crying again.
“Vanessa said Lily would go away like Mommy if she didn’t stop asking questions.”
The adults fell silent.
Adrian crouched in front of his son.
“When did she say that?”
“Yesterday.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Ethan looked terrified.
“She said you wouldn’t believe me.”
“She said you never believed Mommy either.”
The words struck Adrian with brutal force.
During Claire’s final months, she had repeatedly claimed that someone was following her.
Adrian had believed her fear came from grief and exhaustion after a difficult pregnancy loss.
He had encouraged her to see a psychiatrist.
Two weeks later, her car went over a cliff.
The police called it an accident caused by medication.
Adrian looked at the bottle in his hand.
For the first time, he wondered whether Claire’s death had been planned.
A notification sounded on Marcus’s tablet.
He opened the newest security recording.
The footage showed Vanessa leaving through the front gate.
She entered a waiting car driven by a man in a gray suit.
Before the vehicle pulled away, the driver turned toward the camera.
Adrian went completely still.
Lily noticed the change.
“Who is he?”
Adrian enlarged the man’s face.
“My brother.”
Lily stared at him.
Adrian’s younger brother, Julian Blackwood, had supposedly been living in Europe for five years.
He had not attended Claire’s funeral.
He had not called when Adrian became chairman of Blackwood Industries.
He had disappeared after being accused of stealing millions from the family company.
Yet there he was, sitting beside Vanessa.
Marcus received another alert.
A message had arrived from Claire’s old private email account.
The subject line contained only four words.
Adrian read them aloud.
“She did not crash.”
Attached was a map.
A red circle marked an abandoned lakeside hospital sixty miles north of the manor.
May you like
Beneath it was a scheduled time.
Midnight.
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