Chapter 5 - Whispers in the Dark
Back at the suburban house Adrian had purchased with embezzled Halcyon funds, panic had completely dismantled the illusion of civilized domesticity.
Thanks to the covert listening devices I had planted inside the baseboards six months ago—routed through a private server Gabriel’s tech team had now tapped into—every word spoken in Adrian’s living room was broadcasting through the high-fidelity speakers of Gabriel’s penthouse.
We sat in silence, listening to the unraveling of the monsters.
*“Are you insane, Mother?!”* Adrian’s voice shrieked through the speakers, cracking under the weight of pure, unadulterated terror. *“Do you know who that was? That was Gabriel Vale! He had his personal goons assault me in my own foyer! He took that stupid little orphan with him! If she tells him about the Cayman accounts, I’m looking at twenty-five years in federal prison!”*
*“Shut up, Adrian! Shut your pathetic mouth and think!”* Celeste’s voice was venomous, stripped entirely of her usual high-society veneer. We could hear the sound of drawers being ripped open, jewelry boxes being overturned, and the frantic rustling of paper. *“Gabriel doesn’t have proof of the offshore transfers yet. Those accounts are masked behind six layers of panamanian holding entities!”*
*“He doesn't need proof of the money, you idiot!”* Adrian screamed back. *“Did you hear what he said about the necklace? Did you see the look on his face? Why did you keep that damn silver moon on her? You told me you found her at an agency!”*
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the audio feed for nearly ten seconds. When Celeste spoke again, her voice was low, trembling with a sickness that turned my stomach.
*“I kept it,”* Celeste hissed, *“because every time I looked at that little wretch scrubbing my floors, I wanted to see Arthur’s victory around her neck. Gabriel took my father’s life. He took our family name, our fortune, our place in this city! He reduced the Moreau family to ashes! So I took his only child, and I made her a servant in the house of Arthur’s grandson!”*
In the penthouse, Gabriel’s hand tightened around the armrest of his chair with such intensity that the wood groaned. I placed my hand over his, steadying him. “Listen to the rest,” I whispered. “Let them hang themselves completely.”
*“You’re a lunatic,”* Adrian whispered in horror. *“You’re out of your mind. If Gabriel finds out Mara is his daughter, he won’t just sue us. He will bury us in an unmarked grave!”*
*“He won't find out,”* Celeste snapped back, her tone turning chillingly practical. *“DNA tests from private clinics take days unless expedited. Even if he suspects, he needs legal verification to alter trusts or call in federal warrants. Mara has a scheduled appointment with her psychiatrist on Thursday morning. The prescription Adrian had Dr. Sterling write for her depression—the high-dose lithium compound.”*
My breath hitched. Adrian had been forcing me to take “vitamins” every night for six months. I had been hiding them under the floorboards, but I had never known what they actually were.
*“We move the schedule up,”* Celeste ordered ruthlessly. *“Tonight. We pack what cash we have in the floor safe. We take the secondary passports. We find Mara before Gabriel releases her from whatever medical facility he took her to, or we intercept her at the estate. One fatal overdose, Adrian. A tragic suicide brought on by the stress of an orphan suffering from identity delusions. When the wife dies, the widower inherits. We liquidate the offshore accounts and we fly to Dubai before the sunrise.”*
*“And what about Gabriel?”* Adrian asked, his voice trembling with cowardice.
*“Gabriel will be mourning a dead daughter for the second time in his life,”* Celeste laughed, a dry, rattling cackle. *“He’ll be too broken to hunt us.”*
Gabriel switched off the receiver with a gentle click.
The penthouse room was dead silent save for the drumming rain outside. Gabriel turned to Vance, who was standing by the door with a team of four armed operatives.
“Did you record that transmission across all redundant channels?” Gabriel asked.
“Every byte, Mr. Vale,” Vance confirmed. “Directly mirrored to the federal prosecutor’s secure cloud.”
“Good,” Gabriel said. He stood up, buttoning his suit jacket. The look on his face was no longer one of grief. It was the face of an emperor preparing to execute an entire court of traitors. “Adrian thinks he is attending the emergency Halcyon executive board meeting tomorrow morning at eight o’clock to secure his promotion.”
“He thinks he can use that meeting to authorize an emergency international transfer from our reserve liquidity pool,” I added, looking at my father. “He set up an automated authorization ticket three days ago under the guise of funding a European data center.”
Gabriel looked at me, a fierce pride glittering in his eyes. “Julianna, how would you like to chair your first board meeting?”
I stood up, letting the cashmere cardigan slip from my shoulders, revealing the sharp, unyielding woman who had survived twenty years of darkness.
May you like
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world, Father.”
***
