CHAPTER 18 — THE SECOND PENDANT
Security teams searched every room.
They found no intruder.
No broken windows.
No missing property.
But someone had entered the hidden room before Evelyn opened it.
Dust covered most of the cabinet.
Except for the handle.
Someone had touched it recently.
Leah photographed everything while Caroline reviewed the foundation’s access logs.
“The code was assigned to a temporary contractor,” Caroline said. “A man named Peter Lang.”
Rosa looked at the photograph on the employee file.
“I know him.”
Everyone turned toward her.
“He worked here years ago. His name wasn’t Peter.”
“What was it?” Evelyn asked.
“Michael Crane. He drove for Adrian.”
Victor leaned closer to the screen.
“Crane died in a highway accident.”
“No,” Rosa said. “Adrian said he died.”
The difference settled over the room.
Caroline searched the contractor’s address.
It belonged to an empty warehouse that had been condemned three years earlier.
“He has had access to the foundation for almost a month,” she said.
Evelyn looked toward the residential wing.
“To the women?”
“To the building systems,” Caroline replied. “Security cameras, alarm wiring, electronic locks.”
They shut down every digital lock and assigned guards to each hallway.
Mara and her children were placed in a room near Rosa’s office.
Before midnight, Evelyn sat with Mara in the kitchen.
“Tell me about my mother.”
Mara wrapped both hands around a cup of tea.
“I was nineteen when I met her. My father worked for a private psychiatric facility. Women were brought there under false names. Some were wives. Some were witnesses. Some had inherited money powerful people wanted.”
“The Covenant used the facility.”
“Yes. Katherine discovered it.”
“Why didn’t she expose them?”
“She tried.”
Mara looked toward the doorway to make sure they were alone.
“She gathered names. Bank transfers. Judges. Doctors. Police officers.”
“The leather book.”
“No. That book is only an index.”
“An index to what?”
Mara hesitated.
“To the Registry.”
Evelyn waited.
“Katherine believed the Registry was hidden somewhere inside this estate. It contained every person the Covenant controlled—and every person they planned to control next.”
“Why would she hide it here?”
“Because no one searches the home of the man helping them.”
Evelyn’s breathing slowed.
“My father?”
Mara did not answer.
A scream came from the upper floor.
They ran toward the residential wing.
The little girl Evelyn had welcomed earlier stood in the hallway, crying.
On the wall above her bed, someone had drawn the circle divided by nine lines.
Beneath it were four words.
EVELYN HAS THE WRONG BOOK.
Rosa searched the room.
The windows were locked.
The hallway guard had seen no one enter.
Then the boy, Daniel, pointed toward the ceiling vent.
“He was watching us.”
“Who?” Evelyn asked.
“The man from the car.”
Daniel held out a folded piece of paper that had been pushed through the vent.
Evelyn opened it.
Inside was a photograph of Katherine Harlan taken only weeks before her death.
She was standing beside Victor.
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On the back, someone had written:
ASK HIM WHAT HAPPENED AFTER MIDNIGHT.
