Chapter 19: Adrian’s Warning
“You should not have opened the wall,” Adrian said.
Detective Ellis activated a recording device.
“Where is Mara?” I demanded.
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No. But it happens to be true.”
Adrian’s voice sounded different.
The arrogance was still there, but something else lived beneath it.
Fear.
“You knew about Aster House,” I said.
“I knew the name.”
“You married me because of a financial order.”
Silence.
“Answer me.”
“My mother introduced us because she believed the marriage would combine two protected estates.”
“You let me believe you loved me.”
“I did love you.”
“That is not love.”
“I know that now.”
I nearly hung up.
Then Adrian said Noah’s name.
“Do not let him reach his birthday inside that building.”
“Why?”
“The center is not simply property. It is the original registered seat of the Aster Children’s Trust.”
Claire looked at Victor.
He avoided her eyes.
“What happens when Noah turns one?” I asked.
“The trust recognizes a successor.”
“Who?”
“That depends on the blood verification.”
“What blood verification?”
“I never saw the complete file.”
“Who did?”
“My mother.”
“Margaret is in prison.”
“No,” Adrian said. “The woman convicted under my mother’s name is in prison.”
The room went silent.
I gripped the phone.
“What did you say?”
“I learned three months ago that the prison medical records do not match hers.”
“Where is Margaret?”
“I don’t know.”
“You always know more than you admit.”
“Not this time.”
Detective Ellis wrote a question on a piece of paper.
WHO IS THE TRUSTEE?
I repeated it.
Adrian breathed slowly.
“When I was a child, my mother received instructions from someone she called the Trustee. She was terrified of him.”
“Give me a name.”
“She never did.”
“Then why call me?”
“Because Mara Cole is not Mara Cole.”
“Who is she?”
“Natalie Pierce. She worked in the accounting division that managed private Aster settlements. She disappeared six years ago.”
“Why did she come to me?”
“She must have stolen something.”
“The ledger?”
“No. The ledger was planted before the mansion reopened.”
“By whom?”
“Someone close enough to know the reconstruction plans.”
My eyes moved toward Claire, Rosa, Victor, and Ellis.
Adrian continued.
“Someone wanted you to find it.”
The prison line crackled.
A distant alarm sounded behind him.
“Adrian?”
“There is something else.”
“What?”
“The succession does not depend only on Noah.”
I looked down the hallway toward the room where my son was sleeping.
“What does it depend on?”
“You.”
“Why?”
“Because Whitmore is not your original family name.”
I turned toward Victor.
My father looked as though he had been struck.
Adrian lowered his voice.
“Ask Isabelle who Thomas Arden was.”
The line suddenly disconnected.
I stared at the phone.
My mother had been standing at the nursery entrance.
She had heard everything.
“Mom?”
Isabelle held the doorframe for support.
“That man is dead,” she whispered.
“Who was he?”
She looked at my father.
Victor lowered his head.
May you like
My mother’s answer changed everything.
“Thomas Arden was the man who believed he owned me before Adrian believed he owned you.”
