Chapter 4 - THE BRIDE WHO WAS NEVER IN PARIS

Victoria Shaw was not in Paris.

She had never gone to Paris.

Ronan confirmed it at 2:17 a.m.

No passport record.

No private flight.

No hotel reservation.

Nothing.

The photographs Victoria had sent Adrian from Paris had been taken nine months earlier.

She had lied.

For three days.

While Anna was trapped beneath the house.

Adrian sat alone inside his grandfather’s study.

In front of him were two glasses.

One contained bourbon.

The other remained empty.

For seventeen years, Julian had always sat opposite him when things went wrong.

The habit was difficult to ignore.

Adrian stared at the empty chair.

He remembered being nineteen.

Two young men with almost nothing except ambition.

Julian had slept on Adrian’s apartment floor.

Adrian had paid Julian’s tuition when his father died.

Later, when Adrian built Blackwood Shipping into an international empire, Julian became his financial architect.

They survived hostile takeovers.

Government investigations.

Assassination attempts.

Blackmail.

Enemies.

Julian had once taken a bullet meant for Adrian.

How did a man go from bleeding for you...

To planning your funeral?

The door opened.

Anna entered.

She was wrapped in a gray blanket.

“You should be resting.”

“So should you.”

“I don’t sleep much.”

“I noticed.”

Adrian studied her.

“You shouldn’t be walking.”

“I needed to tell you something.”

“What?”

Anna closed the door.

“Victoria came to see me before they locked me downstairs.”

Adrian waited.

“She offered me money.”

“How much?”

“Five million dollars.”

His eyebrow lifted.

“For what?”

“To take Lily and disappear.”

“Why?”

Anna hesitated.

“She thought you were becoming attached to us.”

Adrian stared at her.

“That’s ridiculous.”

Anna gave him a tired look.

“Is it?”

He said nothing.

She continued.

“Victoria hated Lily.”

“She called her distracting.”

“Embarrassing.”

“An inconvenience.”

Adrian’s jaw tightened.

“She said after the wedding, all staff with children would be removed from the estate.”

“I refused the money.”

“Then?”

“Victoria became angry.”

“She said I didn’t understand what kind of man you were.”

“What kind of man am I?”

Anna looked directly into his eyes.

“A man everyone thinks is heartless.”

“And?”

“I told her I didn’t believe them.”

Something shifted in Adrian’s expression.

Anna continued.

“She laughed.”

“Then she told me heartless men were easiest to manipulate.”

“Because they were desperate to believe the first person who made them feel human.”

That one landed.

Adrian looked away.

Victoria had entered his life eighteen months earlier.

Elegant.

Educated.

Controlled.

She never feared his reputation.

She challenged him.

Made him laugh.

Made his enormous home feel less empty.

Or so he had believed.

“What did you find after that?”

“The file.”

“The photographs.”

“And something else.”

Anna reached beneath the blanket.

She removed a small brass key.

Adrian stared at it.

“I found this in the underground room.”

“I hid it in my shoe before Julian found me.”

Ronan entered from the adjoining security room.

Adrian handed him the key.

“Find what it opens.”

Ronan studied it.

“There’s a number.”

Adrian looked.

Anna suddenly went pale.

“What?”

“I’ve seen that number.”

“Where?”

“On the original cellar map.”

Ronan opened a tablet.

He pulled up digitized estate plans.

After several seconds, he stopped.

“There.”

A tiny storage chamber appeared beneath the eastern garden.

Room 317.

Adrian stood.

“We’re going.”

Anna shook her head.

“No.”

He looked at her.

“They know you found me.”

“They’ll expect you to search.”

“Good.”

“That means they’ll be waiting.”

Adrian reached for his jacket.

“They already tried killing me once tonight.”

“So what?”

He met her eyes.

“Now I’m angry.”

Twenty minutes later, Adrian, Ronan, and four armed guards entered the tunnel.

Room 317 was nearly half a mile from the manor.

The brass key opened the door.

Inside were steel shelves.

Computers.

Documents.

Passports.

Stacks of cash.

Gold bars.

Dozens of burner phones.

But Adrian barely looked at any of it.

Because hanging on the far wall was a wedding photograph.

A photograph that had never happened.

Adrian wore a tuxedo.

Victoria wore white.

Across Adrian’s face someone had drawn a black X.

Underneath the photograph were three words.

PHASE ONE COMPLETE.

Ronan stared.

“What the hell?”

Adrian walked toward the desk.

There was one open file.

He picked it up.

The first page contained his life insurance information.

The second contained corporate succession documents.

The third contained a medical examiner report.

Adrian stopped.

The report had already been written.

Cause of death:

Cardiac arrest following accidental poisoning.

Date:

Thirty-nine days from now.

His wedding night.

Then Ronan noticed something.

“Adrian.”

He pointed toward the computer screen.

A countdown was running.

00:04:13.

Four minutes.

Thirteen seconds.

Anna’s warning echoed in Adrian’s mind.

They’ll expect you to search.

Adrian looked around.

“Everybody out.”

Ronan understood immediately.

“Move!”

The guards ran.

Adrian grabbed the file.

Then he noticed a second folder.

LILY MONROE.

He froze.

Three minutes.

Thirty-eight seconds.

“Adrian!”

Ronan shouted from the corridor.

Adrian snatched the folder.

Then ran.

Behind him, somewhere deep inside Room 317, a mechanical clicking began.

The countdown continued.

Three minutes.

Twenty seconds.

And Adrian suddenly understood something even worse.

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