Chapter 10 - THE CHURCH BENEATH THE CHURCH
We hit the floor.
Smoke canisters rolled through broken windows.
Tony’s men fired toward the lawn.
Harlan crawled behind a sofa.
I grabbed Luca.
“You brought this here?”
“Not me.”
“Great reunion.”
He almost smiled.
Vivien entered through the side door with a shotgun.
I stared at her.
“Where did you get that?”
“Your kitchen.”
“Why is there a shotgun in my kitchen?”
She looked at me.
“Really?”
Fair.
Tony shouted from the hall.
“East wing breach!”
Luca grabbed my arm.
“We need to go underground.”
“Harlan?”
“Bring him.”
The senator protested.
I pointed a gun at him.
“You’re suddenly a guest.”
We moved through the tunnels.
Vivien.
Luca.
Harlan.
Tony.
Me.
Somewhere behind us, men searched Ravenwood.
Luca led us toward the old chapel.
Ravenwood had once belonged to a railroad magnate who built a private church on the property.
My family bought the estate decades later.
I had planned to marry Vivien there Saturday.
That irony was becoming exhausting.
We entered the chapel through a hidden door behind the altar.
Luca knelt beside a stone panel.
“Key.”
I gave him number seventeen.
He inserted it.
Nothing happened.
“Wrong key?”
“No.”
He turned it halfway.
Then looked at Harlan.
“Dad said every key needs a name.”
Harlan’s face drained.
“What name?”
“You know.”
“I don’t.”
Luca pressed the gun beneath his chin.
“Try harder.”
Harlan whispered, “Gabriel.”
The lock clicked.
I looked at him.
“My grandfather?”
Harlan said nothing.
The stone floor opened.
Stairs descended into darkness.
At the bottom sat an old steel vault.
Inside were seventeen safety boxes.
One for each key.
Luca opened number seventeen.
Empty.
He cursed.
Harlan laughed.
“You’re too late.”
Then Vivien noticed something.
“Wait.”
She reached inside and pressed the back wall.
A panel popped loose.
Behind it was a single envelope.
My name on the front.
I opened it.
My father’s handwriting.
Dominic, if you’re reading this, I failed twice. Once as a father. Once as a man.
I kept reading.
He admitted Luca’s death had been staged.
He admitted forcing Luca into exile.
He admitted Harlan controlled judges, cops, contractors, and politicians through blackmail accounts.
Then one line stopped me.
Elena Carter holds the only complete copy. She does not know she has it.
I looked at Luca.
“Elena?”
His face changed.
“What?”
I read the line aloud.
Harlan lunged for the letter.
Tony hit him.
Vivien shouted, “Why Elena?”
Luca suddenly understood.
“Emma’s rabbit.”
We all stared at him.
“The gray rabbit?”
Luca nodded.
“I gave it to Elena before I disappeared.”
I remembered the twice-mended ear.
The thing Emma carried everywhere.
Luca whispered, “Dad hid a microdrive inside it.”
My stomach turned.
Emma had been carrying the evidence for years.
And Claire had taken the rabbit earlier.
I looked at Harlan.
He smiled.
“Now you understand.”
My phone vibrated.
A video message.
Elena was tied to a chair.
Claire stood behind her.
Emma was crying beside them.
The gray rabbit sat on a table.
Claire held scissors against its stitched ear.
She smiled at the camera.
May you like
“Found your vault.”
Then she cut the rabbit open.
