Chapter 6 - The Camera That Wasn’t Ours

The security room was two floors below the ballroom.

I had been inside exactly once.

That night made twice.

Damian stood behind the technician.

“Show me every camera connected to the private network.”

The screen filled with hallways.

Elevators.

Kitchen.

Garage.

Ballroom.

Office.

Nothing unusual.

I looked closer.

One view bothered me.

The ballroom fountain.

The angle was wrong.

Our camera near the fountain faced the doors.

This one faced the fireplace.

I pointed.

“That isn’t ours.”

The technician frowned.

“It is on the network.”

“Not physically.”

He looked at me.

“I clean that wall every morning.”

Damian said:

“Find it.”

We went back upstairs.

Three minutes later, I saw it.

A black pinhole inside the decorative speaker above the fountain.

Carlo swore.

Mr. Harrow looked almost impressed.

“Vincent heard everything.”

“Not everything,” Evelyn said.

Damian turned.

She lifted the blue folder.

“The clinic copies were never in this room.”

Damian looked at Carlo.

“And the ledger?”

“With Bianca, if she found it,” Carlo said.

His phone remained silent.

Damian’s attorney arrived first.

Federal agents were on their way to Crowe Harbor.

Damian gave one instruction.

“No one approaches Warehouse Nine until Bianca is confirmed safe.”

The attorney nodded.

Carlo did not.

“You think Vincent will wait?”

“I think charging in is what he expects.”

Damian looked at the hidden camera.

“So we give him something else.”

He walked to the fireplace.

He held Thomas’s letter where the pinhole could see it.

Then he tore it in half.

Carlo shouted:

“What are you doing?”

Damian tore it again.

Evelyn did not react.

Mr. Harrow did.

He smiled.

Damian dropped the pieces into a champagne bucket and lit them.

The paper burned.

Carlo stared.

“That was evidence.”

Damian looked at me.

I understood.

I took my phone from my apron pocket.

Earlier, while everyone argued, I had photographed the letter.

Front.

Back.

Envelope.

Mr. Harrow nodded.

“And I notarized a copy twelve years ago.”

Carlo looked between them.

Damian faced the hidden camera.

“Now Vincent thinks the original is gone.”

Evelyn added:

“And Bianca becomes less useful.”

Carlo looked sick.

“That does not make her safe.”

“No,” Damian said.

“But it changes his reason for keeping her.”

A message arrived on Damian’s phone.

Unknown number.

BRING THE ASHES IF YOU WANT HER BACK.

Damian showed it to us.

Carlo sat down.

I looked at the message.

Something felt wrong.

“Why ashes?”

Damian glanced at me.

“What?”

“He saw you burn it.”

“Yes.”

“So the camera has audio and video.”

“Yes.”

“Then why did Vincent call Carlo before? Why not just speak through the camera?”

Mr. Harrow looked at me.

Carlo frowned.

I continued.

“Because maybe he wasn’t watching live.”

The technician returned.

“He wasn’t.”

Everyone turned.

“The device uploads in thirty-second bursts to a remote server.”

Damian said:

“Location?”

“Masked.”

“Can you trace it?”

“Trying.”

Evelyn looked at the clock.

12:31 a.m.

“Bianca went to the warehouse before midnight.”

Carlo nodded.

“If Vincent was watching delayed footage, he may not be there.”

Damian looked at him.

“Then where?”

Carlo’s eyes moved to the burned letter.

“Where he always goes when he needs leverage.”

“Which is?”

Carlo hesitated.

“Your father’s old house.”

Damian went still.

Crowe House.

The estate outside the city had been closed for eight years.

Damian never used it.

Evelyn looked at Carlo.

“Why?”

“There’s a private archive under the east wing.”

Mr. Harrow frowned.

“Thomas closed that archive.”

“Vincent reopened it after he died.”

Damian called the investigator again.

The warehouse team redirected.

I looked toward the ballroom doors.

Then saw something near Bianca’s chair.

Small.

Gold.

A broken clasp.

I bent down.

It was not jewelry.

It was a keycard chip from a designer clutch.

Bianca’s.

I picked it up.

Carlo recognized it.

“She carries her access card in that case.”

“To where?” I asked.

He looked at Damian.

“Crowe House.”

Damian’s face changed.

“Why would Bianca have access to my father’s house?”

Carlo did not answer.

Evelyn did.

“Because Vincent gave it to her.”

Bianca had been going there.

Maybe for weeks.

Maybe longer.

Damian looked toward the black marble floor where she had stood in her red gown.

“What was she doing there?”

Carlo’s eyes filled with dread.

“Looking for her mother’s copy.”

“Sofia’s copy of the account records?”

“Yes.”

Mr. Harrow tightened his grip on his cane.

“If Sofia hid a duplicate ledger at Crowe House, Vincent may have spent nineteen years looking for it.”

Evelyn whispered:

“And Bianca found it.”

Carlo’s phone buzzed.

One image.

Bianca.

Still wearing the dark red gown.

Sitting in an old wooden chair.

Behind her, I saw faded green wallpaper.

I knew that room.

Every member of staff had seen archival photographs of Crowe House.

The old library.

Across Bianca’s lap rested a leather ledger.

On the wall behind her was a clock.

12:38.

Live.

Damian stared at the photograph.

Then another message arrived.

COME ALONE.

Carlo stood.

“I’m going.”

“No.”

“She is my daughter.”

“And Vincent wants you frightened.”

Carlo shouted:

“She is my daughter.”

Damian stepped closer.

“And Evelyn is my mother.”

Silence.

Damian continued.

“And Thomas was my father.”

His voice never rose.

“Fear has made decisions for this family for nineteen years.”

He looked at the photograph again.

“That ends tonight.”

He handed the phone to his attorney.

“Send the image to the agents.”

Then he looked at me.

“Elena, go home.”

I shook my head.

“No.”

His eyes narrowed.

“That wasn’t a request.”

“Then fire me tomorrow.”

Mr. Harrow coughed to hide a smile.

Damian stared at me.

“Why are you doing this?”

I looked at Bianca’s photograph.

“Because she tried to stop me from opening one door.”

Then at him.

“And every truth tonight came through it.”

Evelyn picked up her coat.

“She comes.”

Damian looked at his mother.

“You don’t get to decide that.”

Evelyn held his gaze.

“Apparently neither do you.”

For the first time that night, Damian almost smiled.

Then the technician shouted from the security room.

“I have the upload destination.”

Damian turned.

The technician read the location.

Not Crowe House.

Not the warehouse.

A private office building three blocks away.

Carlo stared.

“That belongs to Vincent’s attorney.”

Mr. Harrow’s face hardened.

Damian looked again at the photo of Bianca.

“If the camera feed is going there…”

Evelyn finished the thought.

“Then Vincent may not be at Crowe House.”

And I realized something worse.

The photograph of Bianca might be real.

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The clock might be live.

But the man holding her did not have to be Vincent.