Chapter 10 - Victor Turned the Gun on Her Memory
Victor held the handgun with both hands, but his stance was wrong.
His elbows locked. His shoulders were too high. The weapon trembled because fear, not training, controlled him.
The security man raised empty hands.
“Victor, lower it.”
“Back away.”
He aimed toward Daniel, then swung the barrel toward Margaret when she moved.
Emma stepped between them.
“Point it at me.”
Victor stared.
She had never spoken to him like that.
“What?”
“You’ve spent two years hurting me when nobody could see. Now everyone is watching. Point it at me.”
His jaw tightened.
“Move.”
“No.”
Margaret’s voice remained calm.
“Emma, step aside.”
Emma did not.
She watched Victor’s eyes.
He wanted her afraid.
Without that, he did not know who he was.
“You said there’s a recording,” she told him. “Show it.”
Victor’s free hand pulled a phone from his pocket.
Not the phone Margaret had disabled.
A second device.
He tapped the screen while keeping the weapon raised.
A grainy video appeared.
Six-year-old Emma stood at the top of the basement stairs wearing the red coat. Elias was below, arguing with Daniel.
The audio cracked.
Elias said, “You used her name on the trust.”
Daniel reached for him.
The child moved.
Then the image jumped.
Elias fell backward.
The recording ended.
Victor looked at Emma.
“You pushed him.”
Emma stared at the screen.
“I don’t see that.”
“You moved.”
“The video skips.”
Lenora’s lighter remained against the red ledger.
She spoke softly.
“Because the missing seconds were damaged.”
Margaret looked at her.
“No. They were removed.”
Daniel nodded.
“I saw the original.”
Emma turned to him.
“What happened?”
His voice broke.
“Elias backed away from me. You reached toward him because you were scared. Lenora came behind you.”
Lenora’s smile vanished.
Daniel continued.
“She pushed both of you.”
Emma touched her shoulder.
A buried sensation surfaced: fingers pressing between her shoulder blades, the sudden loss of balance, Elias turning in mid-fall to catch her.
“He held me.”
“Yes,” Daniel said. “He took the impact against the railing. You landed on him.”
Emma’s knees weakened.
“He saved me.”
“Yes.”
“And you hid him.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Victor shook his head.
“This changes nothing.”
“It changes everything,” Margaret said.
He swung the gun toward her.
The security man shifted his weight.
Victor noticed.
“Don’t.”
Margaret remained still.
“You have one chance to put it down before the situation leaves your control.”
“You already took everything.”
“No, Victor. You lost everything before I arrived. I only stopped pretending you deserved time to fix it.”
His face twisted.
“You think you’re better than us?”
“No.”
Margaret looked at Emma.
“I think my daughter deserves to survive you.”
Victor’s hand shook harder.
Lenora moved her thumb.
The lighter sparked.
Emma saw a drop of fuel along the ledger’s edge.
She moved toward Lenora.
Victor shouted, “Stop!”
His attention left the security man.
The man stepped inside Victor’s reach, redirected the weapon upward, and trapped Victor’s wrist against his chest.
The gun fired once.
The bullet struck the garage ceiling.
Victor struggled, boots slipping on oil near the van.
The security man rotated his wrist and forced him to release the weapon.
It hit the floor.
Daniel kicked it away.
At the same moment, Lenora lit the ledger.
Flame touched the leather corner.
Emma grabbed a wool blanket from the van and threw it over Lenora’s hands.
The lighter fell.
Margaret seized the ledger.
Lenora clawed at her coat.
“You don’t know what’s in there!”
Margaret pulled free.
Victor was forced to the ground, one arm secured behind him.
His cheek pressed against the concrete.
For the first time, Emma looked down at him without fear.
Then the red ledger vibrated in Margaret’s hands.
It was not a book.
A phone had been concealed inside a hollow cover.
The screen lit.
A live video showed another room beneath the house.
An elderly man lay in a medical bed.
His eyes were open.
Daniel stared at the screen.
“Elias.”
The man raised one trembling hand toward the camera.
Then another figure entered the room.
A woman wearing Margaret’s cream blouse.
Emma looked at her mother.
Margaret was still wearing it beneath her coat.
The woman on the screen had Margaret’s face.
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She leaned over Elias and whispered, “Emma can never know which one of us is her mother.”
📖 Unmask the woman wearing Margaret’s face—and discover why Elias’s live room was connected to Emma’s birth records in CHAPTER 11. 👇
