Chapter 6 - The Phone Behind the Wall
The black phone vibrated again.
I stared at Peter's name.
Another message appeared.
GET THE PAGE BEFORE ARTHUR TALKS.
My hands went cold.
This wasn't Julian's phone.
I'd seen his dozens of times.
This one had a cheap black case and a cracked corner.
I slipped it beneath the folds of my dress and pulled the service door open.
A narrow corridor ran behind the guest suite.
Old wallpaper.
Unpainted trim.
The air smelled like dust and cedar.
Someone had been using it recently.
Fresh shoe marks crossed the floor.
I followed them.
Behind me, the guest room door rattled.
"Sophia?"
Julian.
I kept moving.
He unlocked the room.
A second later I heard him swear.
The service corridor turned left.
At the end, a thin panel opened into the upstairs linen closet.
I stepped through and nearly collided with a woman carrying folded towels.
She gasped.
"Mara."
Mara Bell had managed the Vance household for nearly twenty years.
She had pinned my veil before the ceremony.
Now her eyes widened at my swollen face.
"Oh my God."
"Please don't scream."
She set the towels down.
"What did they do to you?"
"I need Arthur's study."
She looked toward the hall.
"Mrs. Vance locked that wing."
"Arthur said there's a backup drive."
Mara's face changed.
That told me she knew something.
"What?"
"Come with me."
She grabbed my hand.
We moved through another narrow passage and down a rear staircase.
My vision was improving, but every blink hurt.
Mara took me into a small service pantry.
She soaked a clean cloth in cool water and handed it to me.
"Hold this over your eyes."
"Who owns the phone?"
I showed her.
The blood drained from her face.
"You found that where?"
"Behind the wardrobe."
She didn't answer.
"Mara."
"Three nights ago, I saw Mr. Caldwell upstairs."
I stared at her.
"Peter was here?"
"Mrs. Vance told the staff he was reviewing wedding documents."
"Why didn't anyone tell me?"
"I assumed you knew."
Of course she had.
Peter was my attorney.
There would have been no reason for her to question it.
"Did he use the service corridor?"
"I don't know."
The phone buzzed again.
This time the sender was Julian.
WHERE ARE YOU?
Mara whispered, "That's not good."
I opened the thread.
There were dozens of messages.
Some had been deleted.
But enough remained.
Julian: SHE REFUSED THE FOLDER.
Unknown owner: THEN DELAY THE DEPARTURE.
Peter: ARTHUR'S COPY CANNOT REACH HER.
My throat tightened.
The three of them had been coordinating.
I scrolled higher.
A message from Evelyn appeared.
SHE THINKS THE LAND APPRAISAL IS ROUTINE.
My knees weakened.
"Mara."
She steadied me.
"What land appraisal?"
"Sterling Point."
Her expression went strange.
"What?"
"You know it?"
She hesitated.
That hesitation cut through me.
"Tell me."
"Mr. Arthur used to visit Sterling Point."
"When?"
"Years ago."
"With my father?"
She nodded.
I stared at her.
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"You do know something."
Mara looked toward the door.
Then lowered her voice.
"Your father and Arthur Vance were partners once."
I stopped.
"No."
"Not publicly."
"My father never had a partner named Vance."
"Not in the company."
"Then in what?"
She swallowed.
"The land."
The black phone vibrated again.
A new message.
Peter.
IF ARTHUR HAS REACHED THE HOUSE, THE STUDY DRIVE MUST BE DESTROYED.
Mara read it over my shoulder.
"Oh no."
We both turned toward the hall.
A door slammed upstairs.
Julian's voice echoed through the mansion.
"Mara!"
Her eyes met mine.
"Go."
"What about you?"
"I can keep him upstairs for a minute."
"Mara—"
"Your father once told me that if anything ever happened to him, Arthur's study was the only room in this house he trusted."
My heart stopped.
"My father was inside Arthur's study?"
"Many times."
Julian shouted her name again.
Mara pushed a small brass key into my palm.
"West hall. Last door."
I ran.
Behind me, Mara stepped into the corridor.
"Mr. Vance?"
Julian snapped, "Where is my wife?"
I reached the west hall.
The last door was locked.
The brass key fit.
I slipped inside Arthur's study and closed the door.
The room smelled like leather and old paper.
A large portrait of Arthur hung behind the desk.
I pulled it aside.
There was a recessed safe.
Not a hard drive.
A safe.
And taped to its door was a handwritten note.
My father's handwriting.
Sophia—
May you like
If you're reading this, they finally did what I was afraid they would do.
📖 Discover what my father hid inside Arthur's study—and why he had expected the Vances to come after me years before I met Julian in CHAPTER 7. 👇
