Chapter 15 - A Voice in the Dark
The second floor was a canyon of shadows. The moonlight filtered through the arched skylights above, casting fractured, cage-like patterns across the corridor carpet.
Emily held the weapon with both hands, arms extended, muzzle sweeping the doorways. Her senses were hyper-tuned; she could smell the faint trace of Julian’s signature Tom Ford cologne—oud wood and smoke—hanging like a suffocating shroud in the air.
"Julian," she spoke, her voice steady, refusing to give him the satisfaction of hearing her shake. "I know you're here. And I know about Eleanor, Marie, Sophia, and Victoria."
A soft, mocking chuckle drifted from the master bedroom. It was a sound that had once made her heart flutter with romance. Now, it made her blood curdle.
"You always were the brightest of the bunch, my darling," Julian’s voice purred from the gloom. It sounded smooth, aristocratic, completely devoid of remorse. "Eleanor was too fragile. Marie was too vain. But you... you actually managed to survive a drop that would have snapped the spine of an Olympic diver. I applaud you."
Emily pivoted around the doorframe of her bedroom, her gun aimed dead center.
The room was bathed in pale moonlight. Sitting in the velvet armchair by the bay window was a silhouette in an immaculate charcoal suit. He had one leg crossed over the other, a crystal glass of bourbon balanced on his knee.
"Step into the light," Emily ordered, her finger tightening on the trigger. "Hands where I can see them, or I swear to God I will empty this magazine into your chest."
The figure didn't move.
"Go ahead, Emily," the voice said, but oddly, the sound didn't come from the man in the chair.
It came from a small Bluetooth speaker placed on the nightstand beside the bed.
Emily froze. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness.
The man in the chair wasn't Julian.
It was an intricately dressed tailor’s mannequin, wearing the very tuxedo Julian was supposed to wear at their wedding reception. Pinned to the lapel was the corsage—and tied around the neck of the dummy was a high-tensile wire looped up to the ceiling fan.
Dangling beneath the mannequin’s crossed hands was an iPad. The screen lit up suddenly, casting an eerie glow over Emily’s face.
Julian was on the screen, streaming live.
He was sitting in the leather seat of a private jet, the dark tarmac visible through the oval window behind him. He looked freshly groomed, without a single scar on his handsome face. He raised a flute of champagne to the camera.
"Did you really think I’d walk into your house like a cheap burglar, Em?" Julian smiled, his eyes flashing with cruel brilliance. "I’m currently at thirty-five thousand feet, cruising toward an undisclosed territory. But before I left, I wanted to deliver a parting gift."
"I will hunt you down," Emily choked out, her knuckles turning white on the gun. "I will spend every dime my family ever made to put you in a cage."
"You won't have the chance," Julian whispered smoothly. "Look out your window, Emily. Look at the driveway."
Emily tore her gaze away from the screen and looked down through the bay window into the circular courtyard below.
Sarah’s car was parked there. And standing beside the driver’s side door, holding a burning flare and a remote detonator, was someone Emily had trusted with her deepest secrets.
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It was Vanessa.
***
