Chapter 5 - The Room Beneath the HouseThe scream lasted only three seconds.

Then silence.

I stood frozen on the cellar stairs.

Daniel appeared behind me.

"Claire."

I spun around.

"Who is down there?"

"No one."

"I heard someone."

"You've been under stress."

I stared at him.

"Don't gaslight me."

Something dark flashed across his face.

Then Eleanor appeared behind him.

"She's alive," she said.

Daniel turned sharply.

"Mother!"

Eleanor ignored him.

"Go downstairs, Claire."

I hesitated.

"She's waiting for you."

Daniel blocked the staircase.

"You are not going down there."

Eleanor stepped forward.

"Move."

He didn't.

For several seconds, they stared at each other.

Then Daniel moved.

I descended.

The cellar was larger than I'd expected.

At the bottom was a concrete corridor.

There were doors on both sides.

The first one was locked.

The second opened.

Inside was a desk.

A lamp.

Three filing cabinets.

And a wall covered in photographs.

My breath stopped.

There were photographs of women.

Mara.

Julia.

Rebecca.

Seven others.

Some were wedding pictures.

Some were surveillance photographs.

One was taken the day before each woman vanished.

I walked deeper into the room.

Then I saw another photograph.

It was me.

Taken three months before Daniel proposed.

My hands went numb.

"He was watching me."

Eleanor stood behind me.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because your father left something behind."

"What?"

She didn't answer.

I opened the largest filing cabinet.

Inside were files labeled with dates.

The oldest was from twenty-four years ago.

I pulled it out.

A newspaper clipping fell onto the floor.

The headline read:

LOCAL ACCOUNTANT KILLED IN HIT-AND-RUN

The victim's name was Thomas Vale.

My father.

I stared at it.

"No."

Eleanor whispered:

"The official story was an accident."

"But?"

"But someone paid to make it disappear."

I turned the page.

There was a photograph of the crime scene.

Then another.

Then another.

And finally, one photograph of the driver's car.

A black Mercedes.

I recognized the license plate.

It belonged to Daniel's father.

I dropped the file.

"My father was murdered."

Eleanor nodded.

"Yes."

"By your family?"

"By someone in this family."

Daniel stood in the doorway.

His face was unreadable.

I looked at him.

"You knew."

He shook his head.

"I knew my father was involved."

"You knew!"

"I didn't know he ordered it."

I backed away.

"Who did?"

Nobody spoke.

Then I heard a click behind me.

A gun being loaded.

I turned.

There was a woman standing in the doorway.

She looked exhausted.

Her face was pale.

Her hair was short.

A scar ran along her jaw.

I knew her face.

I had seen it in the photographs.

"Mara?"

She raised the gun.

"Don't move."

Daniel went white.

"You died."

Mara's eyes filled with tears.

"No."

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She looked at me.

"They just needed you to think I did."