Chapter 3 - The Brother Who Never LeftStallone's younger brother Julian had always been the family’s shadow.
Charming when people were watching.
Cruel when they weren't.
As children, Julian had followed Stallone everywhere, first out of admiration, later out of resentment.
Stallone inherited their father's business.
Julian inherited enough money to disappear.
Yet he never truly left.
He always returned whenever something valuable was at stake.
Now the evidence showed his passport had been used at a private airport in another country, but immigration records confirmed something impossible.
The passport was there.
Julian wasn't.
Someone else had traveled under his identity.
Stallone ordered investigators to find him.
Two hours later, a location came through.
A rural property owned by one of Julian's companies.
Stallone went there himself.
The house looked abandoned.
The lights were off.
The door was unlocked.
Inside, everything smelled of dust.
Then Stallone found a room filled with monitors.
Dozens of them.
All connected to the mansion.
Kitchen.
Dining room.
Nursery.
Hallway.
Garden.
Even the garage.
He stared at the screens.
This was not surveillance.
It was obsession.
A large central monitor displayed Noah's bedroom.
There was a chair in front of it.
Someone had been sitting there.
Watching.
For months.
Stallone noticed a small cup beside the chair.
Cold coffee.
A notebook lay open.
The pages contained times and observations.
“Noah cried at 3:14.”
“Noah asked for Daddy.”
“Noah refuses medicine.”
“Noah remembered the blue door.”
Stallone stopped.
The blue door.
He turned the page.
“Noah said Mama told him not to open it.”
Then another line.
“He remembers more than expected.”
Stallone felt his pulse hammer.
He photographed every page.
An investigator opened a drawer.
Inside was a collection of children's drawings.
All from Noah.
Stallone picked one up.
It showed a large house.
A little boy.
A woman.
And a black rectangle.
“What is this?”
The investigator studied it.
“Maybe a television.”
Stallone shook his head.
“No.”
He knew his son.
That rectangle was a door.
On the back, written in child's handwriting, were three words.
DON'T OPEN IT.
Another investigator shouted.
“Sir!”
A hidden compartment had been discovered behind a bookshelf.
Inside sat a metal box.
Stallone opened it.
There were photographs.
His late wife.
Noah as a baby.
Julian.
Helen.
And one photograph that made Stallone's stomach tighten.
It showed his wife standing beside a blue-painted door inside the mansion.
The date was written on the back.
Three days before she died.
Stallone turned the photograph over.
A handwritten sentence read:
“If anything happens to me, look behind the blue door.”
He stared at the words.
His wife had died in a car accident.
Everyone had called it tragic.
Everyone had said the brakes failed.
Everyone had said there was nothing suspicious.
Stallone had believed them.
But now his wife had left a warning.
And someone had spent months preventing Noah from remembering it.
The front door slammed.
Everyone turned.
Footsteps moved through the house.
Slow.
Measured.
Someone was coming upstairs.
Stallone motioned for the investigators to hide.
The footsteps stopped outside the room.
The door opened.
Julian entered.
He was wearing a dark suit.
And a red tie.
Noah's description flashed through Stallone's mind.
Julian smiled.
“I wondered when you'd finally find this place.”
Stallone stepped forward.
“You've been watching my son.”
Julian's smile faded.
“I've been protecting the family.”
“You call that protection?”
Julian looked at the monitors.
“You don't understand what you're dealing with.”
“I understand enough.”
“No. You don't.”
Stallone approached him.
“You threatened my son.”
Julian shook his head.
“I never touched him.”
“You gave orders.”
Julian laughed once.
“So you finally figured out the easy part.”
Stallone stared.
“The easy part?”
Julian looked toward the investigators.
“They've been searching the wrong house.”
Before Stallone could answer, Julian suddenly grabbed a small device from his pocket and pressed a button.
Every monitor changed.
Noah's bedroom appeared.
Live footage.
The boy was alone.
The image showed Noah sitting on his bed.
Then a voice came from the monitor.
Helen Stallone.
“Hello, my darling.”
Stallone's face went pale.
Helen's voice continued.
“Your father has found the room.”
Julian looked at Stallone.
“You're still not asking the right question.”
Stallone turned toward the monitor.
“What question?”
Julian's eyes hardened.
“Why did your wife die?”
The screen went black.
Then the mansion security system sent an emergency alert.
Someone had entered Noah's room.
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And according to the camera feed, it wasn't Helen.
It was Gideon.
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