Chapter 11 - Isabelle Was Never DeadNobody moved.
Dominic couldn't speak.
The woman in front of him looked older.
Thinner.
But it was her.
His wife.
His dead wife.
The woman he had buried.
The woman whose blood had stained his hands on the day he swore revenge.
Isabelle took one step forward.
Dominic raised his gun.
Not because he wanted to shoot her.
Because he was afraid she wasn't real.
“Say something.”
She whispered:
“You are my sunshine.”
Dominic's hand trembled.
The girls screamed.
Then ran.
Not away.
Toward her.
Isabelle dropped to her knees.
The girls crashed into her arms.
For fourteen months, Dominic had imagined his daughters standing beside their mother's grave.
Now all three were crying into Isabelle's shoulders.
Nora spoke first.
“Mommy.”
Isabelle closed her eyes.
“My babies.”
Dominic watched.
Every nightmare he had lived through suddenly became one impossible moment.
He lowered the gun.
“How?”
Isabelle stood slowly.
“I wasn't supposed to survive.”
“You were murdered.”
“No.”
She touched the scar near her eyebrow.
“They wanted you to believe I was.”
Dominic's voice broke.
“Why?”
“Because if you believed I was dead, you would hunt the wrong person.”
“Who?”
Isabelle looked at Eleanor's image on the screen.
“Her.”
Dominic stared.
Eleanor smiled.
“You always were sentimental.”
Isabelle looked at the camera.
“You lost.”
“No.”
Eleanor's voice remained calm.
“You found the ledger. That changes nothing.”
“It changes everything.”
Isabelle lifted the ledger.
“You no longer control the network.”
Eleanor laughed.
“You think a book can destroy thirty years?”
“No.”
Isabelle turned to Dominic.
“But the man who owns the name can.”
Dominic looked at her.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Trust me.”
He almost laughed.
“After fourteen months?”
“I did it to keep you and the girls alive.”
“You let me think you were dead.”
“I had to.”
“You let me bury you.”
“I watched from a distance.”
Dominic's eyes filled with fury.
“You watched me die too.”
Isabelle lowered her gaze.
“I know.”
Silence.
Then Evelyn spoke.
“How did Eleanor fake the death?”
Isabelle answered:
“She used a body from the network. A woman who looked enough like me from a distance.”
Dominic remembered the funeral.
The coffin had been closed.
He had never seen Isabelle's face.
His entire grief had been built on a lie.
Then he remembered something else.
“You called Grace before you died.”
Isabelle nodded.
“She was helping me.”
“Why didn't she tell me?”
“Because Vincent was watching you.”
Dominic looked at Vincent.
He stood near the doorway.
“Then why did he pretend to betray me?”
“To keep them convinced.”
A sharp sound came from the ceiling.
Isabelle looked up.
“They're here.”
“What?”
“The extraction team.”
Dominic's security alarm began screaming.
Windows shattered.
Men in black moved across the lawn.
Dominic grabbed the girls.
Evelyn pulled Isabelle behind cover.
Gunfire filled the mansion.
Dominic shouted:
“Who are they?”
Isabelle looked at him.
“Your own men.”
Dominic stared.
“No.”
“I told you.”
She pointed at the ledger.
“Your empire was never yours.”
A figure entered the hallway.
Dominic recognized him immediately.
His chief of security.
Thomas Reed.
Thomas raised his weapon.
But he wasn't aiming at Dominic.
He aimed at Isabelle.
Then Vincent shot him first.
Thomas collapsed.
Vincent shouted:
“Move!”
Dominic grabbed the girls.
Isabelle grabbed his hand.
“There's one place they won't search.”
“Where?”
She looked toward the basement.
“The room where your father kept his first ledger.”
Dominic's stomach dropped.
May you like
They descended the stairs.
And behind them, the mansion doors exploded inward.
