Chapter 6 - The House Full of LiarsRhett returned to his mansion before sunrise.
He did not bring Isa through the main entrance. Anton took her through a private service passage and settled her in a room on the third floor, far from the cameras and corridors used by household staff.
It was the same room where Rhett's mother had once stayed whenever his father traveled.
He had not opened it in years.
The furniture remained beneath white sheets. A faded painting of Lake Michigan hung above the fireplace. On the bedside table stood a silver-framed photograph of a woman with dark hair and gentle eyes.
Rhett's mother.
Isa stopped at the doorway.
“She looks like you,” Rhett said.
“No,” Isa replied softly. “She looks like the woman I remember.”
He studied her.
“You've met her?”
“Once.”
“When?”
Isa sat carefully on the edge of the bed.
“I was sixteen. Two days before the fire, my father took me to a small house outside Milwaukee. He told me to wait in the car. When he came back, he was with a woman who had a scar on her left hand.”
Rhett looked at the photograph.
His mother had a thin scar across the base of her thumb, a wound he remembered from childhood.
“My father said she was a friend,” Isa continued. “She gave me this.”
She pulled a small silver locket from beneath her sweater. Inside was a faded photograph of a little girl standing between two adults.
Rhett recognized the woman immediately.
The man beside her was Isa's father.
“Your parents knew my mother.”
“They were trying to protect her. My father said Conrad had discovered something about the family and would kill anyone who knew.”
“What did he discover?”
“I never found out. He died before he could tell me.”
Rhett looked at the locket, then at the photograph beside the bed.
For years, he had believed his mother had died from an illness when he was a teenager. Conrad had arranged the funeral. Conrad had delivered the news. Conrad had stood beside him while he buried an empty coffin, explaining that his mother's body had been too badly damaged to be identified.
An empty coffin.
The memory struck him like a blow.
He had never questioned it.
“Marcus,” Rhett said.
Isa looked up.
“What about him?”
“He worked for my father before he worked for me. If he altered those security records, he may know where my mother went.”
“You can't trust him.”
“I'm not planning to trust him.”
Rhett left her with Anton and went downstairs to his private office.
His computer remained connected to the family security network. The system showed a dozen failed login attempts from an external address during the previous hour.
Then a new message appeared.
A video file.
Rhett opened it.
Marcus sat in a dim room, his face bruised, his hands tied behind his back.
Conrad stood behind him.
“You should have listened,” Conrad said to the camera. “Your loyalty has always been an expensive weakness.”
Marcus lifted his head.
“Rhett, don't come looking for me.”
Conrad smiled.
“Your assistant has something I need. He believes the ledger is hidden inside your father's study.”
Rhett leaned forward.
Conrad moved around Marcus and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“But I think we should stop pretending this is a search for money.”
He looked directly into the camera.
“Rhett, your mother is alive. She has been alive for eight years. And if you want to know why she left you, bring Isadora Voss to the old Valon estate tonight.”
The video ended.
Rhett didn't move.
A second message appeared, containing a photograph of a woman sitting beside a window.
Older. Thinner. Her hair streaked with silver.
But unmistakably his mother.
Written beneath the photograph were seven words.
She remembers what you did that night.
Rhett closed the laptop.
For years, he had believed his mother was dead, Elias was a traitor, and his father's murder had been avenged.
Now every certainty in his life was collapsing.
He walked upstairs and found Isa standing beside the open window, staring into the rain.
“Conrad has Marcus,” he told her.
She turned.
“He wants me to come to the old estate.”
“Then we'll go.”
“No.”
Rhett stopped.
Isa's face was pale, but her eyes were steady.
“It's a trap.”
“Of course it is.”
“He has your mother.”
“And if he is telling the truth, she's the only person who can explain why my signature is on that order.”
Isa reached for his hand, then seemed surprised by her own movement.
“Rhett, you have to understand something. If your mother was there that night, she may have seen who really started the fire.”
“Then we'll find her.”
“And if she tells you something you can't forgive?”
He looked at her.
“I've spent eight years punishing people for a truth I never checked.”
His voice hardened.
“I'm done letting Conrad decide what I believe.”
Downstairs, a security alarm chirped.
Anton rushed into the room.
“Boss, we've got movement at the east gate.”
“How many?”
“Six vehicles.”
Rhett's eyes narrowed.
“Conrad?”
Anton shook his head.
“No, sir. They have no weapons visible. They're carrying white flags.”
Isa went deathly pale.
Rhett caught it.
“What is it?”
She backed away from the window.
“No.”
“Isa?”
She looked at him with absolute horror.
“The white flags aren't a peace offering.”
May you like
She pointed toward the gate.
“They mean my brother has come to surrender.”
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