Chapter 13 - PRAGUE
Gabriel finally told Mariana the truth that evening.
Thirty-one years earlier, he and Thomas had created an investment partnership with a third man named Elias Vale.
The fund operated across Europe.
It grew quickly.
Too quickly.
Gabriel discovered that Thomas was using shell companies and false invoices to move investor money.
Elias helped document it.
They planned to remove Thomas.
Before they could, Elias disappeared during a business trip to Prague.
His body was never found.
Thomas claimed Elias had stolen from the fund and fled.
Gabriel never believed him.
Mariana stared at her father across the dark conference room.
“You think Thomas made Elias disappear?”
“I think Thomas knows what happened.”
“Did you report him?”
“Yes.”
“Nothing happened?”
“Not enough evidence.”
Gabriel looked toward the city lights.
“I dissolved our partnership and spent years separating my companies from his.”
“Then Thomas vanished.”
“And you knew Margaret?”
“Only socially.”
“She married Thomas during those years.”
“Was she involved?”
“I never knew.”
Mariana thought of the charity accounts.
The secret companies.
The staged death.
Margaret was not merely protecting her son.
She had been protecting Thomas’s financial system.
Mariana’s phone vibrated.
A message from an unknown number appeared.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LEFT THE MONEY ALONE.
A second message followed.
ASK ANDREW WHAT HIS MOTHER KEPT IN THE BLUE ROOM.
Mariana showed Gabriel.
He frowned.
“What blue room?”
Mariana called Andrew.
He answered immediately.
“My parents’ old house had a blue room.”
“What was it?”
“My father’s study.”
“Does the house still exist?”
“Margaret sold it after he disappeared.”
“To who?”
Andrew paused.
“I don’t know.”
Within thirty minutes, Evelyn found the property record.
The old Whitmore home had been sold to a corporation called Kingswell Heritage.
Kingswell Heritage was controlled by Northstar Meridian.
Thomas had secretly kept his own house.
At midnight, Mariana, Andrew, Evelyn, and two investigators arrived with legal authority granted through a financial preservation order.
The house had been empty for years.
Dust covered the floors.
The blue study was locked.
Andrew stood in front of the door.
“I haven’t been here since I was seventeen.”
Mariana looked at him.
“You don’t have to go in.”
“Yes.”
He swallowed.
“I do.”
The lock was opened.
Inside were shelves of old books.
A desk.
A wall safe.
And dozens of storage boxes.
Andrew opened the first box.
Tax records.
The second.
Photographs.
The third contained letters.
Mariana picked up one envelope.
It was addressed to Margaret.
The return name was Theodore Mason.
Thomas’s alias.
The postmark was from eight years earlier.
Thomas had been communicating with Margaret long after his supposed death.
Andrew opened another letter.
His face changed.
“What?”
Mariana asked.
He handed it to her.
The letter discussed him.
ANDREW STILL BELIEVES I’M DEAD.
KEEP IT THAT WAY UNTIL HE HAS SOMETHING WORTH TAKING.
Mariana read the sentence twice.
Andrew turned away.
His father had not disappeared to protect him.
His father had waited for Andrew to become useful.
Then Evelyn called from the safe.
“You need to see this.”
Inside were ledgers.
Dozens of them.
And taped beneath the lowest shelf was a small flash drive.
Mariana removed it carefully.
On the plastic surface, someone had written one word.
May you like
PRAGUE.
*
