Chapter 126: Greys

Cecilia

I closed the book slowly, carefully, like it might shatter if I moved too quickly. My hands had stopped shaking, replaced by a strange, cold numbness that spread from my chest outward.

"Ceci." Daniel's voice seemed to come from very far away. "I've worked a lot of cases," he said quietly, his eyes on the diary in my hands rather than on my face, giving me the space to process without feeling watched.

"Cold cases, mostly. Missing persons, unsolved deaths, that kind of thing. And you'd be surprised how many of them involve parents who just... didn't love their kids. Not the way they were supposed to."

I looked up at him, and he met my gaze steadily, his expression open and honest in a way that made something in my chest loosen slightly.

"It's more common than people think," he continued. "Parents who see their children as burdens, as obstacles to the life they wanted. Parents who abandon, who neglect, who actively harm their own kids because they just can't—or won't—feel what they're supposed to feel."

He paused, choosing his words carefully. "What I'm saying is, you're not alone in this. And it's not your fault. None of it was ever your fault."

"I know," I said, and was surprised to find I meant it. The words came out steady, certain, without the tremor I'd expected. "I know it wasn't my fault. She made her choices. All of them."

Daniel nodded, seeming satisfied with my answer, but then his expression shifted into something more frustrated, more professionally analytical. He ran a hand through his hair, making it stand up at odd angles, and let out a bitter laugh that held no humor.

"The problem is," he said, gesturing at the diary, "this doesn't actually prove anything. Not in a way that would hold up legally. There's no record of money changing hands, no bank transfers, no paper trail. It's just her written account of conversations that may or may not have happened the way she described them."

He stood up, pacing the small space between the bed and the wall, his movements agitated. "We can't use it to prove that Irene Winston orchestrated what happened at the engagement party. A good defense attorney would tear it apart in minutes."

I watched him pace, his detective mind clearly working through the problem, trying to find angles that didn't exist. "So we're back to square one," I said. "We know what happened, but we can't prove it."

"Looks like we'll have to approach this from Irene's side," Daniel said, stopping his pacing to look at me. "Try to find evidence on her end—phone records, financial transactions, anything that connects her to your mother or to Matthias."

"Actually," I said slowly, an idea forming as I looked down at the diary in my hands, "maybe not."

Daniel's eyebrows rose. "What do you mean?"

I flipped back through the pages, finding the entry about my mother's return to America, about fleeing from Rhys Grey. "Don't you think this part is strange?"

"Which part?" Daniel moved closer, reading over my shoulder.

I pointed to the relevant passage. "This. About my stepfather—Rhys Grey. She says he 'did things that aren't fit to write about.' Things bad enough that she felt she needed to escape England immediately, even though it meant coming back to America with nothing."

Daniel frowned, reading the passage more carefully. "You think he hurt her?"

"I don't know what he did," I said, my mind racing. "But think about it—she was living in a manor house with a titled nobleman. Even if he wasn't giving her money, she had shelter, food, security. The basic necessities of life. But she gave all of that up to come back here with literally nothing. No money, no prospects, no plan."

I looked up at Daniel. "What could be bad enough to make her do that? What could drive her to abandon that kind of security and comfort?"

Daniel's expression shifted, his eyes lighting up with the kind of excitement that comes from spotting a crucial detail others have missed. "You know what? You'd make an excellent detective. That's exactly the kind of question we should be asking."

"I'm very satisfied with my position as a director at Winston Corporation," I said dryly, cutting off what was clearly about to become an enthusiastic recruitment pitch. "So I'll have to decline any career advice about becoming a detective, but thank you for the thought."

Daniel laughed, the sound genuine and warm. "Fair enough. Can't blame a guy for trying."

He pulled out his phone, already making notes. "This is definitely a lead worth pursuing. If Rhys Grey did something to your mother—something serious enough to make her flee the country—there might be a record of it. Police reports, hospital records, something."

He paused, tilting his head slightly as something occurred to him. "Wait. Your mother's last name was Grey, right? After she married?"

"Yes," I said, not sure where he was going with this. "She became Evelyn Grey when she married the count."

"Is that the Grey?" Daniel asked, his voice taking on a particular quality that made me look at him more closely. "As in, the British Grey family?"

I blinked at him, confused. "I only know that my mother married a Count Grey in England. I don't know any specific details about the family. She never contacted me during those years, never told me anything about her life there."

Daniel was quiet for a moment, his expression thoughtful in a way that suggested he was processing information I didn't have. "I didn't think much of it when I first heard your mother's married name," he said slowly. "Grey is common enough, after all. Hell, your fiancé's assistant is named Grey, right? Ethan Grey?"

"Yes," I confirmed, still not understanding why this mattered.

"But if we're talking about the British Greys—the titled family, the ones with the manor house and the old money—that's a different story entirely." Daniel's voice had dropped lower, more serious. "In detective circles, the Grey family has a... reputation."

Something cold settled in my stomach. "What kind of reputation?"

Daniel met my eyes, and I saw genuine concern in his expression. "The kind that makes investigators very nervous. Over the years, several detectives have tried to look into the Grey family—investigate various incidents, follow up on rumors, that sort of thing. And every single one of them has either backed off the case or..."

He paused. "Or they've met with accidents. Unfortunate circumstances. The kind of things that are technically explainable but feel wrong if you know what to look for."

"You're saying the Grey family is dangerous," I said, my voice coming out flat.

"I'm saying the Grey family is connected," Daniel corrected. "Powerful. The kind of people who can make problems disappear—and sometimes make the people investigating those problems disappear too. It's one of the biggest unsolved mysteries in the detective community. Nobody can prove anything, but everybody knows to stay away from cases involving the Greys."

I thought about my mother, fleeing England in such a hurry that she'd left with nothing. About whatever Rhys Grey had done to her that was bad enough to drive her away from security and comfort.

About the fact that she'd been so desperate, so broke, that she'd agreed to help destroy her own daughter's life for money.