Chapter 151 Chapter 151
Dominic’s POV
The house smells like dust and memory, That’s the first thing that hits me when I unlock the door.
It’s been years since I’ve stepped into my father’s old study, the one room my mother never changed, the one room I never wanted to.
The curtains are still drawn, the air still faintly laced with cigar smoke and sandalwood polish. His presence lingers here, even though he’s been gone nearly a decade. I tell myself I came to look for records.
That’s what I told Camilla, what I told Stanley before leaving Zurich but the truth is messier. I came here because I need answers and the only man who might have left them for me is the one who spent his life pretending he didn’t have any.
The storm outside hisses against the windows as I cross to the heavy mahogany desk. Everything’s still in its place, his fountain pens, his silver letter opener, the framed photograph of him shaking hands with some politician I barely remember.
I slide open the top drawer. Files. Receipts. Old correspondence. The kind of paper trail that looks clean until you know what to look for.
My father was meticulous, everything labeled, everything dated. Except the bottom drawer. The one he always kept locked.
I kneel, running my fingers along the edge. The lock is old — mechanical, not digital. Easy. I pull a small tension wrench from my bag, slip it in, and after a few quiet clicks, it gives.
Inside are two things. A small velvet box and a stack of hard drives, wrapped in black cloth.
The velvet box holds nothing but a signet ring, my father’s family crest, the same one he wore every day. I set it aside and focus on the drives.
There are four. No labels. Each identical. I pull my laptop from my bag, connect the first one, and wait. It whirs to life, a single folder appearing: “Memorandum.”
Inside, rows of encrypted files. No extension, no readable data. AES-256 encryption, heavy-grade. The kind my father used when he didn’t trust the government, or anyone else.
Inside are financial ledgers. Transactions spanning over twenty years, offshore accounts, company transfers, names I recognize: Z-Core Holdings, Carden & Vale, Voss Consortium.
Stanley’s name appears more than once. At first, the entries are clean and standard corporate cross-payments. But then the trail darkens: amounts wired to unregistered entities, time-stamped during the months after Elia’s disappearance.
Trust: Elia, Transfer authorized.
My stomach tightens.
The second drive takes longer to decrypt. The password hint reads: Nightfall. It opens to a folder titled “June 12.”
The date hits me like a physical blow. June 12, the night Elia vanished. Inside are video files. My throat goes dry. I double-click the first one.
The footage is grainy, timestamped 23:14, security-cam quality. The angle is wide, a corner shot from what looks like a private dock. The water shimmers under dim floodlights and then movement.
A woman steps into frame. Dark hair. Light coat. She’s looking around nervously, glancing toward the shadows off-screen. Elia. Even through the static, there’s no mistaking her.
My heart begins to pound, loud enough to drown out the rain outside. I lean closer as another figure emerges from the darkness. Broad shoulders. Tailored overcoat.
For a moment, I hope it’s Dominic but It isn’t. The man steps fully into the light, and I freeze. Stanley.
He approaches her, Elia says something…, the audio’s muted, but her body language is frantic, pleading. She grabs his sleeve. He pulls away.
Stanley’s face remains composed, even as she gestures wildly toward the water. He takes a step closer, says something sharp, and she flinches.
Then he does something I can’t explain. He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out what looks like a small syringe.
Elia backs away, shaking her head. He lunges forward. There’s a struggle, blurred movement, limbs colliding and then she collapses.
He catches her before she hits the ground. Lifts her into his arms. Carries her out of frame. The footage ends.
I sit there, staring at the blank screen, my hands numb on the keyboard. The seconds tick by, but my brain refuses to move with them.
He was there. He was with her. He lied to everyone including Dominic, the police, me.
I open the next file. Different camera angle. Same night. This time from what looks like inside a car. A reflection in the windshield it was Stanley again, driving. Elia slumped in the backseat. Unconscious.
The timestamp reads 23:39. The route lights pass in streaks, then the car turns sharply into what looks like a service road. He parks near an abandoned boathouse, gets out, and disappears from the camera’s view.
The footage cuts. I scroll to the next clip. Inside the boathouse and faint light, static interference. Elia on a cot now, pale, motionless. Stanley kneeling beside her, checking her pulse. He says something to someone off-camera.
A third figure steps forward, a man I don’t recognize, face half-obscured by shadow. Stanley hands him an envelope. The man nods once and injects something into Elia’s arm.
Her body jerks. Then stills again. Stanley exhales and looks directly toward the camera, as if he knows he’s being recorded.
I stop the footage. My reflection stares back from the black screen, for a long time, I don’t move. My thoughts scatter, colliding with the sound of rain hammering the glass
Stanley didn’t just lie. He orchestrated everything. Dominic’s arrest. The plea. The disappearance. The trust. All of it and he’s been standing beside me this entire time smiling, planning, watching me unravel pieces of his own design.
I grab the third drive with shaking hands. If the second one shows her disappearance, the third might show what came after.
The password hint reads: Seraphine. My breath catches. Seraphine, the alias from the Elia Trust documents.
It takes three tries before it decrypts. Inside, flight manifests, medical records, new identity paperwork. Elia’s name crossed out. Replaced by Seraphine Smith.
Stanley didn’t kill her. He took her and Rebuilt her life under his control.
The implications twist through me like barbed wire. If Elia became Seraphine, then the “other wife” Julian mentioned, the woman who came after wasn’t someone new. It was her.
I push back from the desk, heart pounding so hard I can barely breathe. Every word, every calculated kindness, every moment of Stanley’s cold patience flashes through my mind like a reel of deceit.
He’s been hiding her in plain sight and I married into her prison. Lightning flashes outside, followed by a long roll of thunder. I stand, pacing the study, my hands trembling. The drives are still on the desk, blinking faintly — a rhythm that feels almost alive.
I need to get them out to Dominic, to anyone who can see what I’ve just seen but even as I reach for them, my phone vibrates.
STANLEY SMITH….Incoming Call. I stare at the screen, the name pulsing like a warning. My throat tightens. I don’t answer. It rings again. Then stops. A moment later, a text appears.
You shouldn’t be in that house, Liana.