Chapter 63 The Source
Brittany’s POV
The silence in the sitting room felt like a physical weight pressing against my chest. I didn't blink. I didn't even breathe. I kept my face as still as a frozen pond, refusing to give Chloe the satisfaction of seeing me break. My mind was a blur of faces and conversations, racing through every person who had crossed the threshold of this manor since the war began.
"Tell me the name," I said. My voice was flat, devoid of any emotion.
Chloe leaned forward, her eyes darting toward David at the door before she whispered it. The name hit me with the force of a silent explosion. It wasn't Rosa. It wasn't Marcus. It wasn't any of the security staff or the kitchen workers we had been watching with such suspicion.
It was someone who had arrived more recently. Someone whose loyalty I had never questioned because the circumstances of their arrival seemed to make their allegiance self-evident. They had been in the studio. They had watched me pin the lace samples. They had sat in on the planning conversations of the past two weeks, nodding in agreement as we mapped out the gala.
I sat with the name for three controlled seconds. One. Two. Three. I could feel the blood cooling in my veins, replaced by a sharp, icy focus. Everything made sense now. The targeted cuts in the security feed. The way the document case had been moved but not stolen. The intruder hadn't been an outsider; it was someone who knew exactly where the lines were drawn.
I stood up slowly, smoothing the fabric of my dress. I turned toward the door where David was waiting. "David," I said, my voice steady. "Can you give us a moment?"
David’s brow furrowed. He looked at me, then at Chloe, searching for a sign of what had just been revealed. He read something in my expression, a hardness he hadn't seen before, and he didn't argue. He gave a sharp nod and stepped out into the hallway, closing the heavy oak door behind him.
I looked at Chloe. She looked like she was waiting for me to scream or cry. I did neither.
"How certain is Richard's information?" I asked. "Did he show you proof, or is he just playing one last game with your head?"
"He didn't need to show me proof, Brittany," Chloe said, her voice shaking as she rubbed her eyes. "He was celebrating. He was drinking that expensive scotch he saved for when he’s won. He told me that you were a fool for thinking you could hide anything in this house. He said he had a set of eyes that you would never suspect because you think you’re so good at reading people."
"That’s not certainty, Chloe. That’s a boast."
"He paid me twenty thousand dollars to leave town today," she said, pulling a thick envelope from her coat and tossing it onto the table. "He threw it at me like I was trash. He said he didn't need me to watch you anymore because his new source is already in the room. He's not worried about me contradicting the name because he thinks it’s already too late for you to do anything about it."
I looked at the money. It was a lot of cash for a man who usually counted every penny. Richard was buying her silence because he was confident the trap was already set.
"If you're lying to me," I said, my voice dropping an octave. "If this is a move to get me to turn on my own people right before the gala, I will find you."
"I’m not lying," Chloe whispered, her eyes filling with fresh tears. "I’m terrified, Brittany. I want out. I just want to go back to my mother’s house and pretend I never met a Blackwell. Please, just let me go."
I didn't answer her. I walked to the door and opened it. David was standing there, his hand already on his phone.
"Where are you going?" he asked, sensing the shift in the air.
"To the studio," I said. "Keep her here. Don't let her near a phone or a window."
I didn't wait for his response. I walked down the long, echoing corridors of the manor, my heels clicking like a countdown on the marble floor. My heart was a steady drum. I reached the studio door and pulled the heavy brass key from my pocket. My hand didn't shake. I turned the lock and stepped inside, clicking the lights on.
The room looked exactly as I had left it. The mannequin was draped in the midnight silk. The sketches were spread across the desk. The mood board stood in the corner, a chaotic map of my mother’s soul and my own ambition.
I walked over to the board. I didn't look at the images at first. I looked at the pins.
I had a habit, a small OCD ritual I had developed over years of working in small spaces. Every pin on my board was pushed in at a forty-five-degree angle, leaning toward the center. It was a visual grid I could read without thinking.
I leaned in closer, my breath hitching. The mood board had been photographed. I could see the tiny, microscopic tears in the paper where the pins had been pulled out and shoved back in. The marks on the pins were wrong. They were straight now, pushed in by someone who looked closely and tried to replace everything exactly. They were careful, but they weren't me. They had missed by three millimeters on four separate pieces.
Brittany walks to the studio, unlocks it, steps inside, and finds exactly what she expected to find. The mood board has been photographed. The marks on the pins are wrong, repositioned by someone who looked closely and tried to replace everything exactly, and missed by three millimeters on four separate pieces.