Chapter 3
The Secret Map Behind The Canvas
I pulled out my phone, opening the urgent text message sent by my corporate attorney, Marcus Croft, just moments before the guards arrived.
The message contained a scanned architectural floor plan of Vancewood Estate dated nineteen ninety-four, marked with a bold red hand-drawn circle.
The circle was located beneath the north library—a subterranean basement level that didn't appear on any official tax records or county building permits.
“The key opens a door hidden behind the portrait of your great-grandfather in the lower library,” I revealed, showing her the digital schematic.
Clara stared at the screen, her dark eyes filling with a mixture of intense fear and long-buried childhood memories.
“That’s where he took me when I was twelve,” she murmured, touching the thick, faded scars running along her pale wrist.
“He told the media I was sent to a private psychiatric clinic in Switzerland, but I was in that dark room for nine months.”
“Why?” I asked, kneeling before her and looking straight into her eyes. “What did you see in that room, Clara?”
May you like
“I saw my mother’s real death certificate,” she whispered, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly cold tone.
“And the original land deeds proving Arthur Vance doesn't own a single acre of the Vancewood fortune.”
