Chapter 7 - The Secret Beneath the Mansion
Arthur stood up from his wife's side, every muscle in his broad frame coiled with lethal tension.
He walked toward Julian Mercer, his heavy footsteps echoing deliberately across the splintered floorboards.
"Five months," Arthur said quietly, his voice dangerously low, more terrifying than any roar.
"For five months, I tore this country apart looking for the mother of my child," Arthur said, stopping three feet from Julian.
Julian pressed his back against the towering marble column, his breath coming in shallow, frantic wheezes.
"Arthur, please, she threatened me! Victoria had financial leverage on my firm, she forced my hand!" Julian lied desperately.
"Shut up, Julian!" Victoria shrieked from the floor, struggling to her feet in her wine-soaked crimson dress.
"You took five million dollars from my offshore trust to buy the pharmaceutical paralyzer, you coward!" she screamed at him.
The guests gasped again as the two conspirators turned on each other, tearing away every shred of plausible deniability.
Evelyn held tightly to Clara’s hand, her voice trembling as she laid bare the horror of her confinement.
"They wanted my signatures on the family irrevocable trust," Evelyn whispered, loud enough for every guest to hear.
"They couldn't access Arthur’s personal shares unless I relinquished my co-trustee rights upon a legal declaration of death," she continued.
"They kept me down there, feeding me just enough water and bread through the floor vent while the house was empty during the day," Evelyn wept.
"Victoria would come down at night, whispering through the floorboards that Arthur was falling in love with her," Clara’s mother sobbed.
Arthur’s fists clenched so hard his knuckles turned bone-white, the veins in his neck bulging against his starched white collar.
He looked down at the dark hatch opening, realizing that for months, he had eaten dinners directly above the woman he mourned.
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Every toast, every laughter, every romantic dinner he had shared with Victoria had taken place feet above Evelyn’s living grave.
The monstrous cruelty of it threatened to shatter his sanity, but his protective fury held him together like iron.
