The Woman in White Silk
Chapter 06 - The Woman in White Silk
Isabella recovered faster than most people would have.
That was one of the reasons I had respected her.
She lowered her champagne, laughed softly at something no one had said, and touched my sleeve with the intimacy of a woman confident the room belonged to her.
"The housekeeper's daughter," she murmured. "She ran past the music room earlier. I wanted to make sure she was all right."
"How thoughtful."
"Leon."
There was warning in my name.
Not fear yet.
Warning.
Gabriel watched us over the rim of his glass.
He enjoyed watching pressure change faces. I wondered how many years he had watched mine while teaching himself to become a better liar.
"Come with me," Isabella said.
She led me to the small library off the ballroom, where engagement gifts had been arranged on a long table. Silver frames. Crystal bowls. A set of antique candlesticks from a senator who owed my father too much to stay away.
The door clicked shut.
Isabella dropped the smile.
"What happened upstairs?"
"You tell me."
Her eyes flashed.
"If this is about Gabriel's security arrangement—"
"Security arrangement."
"He said someone was listening to you."
"So you planted a recorder."
She froze.
Only for half a second.
It was enough.
"You found it," she said.
Not a question.
"The child found it."
Her face changed in a way I had not expected.
Horror.
Real, immediate horror.
"Sophie?"
"You know her name."
"I know everyone in the house."
"Do you?"
She put one hand to her forehead.
"Leon, she shouldn't have been anywhere near that room."
"I agree."
"No." She grabbed my arm, then released it as if remembering who I was. "No, you don't understand. Gabriel said he had people inside the house who could plant it without risk. I told him not to use staff. I told him no children."
That was not innocence.
It was a different shape of guilt.
"Why would Gabriel need a recorder?"
Isabella looked toward the door.
"Because your wedding contract gives me ceremonial access but not legal access."
"To what?"
"The foundation accounts. The port holdings. The private investment names. The old ledger chain."
I felt the edges of the trap.
"After the wedding, the empire is ours," I said.
She closed her eyes.
"You heard that."
"Every word."
"Then you heard me call him darling?"
For the first time, her voice broke.
Not the elegant trembling she used at charity galas.
Something smaller. Angrier.
"He made me call him that."
I had heard many lies in my life.
This one did not yet have a shape I trusted.
"Made you?"
"Gabriel owns my brother's debt. My father's medical trial. My mother's house. He owns half the reasons I still breathe in silk instead of air."
"And your solution was to marry me and hand him my empire."
"No." She stepped closer. "My solution was to get close enough to find where he kept the original documents."
"Documents proving what?"
Her answer came quietly.
"That he killed your father."
The room narrowed.
Through the wall, I heard laughter from the ballroom. A woman's bright voice. Glassware. Life continuing because it had no idea the floor underneath it had opened.
"Careful," I said.
"I know what that sounds like."
"Do you?"
"I know you loved him."
"I loved my father. I did not mistake him for a saint."
Isabella's eyes filled, but no tears fell.
"Gabriel told everyone your father died because of rivals. But my father worked customs that year. He saw shipments redirected two nights before the ambush. He kept copies. Gabriel found out. That's why my family broke. That's why my father vanished into medication and silence."
"Why not come to me?"
"Would you have listened?"
I hated that the honest answer was uncertain.
The door opened before I could reply.
Gabriel stood there, smiling.
"Am I interrupting?"
Isabella went very still.
He looked from her to me.
"The guests are waiting for dessert."
I watched his hand rest on the doorframe.
The gold bird pin caught the light.
Behind him, Sophie should have been halfway across the city.
Safe.
Then my phone vibrated with an encrypted message from Marco.
NOT SAFE HOUSE. SOMEONE ARRIVED FIRST.
May you like
Attached was a photo of the brownstone door.
A cream wedding invitation had been pinned to it with a child's blue crayon.
