Chapter 5 - THE SHADOW ON THE STAIRCASE
The realization hit the attic like a physical blow. The storm outside raged, a crack of thunder masking the sudden, terrifying silence that fell over us.
“Get behind me,” Gabriel ordered, his voice barely a whisper. He drew a matte-black pistol from his shoulder holster, his eyes sweeping the dark corners of the attic.
I grabbed Lily’s hand, pulling her and Sofia behind the heavy cedar wardrobe. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird.
“How could she be here?” I whispered frantically. “Your guard said she was taken on the highway.”
“The guard lied,” Gabriel said coldly.
He didn't turn around. He just raised his weapon and aimed it directly at the chest of the bleeding security man still leaning against the attic doorframe.
The guard’s expression shifted. The pained, breathless grimace vanished, replaced by a cold, calculating sneer. He stopped clutching his bleeding ribs, standing up perfectly straight.
“You always were too sharp, Gabriel,” the guard said, reaching behind his back.
He didn't pull a gun. He pulled a heavy steel radio. He pressed the button. “He knows. Take the house.”
Before the guard could drop the radio, Gabriel fired.
The suppressed gunshot was a sharp, biting thwip. The guard fell backward into the hallway, hitting the hardwood floor with a heavy thud.
Lily buried her face in my hip, muffling a scream. Sofia stood perfectly still, her small face pale, her hands covering her ears. She was a child of this world, but the reality of it was finally breaking down her door.
“We have to move,” Gabriel said, grabbing my arm and pulling us toward the door. “My men downstairs are either dead or they’ve turned. The old boss has bought my crew.”
“Where do we go?” I asked, panic making me clumsy as I hurried the girls over the fallen guard.
“The sewing room,” Sofia said suddenly, pointing down the dark, spiraling staircase. “Madeline locked it yesterday, but she didn’t know Mom showed me the secret door behind the bookshelf.”
Gabriel looked down at his nine-year-old daughter. In that moment, she didn't look like Madeline. She had Elena’s fierce, unwavering eyes.
“Lead the way, piccola,” Gabriel said.
We descended the back servants' stairs, moving in total darkness. The power in the mansion suddenly cut out, leaving only the strobe-light flashes of lightning through the tall windows. Below us, I could hear heavy boots kicking open doors on the second floor, men shouting orders in the dark.
Sofia led us into the east wing hallway, crawling on her hands and knees beneath the large bay windows so the lightning wouldn't cast our shadows. She stopped in front of a massive, floor-to-ceiling mahogany bookshelf at the end of the hall.
She reached behind a thick leather-bound encyclopedia and pulled a hidden lever.
The entire bookshelf silently swung inward, revealing the dark, quiet sanctuary of Elena’s sewing room. We slipped inside, and Gabriel pulled the bookshelf shut, locking it from the inside.
The room smelled faintly of machine oil and the vanilla perfume Elena used to wear. Moonlight spilled through the skylight, illuminating the dress forms, the spools of thread, and the large cutting table in the center of the room.
Gabriel immediately went to the door that connected to the main hallway, shoving a heavy oak dresser in front of it to barricade us in.
“We’re trapped,” I whispered, holding Lily tightly against my chest. “They’re going to search every room.”
“There is a panic tunnel beneath this wing,” Gabriel said, holstering his weapon and moving toward the cutting table. “It leads out to the cliffs. But the access code is tied to Elena’s personal safe.”
He pointed to a digital keypad set into the wall behind a framed mirror.
“I don’t know the code,” Gabriel admitted, his voice tight with frustration. “She changed it a week before she died. After Madeline started staying here.”
I stepped closer to the keypad. It was a six-digit lock.
“She brought me her dresses that week,” I murmured, my mind racing back to the last time I saw Elena. “She brought me Sofia’s school uniforms, and the winter coat… and she paid for three dresses in advance.”
I looked at Sofia. “Sofia, do you remember the dresses your mom brought me? The ones she paid for in advance?”
Sofia nodded slowly. “Yes. They were for my tenth birthday, my middle school graduation, and my sweet sixteen.”
“She knew she wasn't going to live to see those days,” I said, tears pricking my eyes. “She was planning for your future. Gabriel, look at the cutting table.”
Resting on the center of the table, untouched since the day Elena died, was a small silver thimble.
But it wasn't just sitting there. It was placed deliberately over a piece of paper, pinning it to the cutting mat.
Gabriel walked over and lifted the thimble.
Underneath was a sketch of a wedding dress. It was the exact dress Madeline had stolen the lace from. But in the margins, Elena had written a sequence of measurements in her neat handwriting.
Bust: 34. Waist: 26. Hem: 42.
“Those aren't dress measurements,” I said, staring at the paper. “A waist of 26 doesn’t match a hem of 42. It’s a code.”
Gabriel walked to the keypad and typed the numbers. 3-4-2-6-4-2.
A green light flashed, and the heavy steel panel hissed open.
Inside the safe wasn't a tunnel entrance.
It was a stack of cash, a pair of passports, and a small, velvet-lined box.
Gabriel opened the box. Inside was a single, old-fashioned brass train ticket, stamped with the logo of the Midnight Express—a private, untraceable rail line that ran across the border.
And resting beneath the ticket was a handwritten note from Elena.
Gabriel read it, his face crumbling. He handed it to me.
“Gabriel. If you are reading this, Madeline won. Take Sofia. Use the ticket. Don’t trust the men outside, and whatever you do, don't look in the basement.”
A heavy, violent pounding suddenly echoed on the barricaded hallway door.
“Gabriel!” Madeline’s voice screamed from the other side of the wood, sharp and hysterical. “Open the door! I know you’re in there!”
Gabriel raised his gun, aiming at the door.
“Gabriel, listen to me!” Madeline shouted, pounding her fists against the wood. “The old boss didn't hire me! I’m not working with him! He’s in the basement, and he has something you need to see right now!”
Gabriel froze.
“What is she talking about?” I whispered.
May you like
Before he could answer, the bookshelf behind us—the secret door Sofia had opened—suddenly clicked. The gears groaned, and the heavy mahogany shelves began to swing outward into the dark hallway.
Someone had opened it from the outside.
