Chapter 12 - The Voice of a Woman Buried Alive
The newest cassette began with silence.
Then came the sound of a chair scraping against stone.
A woman coughed.
Her breathing was slow and strained.
"October second."
I looked at Bennett.
The voice was elderly.
"Elena came again today."
The woman paused.
"She says Samuel has been moved."
My hands went cold.
"She says Grace will learn to cooperate."
A faint tapping sounded in the background.
The woman continued.
"I don't believe her anymore."
There was another pause.
"I haven't believed her in twenty-seven years."
Bennett leaned forward.
On the recording, the woman took a breath.
"My name is Isabella Rossi."
I stood so suddenly that my chair fell backward.
Bennett caught my arm.
"Sit down."
I barely heard her.
Isabella Rossi.
The woman my father had believed was dead.
The woman whose photograph I had found beside the old bed.
The woman who had supposedly disappeared decades before I was born.
She was alive.
Or she had been three weeks ago.
The recording continued.
"If Dante ever finds these tapes, tell him his father never stopped looking for Evelyn."
I stared at the machine.
Isabella's voice grew softer.
"Tell him Elena didn't begin with Grace."
She coughed.
"She began with me."
The tape clicked off.
For a long moment, no one spoke.
Then Bennett said what neither of us wanted to admit.
"If Isabella is alive, we may be looking at unlawful confinement spanning decades."
I stared at the desk.
"Why would my mother keep her here?"
"Control."
"Over what?"
"Perhaps money."
I shook my head.
"No."
Bennett watched me.
"Why not?"
"Because Elena had plenty of money."
I looked at the blue flowers.
"She needed something else."
The detective waited.
"My father."
I thought of how my mother watched him during family dinners.
How she corrected his stories when they mentioned the years before their marriage.
How she became furious whenever I asked about his first business ventures.
I'd believed those reactions were ordinary jealousy.
Now I wondered whether they were fear.
Bennett called for additional search teams.
We examined every corner of the room.
The books had been read recently.
A glass held dried water stains.
Beneath the bed lay a folded blanket.
Someone had lived here.
But there was no prisoner now.
On the back wall, a rectangular section of stone looked newer than the surrounding masonry.
A technician ran a scanner over it.
"There's a hollow space."
My pulse quickened.
They removed part of the wall.
Behind it was a narrow service passage.
At its end, a staircase led toward the oldest foundations of the estate.
We followed it down.
The air became colder.
A generator hummed somewhere nearby.
Then we reached another door.
Unlike the others, this one was unlocked.
Bennett opened it.
Inside was a chair.
A small table.
A radio.
And a stack of photographs.
I crossed the room.
Every photograph showed my family.
My childhood.
My school graduation.
My first business deal.
My wedding.
Grace smiling beside me.
Someone had collected them for years.
On the table lay a picture taken only days earlier.
Grace was visible inside the hidden cell.
Samuel stood beside her.
And in the foreground, a woman's hand rested against the glass.
A pale scar crossed the wrist.
I picked up the photograph.
I remembered that scar.
My mother had one just like it.
She claimed she'd received it as a child.
I turned the picture over.
Three words were written on the back.
She came back.
Bennett examined the image.
"Who?"
I looked around the room.
Then I understood something.
The underground chambers were not merely prisons.
They were places where Elena visited people she wanted to control.
She watched them.
Questioned them.
Made them believe their survival depended entirely on her.
But someone had also been watching Elena.
And that person had collected proof.
A movement sounded beyond the door.
Bennett drew her weapon.
"Police."
No answer.
We followed the sound into another passage.
At the far end, a maintenance elevator stood with its doors open.
A wheelchair sat nearby.
The seat was still warm.
Someone had left moments before.
Bennett called for the search team.
Then my phone vibrated.
An incoming video call.
Unknown number.
I answered.
For a second, the screen remained black.
Then a woman's face appeared.
She was elderly, with silver hair, pale skin, and deep-set green eyes.
She looked exhausted.
But the shape of her smile was familiar.
I had seen it in the photograph of Isabella.
"Dante?"
I couldn't speak.
She smiled faintly.
"You look so much like your father."
"Isabella?"
"Yes."
I gripped the phone.
"Where are you?"
Her expression changed.
"There's no time."
"Tell me where you are."
"Elena knows I escaped."
I looked at Bennett.
She was already signaling her officers.
Isabella leaned closer to the camera.
"Listen carefully."
"I'm listening."
"The woman you call your mother has lied about many things."
"I know."
"No."
Her voice broke.
"You don't understand."
A door slammed somewhere behind her.
Isabella flinched.
"Dante, you need to ask Elena what happened the night you were born."
My breath caught.
"What?"
Tears filled her eyes.
May you like
"Because the truth about your birth is the reason she has destroyed everyone who loved you."
The screen went black.
