Chapter 2 - The Photograph Behind the Pantry Wall
Maeve did not go with them immediately.
That surprised all three brothers.
Roman had expected questions.
Declan had expected shouting.
Gabriel had expected desperation.
Maeve took the skillet to the sink.
Roman stared.
“What are you doing?”
“Cleaning.”
“This can wait.”
“My shift cannot.”
Declan frowned.
“Your dead mother is in a photograph with ours.”
“I noticed.”
“And you’re washing a pan?”
Maeve turned.
“Some of us don’t get paid for emotional revelations.”
The words landed.
Roman looked toward the service clock.
7:36 a.m.
Her shift had started ninety-six minutes earlier.
He said, “You’re on the clock.”
“I know.”
“I mean this conversation is work.”
Maeve stared at him.
Gabriel whispered, “That may be the first normal employment sentence ever spoken in this house.”
Declan glared.
Roman ignored both of them.
“You will be paid.”
Maeve set the pan down.
“Fine.”
They moved to the library.
The same oak desk where Roman had offered her fifty thousand dollars the night before now held the old photographs.
Maeve noticed the irony.
She also noticed the drawer remained closed.
Good.
Roman called an attorney named Helena Price and requested every record connected to Sofia Falcone’s private trust.
Gabriel searched the family archives.
Declan paced.
Maeve sat near the door.
Not because she was afraid of the brothers.
Because she wanted the exit in sight.
Roman noticed.
He said nothing.
Gabriel found the first surprise at 8:14.
“Kathleen’s name was removed from staff files.”
Maeve looked up.
“You said she wasn’t staff.”
“She was listed as household companion and kitchen supervisor for tax purposes.”
“Companion?”
“Our mother refused the word maid for people she trusted.”
Maeve looked toward the door.
“Maybe your mother was smarter than her sons.”
Declan almost smiled.
Roman did not disagree.
Gabriel continued.
“The record ends on October 3, fourteen years ago.”
Roman’s face changed.
“The day Mother died.”
“Yes.”
“Cause?”
The room went quiet.
Maeve looked between them.
“What happened to her?”
Roman answered.
“Officially, cardiac arrest.”
Declan said, “Unofficially, poison.”
Maeve’s throat tightened.
“What kind?”
“No one proved it.”
“Then why blame my mother?”
Gabriel turned the laptop.
A typed statement appeared.
KATHLEEN DONNELLY WAS LAST PERSON TO PREPARE SOFIA FALCONE’S EVENING TEA.
Maeve read it twice.
“Who wrote this?”
“Our father’s investigator.”
“What else?”
Gabriel scrolled.
KATHLEEN LEFT PROPERTY WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION AT 9:42 P.M.
Maeve shook her head.
“She came home that night.”
“You remember?”
“I was ten.”
Her voice softened.
“She woke me up. She was crying.”
Roman leaned forward.
“What did she say?”
Maeve closed her eyes.
Memory came in fragments.
Her mother’s cold hands.
Rain on a coat.
A kitchen light left on at midnight.
“She said we were leaving our apartment.”
“Why?”
“She said somebody had made a terrible mistake.”
Declan stopped pacing.
“Where did you go?”
“A motel near Providence for two weeks. Then we moved to Worcester.”
Roman’s eyes darkened.
“Someone frightened her.”
“Yes.”
“Did she ever use Sofia’s name?”
“No.”
Maeve thought harder.
“She called someone Fi.”
Gabriel looked up sharply.
“Sofia.”
Maybe.
The nickname could fit.
Helena Price called back.
The trust existed.
That was the good news.
The bad news was everything else.
Sofia Falcone had created a private support trust for Kathleen Donnelly and any dependent children.
Medical care.
Education.
Housing emergencies.
It had been funded with two million dollars.
Maeve went still.
“Two million?”
Roman nodded slowly.
“Where is it?”
Helena answered through speakerphone.
“Closed.”
“When?”
“Eight years ago.”
Maeve’s mother had died seven years ago.
Gabriel said, “Who closed it?”
A pause.
“Vittorio Falcone.”
Roman’s uncle.
Their father’s younger brother.
Declan swore.
Roman’s expression did not move.
“What authority?”
“He was appointed successor trustee after Sofia’s death.”
Maeve leaned toward the phone.
“Who received the money?”
Helena hesitated.
“Not Kathleen.”
“Then who?”
“A charitable medical entity called Saint Alder Patient Relief.”
Maeve froze.
Her sister’s dialysis clinic was Saint Alder Renal Center.
Roman saw her face.
“What?”
Maeve whispered, “That’s where Erin gets treatment.”
Now everyone was standing.
The trust had not vanished.
It had been moved.
Into the same medical network now sending Maeve’s sister bills she could not pay.
Gabriel opened another database.
Within ten minutes, he found Vittorio Falcone listed on the board of Saint Alder Patient Relief.
Declan punched the edge of the desk.
Roman said, “Stop.”
Declan glared.
“You think this is coincidence?”
“No.”
Roman looked at Maeve.
“I think somebody took money intended for your family and built a charity around it.”
Maeve felt nauseated.
She had scrubbed hotel bathrooms.
Worked overnight cleaning.
Skipped meals.
Walked two miles in freezing rain because she was thirty dollars short on bus fare.
Her sister had cried over medical bills.
All while a fund bearing the Falcone name had once held enough money to change everything.
She stood.
“I want to go home.”
Roman looked surprised.
“Maeve—”
“I need to see Erin.”
“We can take you.”
“No.”
“Someone may have known who you were before you came here.”
That stopped her.
“Mrs. Hess.”
All three brothers looked at her.
Maeve continued.
“She hired me through the agency.”
Roman frowned.
“She hires all domestic staff.”
“She said I was a day late.”
Gabriel looked up.
“What?”
“I wasn’t. The agency called me yesterday morning.”
Roman’s expression sharpened.
“Mrs. Hess knew your name before you arrived.”
Maeve remembered the woman’s bloodshot eyes.
The frantic briefcase.
The warning.
Forty-eight hours, Maeve.
If you last that long, I’ll wire you the month’s bonus myself.
Roman stood.
“Find Hess.”
Gabriel was already dialing.
No answer.
Then Declan called from the pantry.
“Roman.”
They followed him.
Declan stood beside the old biscuit tin.
Behind it, the wood panel was slightly separated from the wall.
Maeve touched it.
The panel moved.
Inside was a narrow cavity.
Empty.
Except for one fresh fingerprint in flour dust.
Someone had opened it recently.
May you like
And Maeve suddenly understood breakfast had not simply revealed a family secret.
It had told someone inside Falcone Manor that Kathleen Donnelly’s daughter had arrived.
