Chapter 3 - Inside the Sealed Room
The beam of Lena’s flashlight cut through the darkness of the room, revealing a space that defied every expectation.
It wasn't a dusty storage room filled with old furniture and forgotten boxes. It was a fully furnished living quarters—a bedroom and sitting area, complete with a made bed, a bookshelf lined with contemporary novels, a small writing desk with an open journal, and fresh bottles of mineral water on a bedside table.
Victor stepped across the threshold, his breath catching in his throat. The room didn't smell of dust and decay. It smelled of lavender soap, faint perfume, and human habitation.
"This... this is impossible," Lena murmured, shining the light around the room. "Someone has been living in here. Recently."
Victor walked slowly toward the writing desk. He reached out and touched the cover of the open leather journal. The pages were crisp. Resting on top of the journal was a silver pen and a photograph—a picture of Victor and Evelyn laughing on a beach in Santorini, dated just three months after her supposed death.
"Mother!" Victor roared, his voice cracking with a raw, terrifying intensity as he spun around to face the doorway.
Mrs. Ashcroft stood in the frame, her posture rigid, her face locked in a mask of cold defiance. She didn't try to run. She didn't even look surprised.
"You kept her here," Victor said, stepping toward her, his voice shaking with a rage so profound it felt like a physical weight. "You told me she died at the clinic. You held a funeral. You buried an empty casket. And you kept my wife locked in a room in our own home?!"
"I protected this family," Mrs. Ashcroft replied, her voice disturbingly calm. "Evelyn was unstable, Victor. After Theo was born, her mind fractured. She became a liability to the Ashcroft name, to the company, and to your political future. The clinic was a public scandal waiting to happen. Bringing her back here in secret was the only way to manage her condition without destroying everything we built."
Theo buried his face in Lena’s skirt, whimpering softly at the shouting. Lena knelt down, wrapping her arms around the boy to shield him from the ugly collision of family secrets.
May you like
"She wasn't unstable!" Victor shouted, grabbing the doorframe. "She loved our son! She loved me! You imprisoned her!"
"Ask her yourself," Mrs. Ashcroft said coldly, nodding toward the adjoining bathroom door, which stood slightly ajar, a thin ribbon of yellow light spilling out across the carpet.
