Chapter 9 The Music Box
Emma barely slept.
Noah's sleepy words echoed through her mind.
"The music box only sings when both princesses come home."
It sounded like something a grandfather would tell a child.
A fairy tale.
A bedtime story.
Except Frank Brooks had never wasted words.
If he had hidden clues for Daniel...
If he had hidden keys for Emma and Lily...
Then a music box was probably not just a music box.
By sunrise, Emma had made her decision.
She wasn't waiting any longer.
She was going back to the old family house.
The Brooks farmhouse sat nearly forty miles outside the city.
After Frank's death, neither Emma nor Lily had found the strength to sell it.
Everything inside remained exactly as he had left it.
The worn rocking chair on the porch.
The blue mailbox Frank repainted every spring.
The oak tree where Emma and Lily had hung a tire swing as children.
Emma parked in the gravel driveway.
Daniel arrived two minutes later in a separate car.
Neither spoke.
Mason followed behind them.
The morning air carried the scent of wet earth and pine.
Emma unlocked the front door.
It creaked open with the same familiar sound she had heard since childhood.
The house felt frozen in time.
Inside, dust floated through narrow beams of sunlight.
Family photographs still lined the hallway.
Emma stopped at one in particular.
It showed Frank standing between his daughters at a county fair.
Emma was sixteen.
Lily was ten.
Frank had one arm around each of them.
All three were laughing.
Daniel quietly joined her.
"He loved this day."
Emma didn't look at him.
"You remember?"
"He told me about it."
She turned sharply.
"When?"
"The first time I asked if I could marry you."
Emma blinked.
"He showed me that photograph."
Daniel smiled faintly.
"He said..."
His voice softened.
"...'If you ever make either of my girls cry, you'll answer to me—even if I'm gone.'"
Emma looked back at the picture.
A lump formed in her throat.
Her father had trusted Daniel once.
Completely.
Mason interrupted gently.
"Let's find the music box."
The three of them searched room by room.
The attic.
The study.
Frank's bedroom.
Nothing.
Emma finally entered the old living room.
Everything looked exactly as she remembered.
The stone fireplace.
The grandfather clock.
The upright piano.
And on the mantel...
A small wooden music box carved with roses.
Emma froze.
"There."
She picked it up carefully.
The brass lock on the front had no keyhole.
Instead...
There were two narrow slots.
Side by side.
Exactly the size of the silver keys.
Daniel slowly exhaled.
"So this is what Frank was protecting."
Emma looked at him.
"Or hiding."
She removed her key from her purse.
The silver key marked E slid perfectly into the left slot.
Nothing happened.
Daniel handed her Lily's key.
The L key fit into the right slot.
Still nothing.
Mason examined the engraved arrows.
"Remember?"
"They turn opposite directions."
Emma nodded.
"But I can't."
Daniel looked at her.
"It takes two hands."
She hesitated.
Finally...
She passed him Lily's key.
For one brief moment, their fingers touched.
Both instinctively pulled away.
Mason stepped back.
"Ready?"
Emma nodded once.
Together...
They turned the keys.
One clockwise.
One counterclockwise.
A soft click echoed through the room.
Then...
Music.
A gentle lullaby filled the house.
The same lullaby Frank used to hum while putting his daughters to bed.
Emma felt tears sting her eyes.
The melody played for exactly twelve seconds.
Then stopped.
Another click sounded.
The bottom of the music box slowly slid open.
Hidden beneath the mechanism was a folded piece of paper.
And...
A tiny brass key.
Emma unfolded the paper.
It contained only one sentence.
"The truth waits where your mother first taught you to dance."
Silence filled the room.
Mason frowned.
"What does that mean?"
Emma didn't answer immediately.
Instead...
She looked toward the piano.
"My mother."
She whispered.
"She taught us to dance right here."
Daniel looked around.
"There has to be more."
Emma walked toward the piano.
It hadn't been moved in decades.
She pressed one key.
Out of tune.
Another.
The same.
Then she noticed faint scratches on the hardwood floor beneath it.
"Mason."
He crouched beside her.
"The piano has been moved before."
Daniel immediately stepped forward.
The three of them pushed together.
The heavy instrument slowly slid away from the wall.
Underneath...
A square wooden panel.
Perfectly hidden within the floorboards.
Emma stared.
"My God..."
There was a tiny brass lock.
Exactly the size of the new key from the music box.
Emma inserted it.
The lock turned easily.
The wooden panel lifted.
Inside rested a small metal box wrapped in waterproof canvas.
Emma carefully carried it to the dining table.
Her hands trembled.
"What if this is it?"
Daniel quietly replied,
"I think it is."
She opened the box.
Inside were five items.
A cassette tape labeled:
Frank Brooks – Final Truth
A stack of legal documents.
Several photographs.
A flash drive.
And...
A sealed envelope addressed in Frank's handwriting.
To My Daughters. Open Together.
Emma's vision blurred.
Together.
Even now...
Their father was asking them to stand side by side.
Before anyone could speak—
A loud crash shattered the front window.
Glass exploded across the living room floor.
Everyone instinctively ducked.
A masked man stepped through the broken window.
Then another.
Then a third.
One shouted,
"Take the box!"
Daniel shoved Emma behind the piano.
"Mason!"
The investigator drew his pistol.
"Police!"
The first intruder fired.
The deafening gunshot echoed through the farmhouse.
A lamp shattered beside Mason's head.
Daniel tackled one of the masked men to the floor.
Emma clutched the metal box against her chest.
"No!"
Another attacker lunged toward her.
She stumbled backward.
The box slipped from her hands.
The cassette tape slid across the hardwood floor.
The sealed envelope scattered beneath the dining table.
The flash drive disappeared beneath the couch.
The legal documents flew into the air like autumn leaves.
Chaos erupted.
One of the masked men grabbed the cassette tape.
Another reached for the envelope.
Then—
Police sirens wailed in the distance.
The attackers froze.
One shouted,
"Leave it!"
Within seconds they fled through the broken window.
The farmhouse fell silent again.
Emma looked around desperately.
The metal box remained.
The photographs were still there.
The legal documents too.
But two things were gone.
The cassette tape.
And Frank's letter.
Daniel slowly stood, breathing hard.
Blood trickled from a cut above his eyebrow.
Emma stared at the empty space inside the box.
For months...
Perhaps years...
Everything had revolved around one recording.
And now...
It had been stolen right in front of them.
Mason picked up one remaining photograph from the floor.
His expression suddenly changed.
"Emma..."
She looked up.
He turned the photograph toward her.
It showed Frank.
Arthur Holloway.
Margaret Carter.
And the same unknown woman from before.
But this time...
May you like
On the back of the photograph, someone had written four words in blue ink.
"She was never dead."
