Chapter 20 - THE ENVELOPE WITHOUT A SEAL
Daniel opened the door.
No one was there.
Only a black envelope rested on the floor.
Helena immediately stopped smiling.
Daniel picked it up.
“Royal?”
“No.”
“How can you tell?”
“There’s no seal.”
He carried it inside.
Helena locked the door.
The envelope contained one photograph.
It had been taken years earlier.
King Frederick stood on the terrace of Arden Palace.
Beside him was Prince Leopold.
Matthias Keller.
And one other person.
A much younger Evelyn Hawthorne.
Daniel stared at the picture.
“That’s impossible.”
Helena took it.
Her face went cold.
The photograph was dated twenty-seven years earlier.
Long before Daniel met Helena.
Long before Hawthorne Defense entered Varenne.
Long before the sixty-eight-million-dollar debt.
“What was my mother doing with your father?”
Daniel whispered.
Helena turned the photograph over.
A sentence had been written on the back.
ASK CHARLES WHAT HAPPENED IN 1999.
Daniel immediately called his father.
No answer.
He called again.
Nothing.
Helena contacted Adrian.
He answered on the second ring.
“Please tell me you are asleep.”
“No.”
She sent him the photograph.
Silence.
Then Adrian whispered.
“Where did you get this?”
“Outside our door.”
“I’ve never seen it.”
“Neither have I.”
Daniel called Sophie.
She answered immediately.
“Dad is gone.”
Daniel froze.
“What do you mean gone?”
“I came downstairs ten minutes ago.”
“His car is here.”
“His coat is here.”
“But he’s not in the house.”
Helena looked at Daniel.
Sophie continued.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“Someone broke into Grandfather’s old study.”
Daniel’s heart began pounding.
“Was anything taken?”
“I don’t know.”
A pause.
“Wait.”
Sophie moved through the room.
Daniel could hear drawers opening.
Then she stopped breathing.
“Sophie?”
Her voice became a whisper.
“There was a safe behind Grandfather’s portrait.”
Daniel remembered the portrait.
The same one that had watched generations of Hawthornes control the company.
“It’s open.”
“What’s inside?”
“Nothing.”
Then Sophie noticed something on the floor.
A torn piece of paper.
She picked it up.
Only one complete sentence remained.
Daniel heard her read it.
THE CHILD MUST NEVER LEARN WHY FREDERICK PAID CHARLES HAWTHORNE.
Daniel stopped breathing.
Helena stared at him.
“My father paid your father?”
Daniel whispered.
“For what?”
Before Helena could answer, someone knocked on the apartment door.
Three slow knocks.
Daniel moved toward it.
Helena grabbed his arm.
“Wait.”
The knocking came again.
Daniel looked through the peephole.
His face changed.
“Who is it?”
Helena asked.
Daniel unlocked the door.
Charles Hawthorne stood in the hallway.
His shirt was torn.
Blood darkened one sleeve.
His face looked terrified.
“Dad?”
Charles stumbled inside.
Daniel caught him.
“What happened?”
Charles looked past his son.
His eyes found Helena.
For almost thirty years, he had carried a secret.
Now fear had finally broken whatever promise had kept him silent.
“Your father did not meet Evelyn in 1999 by accident.”
Helena went still.
Charles reached into his jacket.
He removed a small silver medallion bearing the royal crest of Varenne.
Helena recognized it immediately.
It had belonged to her father.
“Where did you get that?”
Charles closed his hand around it.
“King Frederick gave it to me.”
Daniel stared at him.
“Why?”
Charles began trembling.
“Because he knew what Evelyn had done.”
Helena stepped closer.
“What did she do?”
Charles looked at Daniel.
Then back at Helena.
“The scandal with Leopold was never the beginning.”
He swallowed.
“It was the second time your families tried to bury the same secret.”
Daniel’s voice dropped.
“What secret?”
Charles looked at his son with tears in his eyes.
“When you were born, Evelyn made me promise I would never tell you who arranged your adoption.”
Daniel stopped breathing.
Helena stared at him.
“Adoption?”
Charles nodded.
Daniel backed away.
“No.”
“Dad.”
“No.”
Charles reached for him.
Daniel moved out of reach.
“You’re saying you’re not my father?”
“I am your father.”
“You just said—”
“I raised you.”
“I loved you.”
“But I am not your biological father.”
The apartment became completely silent.
Helena looked from Charles to Daniel.
Then at the medallion in his hand.
A terrible possibility formed in her mind.
She did not want to speak it.
Charles did it for her.
“King Frederick knew who Daniel’s biological parents were.”
Helena’s face turned white.
Daniel could barely speak.
“Who were they?”
Charles looked toward the dark window.
Outside, another black sedan had stopped across the street.
A man stepped from the rear door.
He wore a long charcoal coat.
Even from fifteen floors above, Helena recognized him.
She had believed him imprisoned in Varenne.
Prince Leopold.
Charles saw him too.
His face collapsed.
“He found us.”
Helena grabbed her phone.
Daniel moved toward the window.
Charles seized his wrist.
“Don’t let him see you.”
“Why?”
Charles whispered the answer.
“Because if Leopold proves who you really are, Daniel…”
He looked at Helena.
“…you didn’t just marry a Hawthorne.”
Another knock struck the apartment door.
This time it was hard.
Deliberate.
Charles finished in a terrified whisper.
May you like
“You married the man who could inherit her crown.”
TOBE CONTINUED
