Chapter 4 - Shadows in the Library
Lila didn't speak. She backed away slowly, her hand buried deep in her coat pocket, her fingers clutching the cool, hard surface of the cassette tape.
"Give me the folder, Lila," Claire said, taking a slow, deliberate step forward. The iron poker tapped lightly against the hardwood floor with a dull, menacing sound. Clack. Clack.
"No," Lila said, her voice small but surprisingly firm.
"You don't understand what you're doing," Claire said, her voice dropping into that smooth, motherly tone that made Lila’s skin crawl. "You think you're protecting your mother’s memory, but you're just ruining your father’s life. Do you want your father to go to prison? Is that what you want, Lila? To be left completely alone in the world?"
"My father helped you," Lila said, her eyes darting toward the curtained French doors behind her. "He helped you hurt her."
Claire sighed, a soft, disappointed sound. "Your father is a weak man who wanted a life he couldn't afford. Your mother was rich, Lila. Incredibly rich. But she was selfish. She kept all of her family’s fortune locked away in trusts, letting your father beg for every cent. I simply showed him what he was truly worth."
"She was your friend!" Lila cried out.
"Friendship doesn't pay for estates like this, darling," Claire sneered. She lifted the iron poker, stepping closer. "Now, hand over the coat. Or I will have Dr. Mason move you to a long-term care facility in the mountains tomorrow morning, and you will never see your father or your precious Aunt Eleanor ever again."
Lila didn't answer.
She turned and threw her heavy wooden stool straight at Claire’s legs.
The stool struck Claire’s shins with a loud crack. Claire cursed sharply, stumbling sideways and dropping the iron poker onto the Persian rug.
Lila didn't wait. She lunged toward the tall French doors, yanked the brass bolt back, and shoved the glass doors open into the driving storm outside.
Rain hit her instantly, freezing and relentless, soaking through her clothes in seconds. Thunder cracked directly overhead, illuminating the vast, dark lawns of the estate.
"Lila!" Claire’s scream echoed out into the night behind her.
Lila ran down the stone steps into the slippery grass. She didn't head for the front gates—she knew the electronic security gates were locked at night, and the stone walls were too high for her to climb.
She ran toward the old carriage house at the edge of the property.
The wind roared through the weeping willow trees, whipping her face with wet branches. Lila pressed her arms over her chest, guarding the manila folder and the cassette tape beneath her wet coat.
Behind her, she saw the beams of heavy flashlights piercing the storm. Evan and Claire were both out on the lawn now.
"Lila! Stop!" Evan’s voice was distorted by the wind, sounding frantic, terrified, and angry all at once. "Come back inside! You're going to catch pneumonia!"
Lila reached the wooden doors of the old carriage house. It had been used as a garage and storage barn for decades. She slipped through the narrow gap between the sliding doors and shoved a heavy iron bar into place on the inside, locking it tight.
Inside, the carriage house was dark, smelling of motor oil, old leather, and damp straw.
Lila collapsed behind the tire of her father’s antique sports car, her lungs burning, her body violent shivering from the cold.
She pulled out her pocket flashlight, click it on, and pulled the manila folder from her pocket. The paper was slightly wet at the edges, but the documents inside were dry.
She unfolded the first page.
It was an autopsy report. But it wasn't the official one that the local police had issued sixteen months ago. Attached to it was a private toxicology lab report, dated three days after Naomi’s death.
Red ink was circled around a specific line: High concentration of Digitalis (Foxglove extract) detected in blood tissue.
Lila’s heart stopped.
Foxglove.
May you like
Her mother had grown white foxgloves in her private greenhouse behind the rose garden. Claire had spent every afternoon with her in that greenhouse, making "herbal teas" to help Naomi with her headaches.
It wasn't just a fall down the stairs. They had been poisoning her.
