Chapter 5 - THE GODFATHER WHO LEFT THE CATHEDRAL
Harold walked out.
No explanation.
No dramatic confession.
He simply turned and left through a side door.
Eleanor covered her face.
Chloe stared after him.
“Mom…”
“Not here.”
For once, I agreed.
Whatever happened twenty-seven years ago belonged in private unless it connected directly to crimes against me.
Sterling clearly thought the same.
He shut down the projector temporarily.
Then addressed the cathedral.
“Mr. Whitmore’s remaining instructions concern estate administration and immediate legal protections. Personal family matters unrelated to Mrs. Whitmore’s rights will not be discussed publicly.”
I nearly cried from relief.
David had planned exposure.
Not humiliation.
There was a difference.
Eleanor had not understood it.
Maybe Chloe hadn’t either.
Sterling then announced that because the funeral had already been disrupted beyond recovery, David’s burial would proceed privately after the legal presentation.
That sentence hurt.
Burial.
David was still dead.
All these secrets had made him feel temporarily alive.
They could not change the coffin.
I placed one hand on it.
Cold polished wood.
Everything inside me broke for a moment.
“I miss you.”
Nobody interrupted.
Not even Eleanor.
Then Sterling came beside me.
“Sarah.”
I wiped my face.
“What?”
“We need to leave.”
“Why?”
“Your house.”
My pulse jumped.
“What happened?”
A security company had notified him of unauthorized entry.
Chloe’s assistant had used an old family code.
Two people were inside.
I looked at Eleanor.
She seemed genuinely surprised.
“Who?”
Sterling’s face hardened.
“Someone is searching David’s study.”
The house.
The fortress.
They wanted something.
We left under police supervision.
I refused Sterling’s suggestion to remain somewhere else.
“It’s my home.”
“Yes.”
“I’m going.”
“Yes.”
No argument.
That was why David trusted him.
At the house, officers had detained two people.
One was Chloe’s assistant.
The other:
Dr. Melissa Grant.
The genetic consultant.
Chloe arrived fifteen minutes later and nearly fainted when she saw Melissa in handcuffs.
“What are you doing here?”
Melissa glared at her.
“You told me the files belonged to you.”
“I never told you to break in.”
“No. You told me to retrieve the original chain-of-custody packet before Sterling found it.”
Chloe’s face drained.
Sterling looked at me.
There would be no easy denial now.
Then police found what Melissa had been searching for.
A locked desk drawer.
Inside:
The original paternity materials.
The forged report.
Email exchanges.
And a flash drive labeled:
FORTRESS — LEVEL TWO.
My heart stopped.
“Level two?”
Sterling looked at me.
“David never told me about this.”
That frightened me.
David trusted Sterling with almost everything.
If even he did not know what Level Two contained, David had hidden it deliberately.
The flash drive required a password.
I tried his birthday.
Our anniversary.
Baby name.
Nothing.
Then I remembered the last morning.
I’ve secured the fortress.
No matter what happens, do exactly as Sterling says.
Sterling.
I typed his last name.
HALE.
Wrong.
Then his full name.
STERLINGHALE.
Wrong.
Sterling looked at the keyboard.
“Try the name David called me.”
I frowned.
“What name?”
“During law school.”
“How would I know that?”
“He used it once around you.”
Memory.
Dinner.
David laughing.
Calling Sterling:
Castle.
Because Sterling handled defenses.
I typed:
CASTLE.
The drive opened.
One folder.
LEVEL TWO.
Inside was a video recorded two days before David died.
His first words:
“Sarah, if you’re watching this at home instead of at the funeral, then someone went after the company.”
I stared.
“The company?”
May you like
Then David said:
“And if they did, my mother’s money problem is the smaller one.”
