Chapter 8 - The Ultimatum
Julian froze instantly, his boots planted firmly on the damp gravel path of the greenhouse. The sharp steel blades of the garden shears glinted coldly under the moonlight filtering through the frosted glass roof, resting perilously close to the maid’s throat. The young woman stared straight ahead with wide, unblinking eyes, tears carving fresh tracks down her dust-stained cheeks, yet she made no sound, completely paralyzed by fear.
“Let her go, Victoria,” Julian said, his voice terrifyingly calm, though every muscle in his body coiled like a spring, ready to lunge forward despite the lethal distance between them. “This has nothing to do with her. She’s just a pawn in whatever twisted game you’ve been playing with my family’s estate.”
Victoria tilted her head, a dark, humorless smile touching her lips. “A pawn? Oh, Julian, you truly are blind to the very blood running through your own halls. She isn’t a random hire from the agency. Look at her bone structure. Look at the curve of her jaw. She is the spitting image of your sister Clara, right down to the birthmark hidden beneath that collar.”
Julian’s breath caught in his throat. He stared at the side of the maid’s neck, where a faint, crescent-shaped birthmark peeked out from beneath her torn collar—a birthmark he hadn’t noticed in the dim light of the hallway, but one he knew by heart from old family albums. It was Clara’s mark. Clara, who had vanished twenty-five years ago when they were children, officially declared lost to the surrounding wilderness.
“That’s impossible,” Julian whispered, his voice cracking slightly. “Clara was… she was gone.”
“Bodies can be hidden, Julian. Memories can be rewritten,” Victoria replied smoothly, her grip on the garden shears steady as a rock. “Your father knew it. That’s why he built that vault beneath the study. He tried to bury the truth, but blood always finds its way back to the surface. And now, to protect my inheritance and the legacy of this family, this loose end has to be tied off permanently.”
The maid finally spoke, her voice trembling violently as she looked past Victoria toward Julian. “Don't listen to her, sir… she lied about the adoption papers. She knew who I was the day I walked through those iron gates.”
Victoria’s expression hardened instantly at the girl’s defiance. The steel blades twitched, a tiny bead of crimson welling up against the pale skin of the maid's neck.
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Julian couldn't wait another second. With explosive speed, he surged forward down the narrow stone pathway, closing the distance between them faster than Victoria could react.
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