Chapter 10 – THE MUSIC BOX REMEMBERED

The sound of breaking glass was followed by the heavy thud of boots on hardwood.

Three men dressed in dark tactical gear stepped through the ruined patio door. They weren’t street thugs; they moved with terrifying, military precision. The loyalists. Vincenzo’s old guard.

“Mom, run!” I screamed, pushing her toward the side gate of the yard.

One of the men raised a suppressed pistol, but the lead enforcer shoved his arm down.

“No shooting,” the leader barked. “We just need the woman. Grab the maid.”

Before I could run, a massive hand clamped around my arm, spinning me around. I fought back, kicking and scratching, but the man was too strong. He dragged me back into the kitchen, pinning me against the granite island.

Anna and Grace were huddled in the corner of the living room, terrified.

“Leave them alone!” Anna yelled, stepping in front of her daughter.

The leader ignored them, walking straight toward me. He pulled a photograph from his pocket and slammed it onto the counter.

It was a grainy security image from the night of the birthday dinner. It showed me standing in the dining room, holding the brown paper package—the music box.

“Dr. Evans didn’t have the portfolio,” the leader growled, leaning in close. He smelled of stale tobacco and violence. “We tore his house and clinic apart. But we found his diary. He wrote that he panicked thirteen years ago. He gave the portfolio back to the mother.”

He turned his head to look at Anna.

“But she didn’t have it either,” the leader continued, looking back at me. “She didn’t have a bag when she left the hospital. She only had the baby, and a wooden box she made in therapy.”

My heart stopped.

“The music box,” the leader hissed. “The one you saved from the trash, Emma. Where is it?”

They didn’t know the mansion had burned down. They didn’t know the box was ashes in the rubble.

I looked him dead in the eye. “It burned in the fire. Celia blew up the mansion.”

The man laughed, a harsh, dismissive sound. “Do I look like an idiot? The fire investigators published their report yesterday. They found the remains of the wall safe, the desk, the computers. No trace of a wooden box. Wood doesn’t vaporize without leaving ash. Someone took it out of that house before the bomb went off.”

My mind reeled. If the box didn’t burn… where was it?

I thought back to the chaos. We had run to Celia’s office. Anna had opened the false bottom, taken the brass key to the safety deposit box, and we fled. We left the music box on the desk.

Or did we?

I looked over the man’s shoulder, at Grace. The thirteen-year-old girl was pale, her eyes wide. She was clutching a small, canvas backpack tightly against her chest.

She hears the lullaby in her dreams.

Grace hadn’t left the box. It was the only connection she had ever had to her real mother. In the panic of the explosion, she had slipped it into her bag.

The leader saw my eyes shift. He turned around, noticing the girl and the backpack.

“Well, well,” he smiled darkly. He walked toward Grace, holding out his hand. “Give me the bag, little girl.”

“Don’t touch her!” Anna screamed, grabbing the man’s arm. He backhanded her brutally, sending Anna crashing into the coffee table.

“Mom!” Grace shrieked, dropping the backpack and running to her mother.

The leader picked up the canvas bag. He unzipped it and reached inside.

He pulled out the hand-carved wooden music box.

“Finally,” he breathed.

He smashed the beautiful wooden box against the edge of the granite island. The wood splintered, the delicate musical gears spilling across the counter.

But there was no leather portfolio inside. The box was too small.

The leader frowned, sifting through the broken wood.

He found a thick, folded piece of parchment paper wedged tightly into the lining. He pulled it out and unfolded it.

It wasn’t the trust portfolio. It was a map. A hand-drawn floor plan of St. Jude’s Hospital, with a red ‘X’ marked over the basement morgue.

The words my mother had spoken echoed in my head. Celia told Dr. Evans that if he didn’t help her, she would expose what he had done in the basement morgue.

The leader stared at the map, his face contorting in pure rage.

“Where is it?” he roared, grabbing me by the throat. “Where is the portfolio?”

Before I could choke out an answer, the front door of the house exploded off its hinges.

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