Chapter 4 - CAMILLE’S CONFESSION
We reached Pennsylvania Hospital before sunrise.
Police already occupied the hallway outside Camille’s room.
Nicholas said almost nothing during the drive.
Neither did I.
Margaret remained at the estate with security.
I spent the entire ride staring at my father’s face in the old photograph.
Except apparently he wasn’t my father.
Everything I believed about my childhood suddenly felt unstable.
But Nicholas had something worse.
His father was alive.
Missing.
Possibly injured.
And his fiancée had walked into a hospital wearing his blood.
A detective named Eric Malloy met us outside the emergency department.
“I need you to stay calm.”
Nicholas looked at him.
“People usually say that before telling me something designed to make calm impossible.”
Malloy sighed.
“Ms. Warren claims she was kidnapped.”
“By whom?”
“Her father and Anthony DeLuca.”
Nicholas stared at him.
“That’s her story?”
“She says Anthony attacked Victor in the car. There was a struggle. She says Victor crashed.”
“Where?”
“She won’t say until she talks to you.”
Malloy looked at me.
“And only you.”
“Me?”
Nicholas answered immediately.
“No.”
Malloy shrugged.
“Then we wait.”
I touched Nicholas’s arm.
“I’ll go.”
“No.”
“She might tell us where Anthony is.”
“She might put a knife through your throat.”
“In a hospital full of cops?”
Nicholas looked at me.
“You’ve had enough surprises tonight.”
“So have you.”
For a moment, neither of us moved.
Then Nicholas exhaled.
“I’m coming in.”
Malloy shook his head.
“She specifically said Rachel alone.”
Nicholas’s expression became dangerous.
“Then she can specifically enjoy jail.”
I looked at him.
“Nicholas.”
His eyes met mine.
It was the first time I had used his first name.
Something shifted between us.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Trust.
“Five minutes,” I said.
He hated it.
But he nodded.
Camille sat upright in a hospital bed.
There was dried blood in her blond hair.
A cut crossed her cheek.
One wrist was bandaged.
She smiled when I entered.
“Of course he sent you.”
“He didn’t.”
That smile weakened.
“I came because Anthony is missing.”
Camille looked toward the window.
“He should have stayed missing.”
“Where is he?”
“You think I’m the villain.”
“You left an old woman freezing outside for forty-seven minutes.”
“That wasn’t personal.”
“It felt personal.”
Camille laughed softly.
“You’re still a maid even when you’re trying to sound brave.”
I pulled out a chair.
“And you’re still avoiding the question.”
She looked at me.
“You’ve changed.”
“No. You just never bothered noticing me.”
That landed.
“Where is Anthony?”
Camille’s eyes dropped to her hands.
“I don’t know.”
“Then why is his blood on you?”
“Because I tried to save him.”
I almost laughed.
She didn’t.
“My father put him in the car,” Camille said. “Anthony had a tracker hidden in his coat. He knew Nicholas’s people would find us eventually.”
“Why were you there?”
“My father called me.”
“Why?”
“Because everything was collapsing.”
“What everything?”
She stared at me for a long moment.
“Our future.”
“Yours and Nicholas’s?”
“No.”
Her voice became quiet.
“Mine and my father’s.”
She explained.
Victor Warren had spent decades controlling money that technically belonged to the DeLuca family.
Some legal.
Some not.
But much of it had been stolen through trusts built before Nicholas was old enough to understand them.
Camille had grown up knowing the Warrens’ wealth depended on keeping Nicholas ignorant.
At sixteen, her father told her she might someday have to marry him.
I stared at her.
“You were raised to marry Nicholas?”
“Yes.”
“And he knew nothing.”
“Nothing.”
“That hospital fundraiser…”
“Arranged.”
Everything in Nicholas’s relationship with her had been engineered.
Every dinner.
Every chance meeting.
Every introduction.
Six years of his life built on a script.
“Did you love him?”
For the first time, Camille looked wounded.
“Yes.”
I hadn’t expected that.
“You expect me to believe you?”
“No.”
She swallowed.
“That’s the worst part. I did what my father told me for years. I lied to Nicholas. Watched him. Learned where he kept documents. Helped move money. But somewhere in the middle, it stopped being an assignment.”
“Then why keep lying?”
“Because telling the truth meant losing him.”
“You lost him anyway.”
Her eyes hardened.
“So did you, if you think this ends with you standing beside him.”
I ignored that.
“What happened in the car?”
Camille took a breath.
“My father believed Anthony had hidden the original red ledger.”
“We found it.”
She looked genuinely shocked.
“Where?”
I didn’t answer.
Her fear increased.
“If you found the original, you’re in danger.”
“From Victor?”
“Not just Victor.”
“Who?”
Camille looked toward the door.
“Rachel, my father wasn’t the one who started this.”
“Evelyn?”
She shook her head.
“Evelyn was involved. But she wasn’t in charge.”
“Then who?”
Camille whispered, “Someone Anthony still won’t name.”
I remembered the ledger.
The initials.
A.D.
E.D.
V.W.
C.W.
Maybe another name was hidden in it.
“Where is Anthony?”
Camille closed her eyes.
“The car crashed near the river.”
“Which river?”
“Delaware.”
“Where?”
“Industrial road near Pier 38.”
“What happened after the crash?”
“My father was unconscious. Anthony was hurt. I got him out.”
“And then?”
“I heard another vehicle.”
“Police?”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“Black SUV.”
“Whose?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how do you know Anthony’s alive?”
“I watched him get into it.”
“Voluntarily?”
Her face changed.
“No.”
That single word chilled me.
“Men took him?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“Three.”
“Did you recognize any of them?”
“One.”
“Who?”
Camille stared straight at me.
“Your father.”
I stopped breathing.
“Thomas?”
“Yes.”
“My father died four years ago.”
Camille gave me the same look Margaret had given Nicholas in the ballroom.
Pity.
“No, Rachel.”
I stood so fast the chair scraped backward.
“Don’t.”
“I saw him.”
“You’re lying.”
“I met Thomas Hayes three months ago.”
“No.”
“He’s the reason you were placed in Nicholas’s house.”
My hands turned cold.
Camille reached toward the bedside table.
“Look inside my purse.”
I didn’t move.
“Rachel.”
I opened it.
Inside was a phone.
Camille gave me the code.
I opened a video.
Thomas Hayes appeared on-screen.
Older.
Gray-haired.
But alive.
My father.
The timestamp was eight weeks ago.
He sat across from Camille at a restaurant.
His voice came through clearly.
“Rachel cannot know why she’s there. If she learns who her biological father is before Nicholas learns the truth, everything falls apart.”
I nearly dropped the phone.
Camille watched me.
“There’s more.”
The video continued.
Camille asked, “What if Anthony reaches Margaret first?”
Thomas answered.
“Then Victor handles Margaret.”
“And Rachel?”
A pause.
Thomas looked directly toward the hidden camera.
“Rachel is insurance.”
I turned the video off.
My chest hurt.
I had attended my father’s funeral.
I had held my mother’s hand while she cried.
I had touched the urn supposedly containing his ashes.
“Why fake his death?”
Camille’s voice softened.
“Same reason Anthony did.”
“To hide?”
“Yes.”
“From whom?”
Camille shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
I stepped toward her.
“You know more.”
“I know one thing.”
“What?”
“Thomas wasn’t the man who raised you because he loved your mother.”
My stomach tightened.
“He was assigned to her.”
“By whom?”
“Anthony.”
Everything inside me stopped.
I stared at her.
“Anthony assigned Thomas to my mother?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Camille hesitated.
Then said the words Margaret never got a chance to say.
“Because your biological father was Nicholas’s uncle.”
I couldn’t process it.
Nicholas had an uncle?
Camille continued.
“Anthony’s younger brother.”
“What was his name?”
“Gabriel DeLuca.”
I had never heard it.
“That means…”
“You’re a DeLuca.”
The door opened.
Nicholas stood there.
He had heard enough.
His face was pale.
“Gabriel died before I was born.”
Camille looked at him.
“No.”
Nicholas stepped inside.
“My father told me Gabriel died at seventeen.”
Camille smiled sadly.
“Apparently death is a flexible concept in your family.”
Nicholas ignored the insult.
“Where is my father?”
“Pier 38.”
He turned toward the door.
Camille shouted after him.
“Nicholas!”
He stopped.
She looked at him with tears suddenly running down her face.
“There’s something you need to know before you go.”
He didn’t speak.
Camille’s voice broke.
“My father didn’t kidnap Anthony from the cemetery because he wanted to kill him.”
Nicholas slowly turned.
“Why, then?”
“Because Anthony asked him to.”
Nicholas stared.
“What?”
“The gun. The struggle. The escape.”
Camille shook her head.
“It was staged.”
My blood went cold.
Nicholas stepped closer.
“Why?”
“Anthony needed everyone to believe Victor was still the enemy.”
“Why?”
Camille looked at me.
Then back at Nicholas.
“Because your father doesn’t trust you either.”
Nicholas’s expression hardened.
May you like
Camille whispered:
“He came back for Rachel.”
