Chapter 1 - THE UNFINISHED SONG
Twenty minutes before an important dinner at Adrien Vale’s Newport mansion, the hired violinist canceled.
Elena Moretti, a thirty-four-year-old maid who had worked in Adrien’s household for eleven months, quietly offered to play.
Adrien’s fiancée, Vivian Cross, objected immediately.
But her reaction changed the moment Elena began playing a melody her sick father had taught her years earlier.
Adrien recognized it.
His mother, Isabella Vale, had written that melody before her supposed death in a boating accident twenty-six years earlier.
She had never published it.
She had never finished it.
Yet Elena knew notes Adrien had never heard.
More troubling was Vivian’s reaction.
She recognized the music too.
Later, Vivian secretly offered Elena twenty thousand dollars to leave Rhode Island, then falsely accused her of stealing a letter. Adrien caught the lie and began questioning both women.
Elena finally showed him an old photograph her father had given her.
It showed young Isabella standing beside Elena’s father—and Vivian’s father—in 1986.
Hidden inside Elena’s violin case, they discovered a cassette recorded by Isabella.
On it, Adrien heard his mother say that if he was listening, something had happened to her—and that an “accident” was already being prepared.
The tape had been deliberately cut before she could finish.
Then Vivian appeared carrying the missing fourth page of Isabella’s composition.
Before Adrien could force an explanation from her, security announced an elderly visitor.
Thomas Moretti.
A man Elena had always believed was her dead grandfather.
Thomas arrived carrying another violin case and a photograph of Isabella taken three years after her supposed death.
Then the missing page fell from Vivian’s purse.
Four names were written on the back.
Isabella Vale.
Elena’s father.
Vivian’s father.
And Adrien himself.
Beside Adrien’s name was a date six months before his birth.
Thomas looked directly at him.
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“Before you play that last movement, there’s something Isabella never told you about the man you called your father.”
Then every light in the mansion went out.
