The cold smile on Richard’s face vanished as quickly as it had appeared, replaced by a performance of frantic grief so convincing that the screaming guests instantly rallied around him. The two waiters dragging Leo didn’t stop; they hauled him through the heavy wrought-iron service gate and threw him onto the gravel driveway behind the estate. Leo hit the sharp ground, the palms of his hands stinging as tiny pebbles bit into his raw skin, but he barely felt the pain. All he could hear was the frantic cadence of his own breathing and the distant chaos echoing from the marble patio.

«Stay down, kid, if you know what’s good for you,» the taller waiter muttered, his face pale, his voice trembling as he locked the gate from the outside.

Leo scrambled to his feet, wiping the blood and sweat from his bruised cheek. He couldn’t just run. Elena was still missing, and whatever was happening inside this fortress of money and poison was tied directly to her note. He crouched low, using the sprawling boxwood hedges to conceal his movement as he skirted the perimeter of the manor toward the rear glass house where the event staff had set up their headquarters.

Every shadow felt like a threat. Leo slid through an unlocked side entrance to the lower kitchen level. The air smelled of burnt caramel and rich spices, but the subterranean hallways were dead silent; the entire staff had rushed upstairs to witness the catastrophe. Standing beside the industrial refrigerators, Leo pulled his sister’s crumpled receipt out of his pocket.

Don’t let her drink the vintage crystal. Check the seal.

He had stopped the drink, yet Victoria had collapsed anyway. How? The chemical had sizzled on the marble, releasing a sulfurous vapor straight into the summer breeze. It wasn’t just a liquid poison—it was airborne upon contact with the air.

Suddenly, heavy footsteps echoed down the concrete hallway. Leo ducked into a narrow alcove behind a linen rack, holding his breath as the heavy leather soles paused just feet away.

Through the gaps in the fabric, Leo saw Richard St. Clair. But Richard wasn’t crying, nor was he calling an ambulance. He was casually wiping his hands with a handkerchief, talking on a burner phone.

«She’s incapacitated,» Richard said, his voice terrifyingly calm, completely devoid of the panic he had displayed moments earlier on the patio. «The mixture worked exactly as intended. The paramedics will declare it an anaphylactic attack from the airborne toxin before they ever suspect chemical homicide.»

Richard paused, listening to the person on the other end of the line. A cold chill ran down Leo’s spine.

«No, the boy is a non-issue,» Richard continued, tossing the handkerchief into a laundry chute. «He’s just Elena’s little brother. But find him anyway. He knows about the seal, which means Elena managed to talk before we secured her in the vault.»

Leo’s heart slammed against his ribs like a sledgehammer. Secured her in the vault. Elena was still alive, trapped somewhere on the property.

Before Richard could turn the corner, Leo took a step back, but his heel caught the metal edge of a laundry cart. The cart rattled loudly against the tiled wall, the sharp sound reverberating down the corridor.

Richard stopped instantly. «I’ll call you back,» he whispered into the phone, slipping it into his pocket as he slowly turned toward the linen rack.

Leo didn’t wait to be caught. He bolted out of the alcove, diving through a set of double doors that led into the estate’s subterranean wine cellar. The metal door slammed shut behind him, the automatic lock clicking firmly into place.

It was pitch black inside, save for the faint green glow of emergency exit lights casting long, eerie shadows down endless rows of wine racks. The temperature dropped drastically, the cool, damp air chilling the sweat on Leo’s face. He sprinted down the central aisle, looking for another exit, but the heavy oak doors at the far end were locked from the outside.

He was trapped.

Footsteps echoed from the overhead walkway. Leo squeezed himself behind a massive wooden rack of vintage vintages, his lungs burning. He pulled out his phone, the screen illuminating his terrified face. No signal. Zero bars beneath three feet of concrete and stone.

Then, his phone vibrated in his hand—a single, delayed text message pushing through the dead zone.

It was from Elena’s number.

Leo’s hands shook as he opened the message. It wasn’t a text. It was an audio file, three seconds long. He pressed the phone to his ear, turning the volume down to a faint whisper.

Through the static, his sister’s trembling voice came through: «Leo… don’t trust the gold envelope. It wasn’t a party invitation. It’s the list of—»

The audio cut out, replaced by a loud, sharp metallic clink right behind him.

Leo froze. Slowly, he turned his head toward the shadow at the end of the aisle.

A figure stepped out from behind a wine cask, illuminated faintly by the green exit sign. It wasn’t one of Richard’s guards. It was a woman in a charcoal staff vest—her hair tied back, a pair of thick leather gloves on her hands, holding an empty glass vial identical to the one that had poisoned Victoria.

She lifted her face into the pale light.

Leo’s breath hitched in his throat. It was Elena.

«Elena?» Leo gasped, stepping forward, relief washing over him so fast his knees almost gave out. «You’re okay! I found your note, I stopped her from drinking it, but Richard—»

«Leo, shut up,» Elena whispered harshly, her voice devoid of any warmth. She didn’t move toward him. Instead, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a heavy brass key, sliding it into the lock of a massive steel door hidden behind the wine racks—the vault.

«What’s going on?» Leo asked, taking a cautious step back as he realized the cold, calculated look in his sister’s eyes was the exact same look he had seen on Richard St. Clair’s face minutes before. «Where did you get that vial?»

Elena turned to him, the faint green light reflecting off the smooth, unblinking surface of her eyes.

«I didn’t try to warn Victoria, Leo,» Elena said, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly steady register. «I wrote that note to set up Richard. And you just ruined three years of planning.»