Sal was already in the study when we got there, looking like he’d aged ten years in a few hours.
I’d seen him under fire and he’d never looked this tense.
“Isabella found the leak,” he said, straight to the point.
“Turns out, it was one of the kitchen staff—Marcus Feld.
He’s only been here eight months.
Good references.
Nothing that jumped out at us.” I caught the way he said it.
“Should have.” “While you were outside, Isabella checked his finances.
Three deposits in one week, all through an account that leads—barely, but it does—to a dummy company Rocco’s used before.” Sal’s jaw clenched.
“She went to get him for questioning ten minutes ago.” Adrian’s voice was all ice.
“And?” “He’s dead.” Sal just laid it out, no buildup, like he wanted to get it over with.
“They found him in staff quarters.
Someone staged it to look like a break-in, but that’s not what happened.
The killer knew exactly where his room was and got in and out without setting off any of our security.
And our security works, as we all just proved.” The silence that followed felt cold enough to freeze your breath.
“Someone shut him up,” I said, every word slow, thinking it through.
“Before he could say anything more than what we found in his bank records.” Adrian’s mouth was a hard line.
“Which means whoever’s actually running this is way more careful than Rocco’s ever been.
Rocco likes to keep people alive if they’re useful, or make a big show if they’re not.
This isn’t him.
This is someone protecting something they value more than a dead informant.” Just then, Isabella stepped into the doorway.
The warmth she’d had all week was gone; she looked shaken, pale.
“I found something else,” she said tightly.
“In Marcus’s room.
It wasn’t hidden.
Honestly, almost like whoever killed him wanted us to find it.” She held out a photograph, old and bent at one corner.
My hands shook a little when I took it.
It was my face.
Same features, same eyes.
But the clothes were old—really old.
The kind you only see in faded family albums, and not from this decade.
Or the last one.
The photo itself looked yellowed and brittle.
My stomach twisted just looking at it.
“That can’t be,” I whispered.
“I’ve never seen this before.” “Turn it over,” Isabella said softly.
I did, squinting at the faded handwriting: Rosalind Calloway, First Queen’s line, confirmed.
– 1962.
“Rosalind,” I said.
The name felt wrong and right at the same time, like a word spoken in a dream.
“I don’t know that name.
My grandmother’s name was Edith.” Adrian watched me, careful and quiet.
“Maybe Edith wasn’t the name she was born with.
If your family’s been hiding since the Moon Court fell, it’d make sense for each generation to take on new names, move around, bury the truth.
Probably deep enough their own kids believed the story.” My eyes stayed on the photo.
My fingers didn’t want to let go, but my brain wanted to throw it across the room.
“So this woman—maybe my great-grandmother?
Somebody from way back who looked exactly like me.” Sal’s voice dropped to a hush.
“Or the bloodline doesn’t just pass down power.
Maybe it passes down the face, too.
Genes strong enough that every First Queen’s descendant is nearly a copy of the last.” The idea landed on all of us, heavy and suffocating.
If that was true—if we all really did share the same face generation after generation—then anyone who got their hands on an old photo, or a painting, or anything else from before the Moon Court fell, would know me on sight.
That meant I wasn’t just carrying a secret anymore.
I was wearing it, right out where anyone could see.
Isabella worked through the next part out loud.
“Whoever killed Marcus wanted us to find this.
They’re not just hiding a leak—they want us to know how deep this goes.
Whatever game this is, the stakes are on the table now.” Adrian’s eyes were dark.
“A message.” Sal shook his head, even grimmer.
“Or a warning.
Look at the facts—if someone powerful enough to kill Marcus this cleanly wanted Wren dead, they’d have done it already.
Plenty of opportunities, easier ways.
They left the photograph for a reason.
They want her seen.
They want her identified.
Whoever’s behind this, they already suspect the bloodline survived, and now they have proof.” Adrian reached for my hand—neither of us meant to, but we met halfway, and his grip steadied me when I felt like I might float away.
My mind kept replaying that old ink, that impossible date.
“We need to find out who before they stop waiting and start acting,” Adrian said, his voice sharp with purpose.
Out beyond the study window, dawn finally bled over the wall, the first light sliding warily across the garden that still bore scars from last night.
And in that gray hush, I knew—really knew—that Rocco Moretti and the Redthorn Pack were never the real threat.
They weren’t even the biggest.
My real story was just getting started, and I had no idea who was going to read it next.