Chapter 6
Rosamonde had started with vanity.
That was Elias’s word.
She liked being the woman people approached because she was close to me.
Dinner invitation.
Introduction.
A few private minutes at a charity table.
Nothing formal.
Still wrong.
Merrick saw money.
He turned access into a market.
People who wanted my attention gave “gifts.”
Merrick promised priority.
Then he started making promises Rosamonde never authorized.
Business protection.
Introductions to captains.
Favorable treatment.
None of which he could guarantee.
If those lies reached me, everyone involved was finished socially at best.
Elias knew enough to expose it.
So Merrick removed him.
Then told Rosamonde he was dead.
Why?
Because guilt makes people easier to control.
Once she believed Elias died because she called Merrick, she stopped challenging him.
He reminded her constantly:
“You asked me to handle it.”
That sentence became a leash.
Rosamonde continued smiling beside me while her cousin expanded the scheme under her future name.
I asked Elias:
“Why come back now?”
He looked at Nerelle.
“Because Merrick found me again.”
Two months earlier, Elias left the remote crew.
Tried returning.
Merrick intercepted him before he reached the city.
Not because someone betrayed him.
Because Merrick had men watching Nerelle.
That made her pale.
“He watched me?”
“Yes.”
Not every day.
Enough.
Merrick knew Elias would eventually try to find his sister.
So Elias stopped.
He stayed near mountain seasonal camps.
Waited.
Then last week he learned my engagement reception would be at this lodge.
Public enough.
Crowded enough.
Nerelle assigned coat-check service.
That last detail stopped me.
“How did you know her assignment?”
Elias smiled faintly.
“I didn’t.”
Then:
“I saw her through the staff entrance this afternoon.”
There.
He had come close enough to the lodge to verify she was here.
But Merrick was here too.
Approaching Nerelle directly would expose him.
So he used the one thing she would recognize instantly.
His coat.
He left it where Merrick would find it.
Not intending Merrick to wear it.
Just to rattle him.
Merrick panicked.
Picked it up.
Then, absurdly, gave it to Arthur when Arthur needed a coat.
The evidence walked directly into Nerelle’s hands.
I almost smiled.
Not genius.
Chance.
Truth often gets lucky because liars eventually become careless.
Then Elias added:
“Merrick met me today.”
Nerelle froze.
“What did he want?”
“He offered me money to disappear permanently.”
I looked toward the dark road.
“And you?”
“I told him I wanted Rosamonde to admit what she started.”
May you like
Good.
Because so did I.
