Chapter 50 – Ashes Never Lie
Lena’s fingers trembled as she flipped open the cracked leather notebook Jay had retrieved from a safe hidden behind the bookshelf. The pages were yellowed, scrawled in a familiar, uneven hand—Elijah’s. The first entry was dated two weeks before his disappearance.
> “They say trust no one. But I trusted him. I had to. Jay doesn’t know everything—but he’s going to find out soon. If anything happens to me… it’s because of the name I’m writing next.”
Below the entry, one name was scribbled in red ink.
Cassian Virelli.
Jay’s face went pale. “No. That can’t be right.”
“You know him?” Lena asked, the hairs on her arms rising.
“He was a business partner of my father. Old money, offshore dealings, the kind of man who always left the room just before things we
