A Marriage Built on Ashes

Chapter 5: The Devil’s Bargain

Sloane

I tapped the screen. There were two attachments. I opened the first one. It was a digital folder filled with internal Hartford Hotel accounting logs, but they weren't the clean versions I usually see. These were covered in digital red ink.

Comments were typed into the margins: "This doesn't add up," circled next to a massive payment for "private security," and "Why would this be here?" next to a list of chemical supplies that had no business being in a luxury kitchen.

My heart started to pound against my ribs. I closed the first folder and opened the second. This one was worse. Much worse.

It was a gallery of photos. Dozens of young women, all looking happy in their everyday lives, but all missing. But when I scrolled down, each photo was linked to a specific date and a specific Hartford property. These weren't just missing person flyers; they were linked to "ghost events".

I dropped the phone onto the desk in terror. Everything Cade had said about people being moved like cargo, about his sister Lily, was staring back at me in high-definition pixels.

Suddenly, the phone vibrated. Cade’s name flashed across the screen.

The timing was too perfect. I felt a surge of panic and betrayal. Did he send this? Was he watching me right now? I swiped to decline the call and immediately blocked his number. I didn't want to talk to him. I didn't want him to be right.

Nina returned with the documents, and noticed the agitation in my posture.

“Everything okay, Sloane?”, she asked, as she dropped the documents on my table.

It’s fine, Nina”, I lied. “I guess I’m still...getting used to being back”, trying to give a convincing smile.

Nina reached out for a hug. “It’s okay if you’re not fully ready yet. I’m so sorry about your grandmother”

“Thanks Nina”

“I’ll check on you again later, okay”, she said, looking at me as she backstepped to the door.

As she left, the wave of worry hit me again. I went back to the documents and stared in fear when I noticed something.

All the meetings had a “Guest Pass Required”. Like the one I found in the Harbor two weeks ago.

, I was disoriented. For the rest of the day, I could barely read a single line in any office file to the end, without seeing the strange meeting logs. When I was driving back later in the evening, I could barely see a young girl on the street without my mind flashing back to the missing victims.

As soon as I got home that evening, my mind racing. I ran and grabbed my coat from the rack. My hands shook as I dug through the pockets until my fingers closed around the guest card I had found at the Harbor wing.

I went back to the phone and reopened the email. I scrolled through the logs in the first folder, my eyes blurring until I found the section for June. There it was. An entry for June 13th.

It was the same date.

The card in my hand was the physical proof of the digital crime on my screen. This gala had happened on that night.

I sat back, feeling a wave of nausea. For like 10 good minutes, I wasn’t myself.

I had grown up in these hotels. I had spent some of my good years of my career consulting for them. And yet, there was an entire world, a dark, profitable world, operating right under my nose. I didn't know my family at all. I didn't even know if I knew myself.

I took a deep breath. As much as I hated to admit it, I knew exactly who had the information I needed. I went into my settings, unblocked Cade’s number, and hit the call button.

He picked up on the first ring. He didn't say "hello."

"Did you look at them?" he asked. His voice was flat, devoid of the emotion he’d shown at the cemetery.

"You sent those," I said. It wasn't a question. "How did you get those in the first place?"

"I didn’t. Those are Lily’s. That’s what she’s been investigating," he admitted.

"How could you?" I snapped, the anger finally replacing the fear. "You had no right to dump that on me.”

"Would you have opened anything of mine if you knew it was from me, Sloane?" Cade asked. His voice was quiet now, almost tired. "If I had handed you a flash drive at the funeral, you would have thrown it in the trash. I had to make sure you saw the truth"

"I would never have opened it, and I wouldn’t even scratch my fingers with anything of yours." I whispered, admitting the truth.

"Exactly," he said. "You needed proof, Sloane. I needed you to see that this is real and it’s happening in your buildings, in your name. Can you really say I’m wrong now? Look at the dates."

I gripped the phone tighter. "And the key? The vintage key left in my car after you smashed my window? Was that proof too?"

There was a pause on the other end. I heard him shift, the sound of fabric rubbing against a microphone.

"I don't know anything about a vintage key," Cade said. He sounded genuine, which made the hair on my arms stand up. "And would I really have the guts to ask for help if I was the one that smashed your window."

I felt a new kind of chill. If Cade didn't leave the key, then someone else did, someone that wanted me to find those dresses. Someone wanted me to see what was happening.

"Don't worry about it," I said quickly, trying to keep my voice from trembling. "It doesn't matter."

"It matters a lot," Cade said. "Sloane, if people are reaching out to you, you're in more danger than you realize."

"I can handle myself," I lied. I leaned against the kitchen counter, looking at the city lights outside. "Listen. About Lily. If my family is responsible for what happened to her... I am truly sorry. I’m going to do what it takes to find the truth."

"What do you mean ‘do what it takes’" he said.

I paused before moving on.

“Did you know about the will. My grandmother’s will?”

“Your grandmother's will? No. Why?”

“Because she mentioned you”

“Really. What did she say?”

“She specifically asked that I marry you, else I lose the hotel to my cousin.”

The phone went completely silent for so long I had to call his name out before he said another word.

“Yeah, I’m still here.”, he finally said. “Wow. But it can’t be a coincidence now. Your grandmother must have had some clue for her to be specific.”

“Yesterday, I was willing to burn the Hartford name to the ground than tie it to yours”, but now, after all this, “I’m not willing to let it go till I know the truth.”

“So, what are you saying?”, he asks.

“I... I’ll agree to the marriage," I said, the words feeling like ash in my mouth. "And if you want to get answers for Lily, that’s the only way you can too"

Another couple of seconds of silence followed, and just when I wanted to call him out again, he spoke “I’m tired of not knowing, of sleeping and wondering who the person that killed Lily would hurt next. If it’s the only way, then I can agree to it too.”

“Okay then, but don’t think this means I’ve forgiven you, or that this means I’m going along without some terms of my own. And if my family is innocent, and you're just some staged scheme, or some revenge plot for breaking up. I will destroy you. I will make sure you never work in this city again. I will make sure you're so buried in lawsuits you won't be able to breathe.”

His voice was quiet, almost sad. “If I'm wrong, Sloane, then I'll deserve it.”, he says. “You can come with your lawyer to draft those conditions and I’ll come with mine, whenever you’re ready”

"Fine," I said.

I hung up before he could say anything else. I stood in the dark for a long time, watching the headlights of cars passing on the street below. I was about to marry a man I hadn't spoken to in five years, a man who might be using me to take down my own family. But the alternative was letting my family continue whatever they were doing in those hidden rooms.

I picked up my phone again and dialled Jonathan.

"Jonathan," I said when he answered. "It's Sloane. You asked me to call you when I’d made my decision."

"And?" Jonathan asked.

"I'm meeting with Cade tomorrow," I said. "I'm going to do it.