Chapter 2 - MOM CANCELED THE PARTY
Esme wanted to open her box immediately.
Mom physically put her hand over the ribbon.
“No.”
Esme stared at her.
“You invited thirty people who didn't come, and now the one person who did come says Dad sent him.”
“That does not make him safe.”
Dante's expression barely changed.
“Fair.”
That surprised me.
I expected the frightening man from newspapers to argue.
Instead he stepped backward.
“The gifts stay with the girls.”
“No.”
“They were left to them.”
“By a dead man.”
“By Adrian.”
Mom's jaw tightened.
Hearing Dad's first name from Dante seemed to make everything worse.
Then Mom's executive assistant hurried into the ballroom.
“Celeste.”
“Not now.”
“It's about the parents.”
I looked up.
“What parents?”
Her eyes moved toward Mom.
That hesitation was becoming contagious.
I wheeled closer.
“Why didn't anyone come?”
Mom said:
“People canceled.”
The assistant looked miserable.
I asked:
“All thirty?”
Silence.
Esme understood first.
“Mom?”
Celeste removed her headset.
“I canceled the party.”
The answer hit differently than abandonment.
“Why?”
“I received something this afternoon.”
“What?”
“Nothing you need to see.”
I laughed.
“Apparently that's our family motto.”
Mom looked exhausted.
Not angry.
That frightened me more.
Dante asked:
“When?”
“Four twelve.”
His eyes sharpened.
“Show me.”
“No.”
“What did you receive?”
Celeste looked toward us.
Then finally unlocked her phone.
A photograph.
An upstairs room.
Dust sheets.
Faded wallpaper.
A huge old dollhouse against one wall.
I knew it immediately.
Our childhood playroom.
It had been locked since Dad died.
Mom said there was water damage.
Later she said the wiring was unsafe.
Then she stopped explaining.
Beneath the photograph was one sentence:
ELEVEN YEARS OLD IS OLD ENOUGH.
Esme whispered:
“Who sent that?”
“No number.”
Dante took one look.
Then his attention moved toward my unopened box.
“Adrian chose eleven.”
Mom snapped:
“Don't.”
I stared at him.
“For what?”
Dante answered carefully.
“He left instructions.”
“What instructions?”
“If your mother had told you the truth before today, I was supposed to destroy those gifts.”
“And if she hadn't?”
His eyes moved toward Celeste.
“I was supposed to deliver them.”
Mom said:
“He had no right.”
Something inside me shifted.
Not because she denied whatever Dad had planned.
Because she did not ask what was inside.
She already knew enough to fear it.
I pulled the envelope from my ribbon.
Inside was one object.
A small brass key.
No letter.
No explanation.
Just a tiny paper tag tied around it.
May you like
One word.
PLAYROOM.
