Chapter 4 - The Woman Beneath the Château
Federal agents followed the tracker to an underground medical suite hidden beneath the wine cellar.
Elena was found alive, weak but conscious, behind a locked door.
Lily ran toward her, but doctors stopped the child until Elena was medically stable.
Alexander stood outside the glass room, devastated.
“You were beneath my house.”
Elena looked at him without comfort.
“I screamed while your guests danced above me.”
Margaret claimed Elena had entered treatment voluntarily after the motel fire.
Elena’s response was brutal.
“You drugged me, forged my death and called the locked door therapy because your family owns the clinic.”
Conrad produced medical reports describing Elena as delusional.
The physician who signed them had received two million dollars from the Blackwood Foundation.
Elena explained that Margaret needed her legally dead before Lily’s birthday.
Once Lily entered state custody, the family attorney could seize the worker shares through a guardianship petition.
Alexander apologized for signing the cremation order.
Elena’s eyes filled with anger.
“You had wealth, lawyers and every reason to ask questions. Poor parents lose children because they cannot afford one attorney. You had twelve and still chose convenience.”
He did not defend himself.
The employee ledger was recovered from the medical suite.
It showed that fifty-one percent of Blackwood Holdings belonged to workers and their descendants.
Margaret tried to leave.
Agents blocked her.
Then Elena opened the final ledger page.
Alexander’s name appeared beside the first stolen worker share.
He was not born a Blackwood.
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His biological mother had been a château maid named Teresa Morales.
Margaret had taken him as an infant.
