Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 66732 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66732 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 334(@200wpm)___ 267(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
No matter how much time changes things, never forget who you are.
I still recall our conversation.
“Wherever you go, never forget, Silas. Time passes quickly, and it’s easy to forget yourself. To forget to look after those who truly need it, especially when one has so much.”
“Mom, I work hard.”
“I know, my darling. I know. But life is not forever. Don’t lose yourself.”
She knew she was sick then. She just hadn’t told me yet.
“I don’t ever want you to wake up one morning and realize you’ve wasted your life on things that don’t matter.”
I set the binoculars down on the seat and turn away from my reflection. Would she think this doesn’t matter? My revenge on the Foxes? Yes. She would. But I console myself with one fact as I head out of Ophelia’s old, freezing bedroom and get to the task at hand. I still have a gala to attend, after all.
Things have changed. This isn’t solely about revenge anymore. She’d want me to protect Ophelia from them.
Ophelia isn’t like them. She’s innocent. I know that now. The ends will justify the means.
I tell myself that as I navigate around the boxes in this house with its creaking floorboards. I don’t go through all the rooms. I just wanted to see hers before I do what I really came to do.
I head down the stairs and from the front window, I see the SOLD sign still on the front lawn. I walk toward Hart’s study.
Several years after we’d moved in next door, an envelope had been delivered to the Fox house. Mom usually handled sorting the mail, but Sly happened to be standing there when the mailman came. I remember Sly reading the front of the envelope and opening it, ignoring me entirely as if I was invisible even as I stood in the same room fixing the window.
He’d pulled out whatever was inside, and I still remember his sucking in of breath before a wide smile spread across his face. He’d walked into his office and left the door open as he took photos of each page of whatever was inside. Arrogant move but not unlike him. He’d tucked it all back into the envelope then and called out to me, the look on his face not of one who’d been caught, but one of satisfaction, almost. Or something darker.
“Take this to the Harts. Make sure you hand it to Horatio directly. No one else, got it?”
I took the envelope from him, glanced at the front to see it was addressed to Horatio although the address was the Fox address.
“You opened it?”
“Accidentally,” he said with that grin that showed all his teeth. “Let him know, will you?”
There was something in his tone that made my skin crawl. But he just turned back into his office and slammed the door shut in my face. I walked that envelope over and rang the Harts’ doorbell. Ophelia had answered, and if it’d been Tonia, I don’t think she’d have walked me straight to Hart’s study and opened the door without knocking. I wonder if she’d found it strange to see her father on his knees fumbling with something, but when Ophelia threw the door open, he looked like a guilty man.
He caught my eye, knew I’d seen what he was doing, but he schooled his features quickly. He’d straightened the carpet and stood, muttering some excuse about spilling coffee all while Ophelia filled the moment with some rambling story about school.
Hart had turned to me, and when I handed him the envelope, he looked at it, then at me.
“Fox wanted you to know he opened it accidentally,” I said, knowing exactly how it sounded. Back then, as far as I was concerned, Horatio Hart and Sly Fox had too much in common for one to be any better than the other.
I still remember how Horatio’s face had lost its color. How he’d glanced into the kitchen where Ophelia was climbing up on a stool and chattering away to Tonia. Horatio didn’t even thank me before he’d closed the door, this time locking it behind him.
If I think back, the relationship between Horatio and Sly had been strained by then.
Now, I walk into that office, where the desk is gone. It was an antique and I imagine paid at least in part for his lawyer who ultimately wasn’t worth his salary, considering. The carpet is rolled up and standing against a corner. I remember the exact spot Hart had been when we’d barged in on him, and as I kneel, I take out my phone and switch on the flashlight to peer closely at the floorboards. I run my fingers over the old wood, feeling the uneven texture of it. They are beautiful, old floors. It takes me a few minutes, but I find the spot because a part of one of the floorboards is damaged, something you’d only see if you were looking this closely at it. It’s a very thin space between two boards where the wood is lighter.