39. Isabel
Isabel
It’s pitch black outside when I crawl out of bed and stumble into my bathroom, moving slower than usual. The dull ache that lingers with every step isn’t unpleasant, just a gentle reminder of everything that happened last night.
What stands out more is the absence of noise in my head.
Aiden has quickly turned into my person. The one I know I can count on to pull me out of my head, to quiet the noise and keep me from spiraling over shit I can’t control.
Grabbing my fluffy robe from the back of the door, I slip it on and sneak out. Aiden doesn’t stir, still sound asleep, a slight snore rumbling from his chest.
I pause without meaning to. It’s hard not to admire what’s right in front of me. There’s something unfair about how tempting he looks, even like this. Relaxed, completely unaware, and still impossible to ignore.
One hundred percent lick-able. Exactly what I plan on doing to him later once I’ve had some time to myself.
I’m on a mission.
This is the first time I’ve stepped foot in the penthouse since the fire. The place doesn’t look much different. Not exactly what I expected.
Fires are supposed to leave their mark. Charred walls, damage you can’t ignore. But here, it was contained. The only substantial damage is in the kitchen. It’ll require attention. New appliances. Cabinets need replaced. Other than that, the rest of the place feels untouched. A good thing.
Almost like nothing happened. Not sure if that’s comforting… or unsettling.
I pass the gallery’s locked door on my way to grandfather’s office. Going inside will have to wait. Right now, I need answers. Trent gave me enough to go on. I just have to see what’s actually there.
The door is closed, just like always. I’m about to open it when my attention is drawn to my right, down a short hall that leads to his bedroom.
I shouldn’t go that way, but I can’t stop my feet from moving. Each step feels heavier the closer I get, because I already know I’m not going to like what I see. Aiden mentioned it’s ransacked, but the reality proves worse than I’d imagined.
The room is destroyed. Furniture overturned, drawers emptied, everything scattered, torn apart piece by piece.
Trying not to let my thoughts spiral, I step around the mess and over to the bathroom door. I don’t go inside. I can’t.
The glimpse I catch is enough. Dried blood. The broken mirror. My chest tightens, my pulse racing as I turn and rush out of the room before it pulls me any further under.
The hallway feels darker when I step into it. I brace a hand against the wall, taking a moment to catch my breath and regroup.
Tears sting as the image forms. My grandfather standing there, unaware, caught in a moment he didn’t know would be his last. The thought lingers, digging deeper every second.
What begins as grief evolves into something else. It sharpens, twists, and becomes difficult to hold back.
Anger. Rage. All the things I felt earlier returns with a vengeance. I stomp my way back down the hall and shove the office door open.
The strong whiff of cigar and bourbon instantly hit me, two of his favorite things. He didn’t always smoke them. Most of the time it sat untouched in the ashtray, slowly burning. It was never about the taste; he liked the smell.
A quiet laugh slips out as the memory surfaces. The one and only time I snuck a puff of his cigar. It was a disaster. I nearly puked and hacked up a lung before I could even pretend I liked it.
When he caught me, he started to scold me, but that didn’t last. That familiar smirk tugged at his lips. “Serves you right for trying to smoke my cigars before you’re old enough.”
The room carries a chill that has nothing to do with the temperature. A sadness lingers in the air that I can’t quite put into words. Moving to his desk, I let my fingers glide over the smooth cherry-mahogany wood, tracing the surface where he spent so much of his time.
When I was younger, I’d pretend to be him. Planted my butt in his chair and tried my best to scowl at the chairs across from it. The same way I’d seen him do with my grandmother when she’d say something he didn’t agree with.
Rico Lopez was a hard man to understand. I never feared him, but I knew others did. He rarely raised his voice, but there was a sternness in the way he spoke that made people know he wasn’t leaving room for argument.
I used to be curious about his business. He refused to talk about it. Dismissed it as complicated, insisting it wouldn’t interest me. Back then I let it go. Now, I can’t.
Standing here, it’s impossible not to question it. It was never about sparing me the details. He kept it from me because he had no other choice. His world was tied to men like Trent. Illegal, hidden shit that had to stay buried if he wanted to keep seeing me.
I came in here to grab the key for the gallery, but then it occurs to me that the only key I know about is the one in the safe. The one Aiden used when he searched the penthouse.
That changes things.
I settle into his desk chair and let my eyes wander the room, replaying what Trent revealed about a hidden camera. Given everything I know now, it doesn’t feel far-fetched.
Where would my grandfather hide a camera?
It would need a clear view of the entire office. Dead spots wouldn’t make sense. Faces matter. Meaning it’s behind me.
I spin the leather chair around and study the floor-to-ceiling bookcase. My grandfather was a collector. Loved the classics. First editions were his prize possessions, though he only owned a few. The rest were third and fourth editions, all carefully preserved.
A few years ago, I found a rare second edition of The Canterbury Tales. It cost more than I want to admit, but worth it when it pulled a rare smile from my grandfather. Something I’ll never forget.
Standing, I move closer, searching until I find it encased inside a glass box, carefully protected from time. Not all his books are protected like this, only those he considered priceless—irreplaceable.
He has an impressive collection. Most aren’t first editions, but that never seemed to matter to him. It was more about the stories and history they carried.
Birds of America. Oliver Twist. I used to beg him to read that one to me.
The Prince. Paradise Lost. The Great Gatsby, second edition. Fanny Hill. That was a gift from my grandmother, earning her one of his famous eye rolls. Erotic romance wasn’t his thing.
Fahrenheit 451. Lord of the Flies. Animal Farm. Dracula, first edition. The Hobbit. The Canterbury Tales, fourth edition. The Grapes of Wrath. The Bell Jar.
I stop. Something’s not sitting right.
Another copy of The Canterbury Tales.
That shouldn’t be there. My grandfather didn’t keep duplicates. One edition was enough, no matter how rare. He’d always said there was no point in owning the same book twice.
Which means this doesn’t belong.
It’s just out of reach, too high for me to grab without standing on something. So I do what I’ve done more than once, and what used to get me in trouble every time he caught me.
“Sorry, Gramps, but this is important,” I apologize as I climb the shelves, balancing carefully until I’m high enough to reach it. The moment I touch the book, I know.
“Good move, old man,” I whisper, a hint of admiration slipping through. “No one would ever suspect one of these old editions to be hollowed out and made into a camera. You sure fooled the hell out of me.”
Because I don’t want to mess something up, I let it go. This is Aiden’s area. He’ll know what to do. There’s probably a backup system hidden in here as well.
I step down and slip—exactly what my grandfather warned me would happen when I climbed furniture. I land on my arse, barely missing the edge of the desk with my head.
A huff leaves me, followed by a short burst of laughter as I collapse onto my back. It dries up quickly. My attention drawn to the black box mounted underneath, just behind a drawer that’s shorter than the others.
“Well, fuck me,” I mumble to myself.
It’s small, with a lock that requires a code, the same as the wall safe. One I’m ninety percent sure I don’t have.
“When he hid this here, he had to know eventually we’d find it. That we’d need to get inside,” I say under my breath, piecing things together.
My grandfather loved mind games. He used to leave me coded messages, expecting me to work them out on my own. No hints. No help.
When I didn’t, that was it. No reward. He made sure I understood early on that if I wanted answers, I had to earn them.
“So… now what? How am I supposed to solve this? Would be easier if you’d left me one of those coded messages now, Gramps.”
I started with the obvious, entering the code from the safe. Nothing. Not surprised. My grandfather wasn’t careless enough to make it that easy.
I move through the next options—birthdays, important dates, anything that held some sort of meaning.
Nothing.
“Seriously, why did you make this so damn hard?” I grumble and slap the floor with my palm. “You could’ve just written it down in that damn letter you left me.”
I close my eyes. The words from his letter playing in my head. One part never made sense to me. The ending about the physician and the year holding the key.
“Why the riddles?” I rub my forehead and try to make sense of a man who never did anything the easy way.
Frustration wins out, and I slide out from under the desk, already accepting defeat. Maybe this is one I’m not meant to solve. Aiden’s tech friend Pauly will have to crack it.
But then my eyes land on the book I bought him. The answer hits me all at once. I smack my palm against my forehead and crawl back under the desk and type in the code: 1387. The year the book was first published.
Nothing happens. Either I’m wrong or the code isn’t long enough.
My grandfather’s voice echoes in my head, reminding me how important it was to make passwords difficult—long enough that no one could guess them by accident.
A smile pulls at my lips as the answer comes to me. Another game we played was knowing that each number was assigned letters, just like on a phone. I’d memorized those years ago, so it makes the next code I enter easier—physician1387.
There’s a click before it releases, and I grin like a crazy woman. A rush of pride settles in, the kind that comes from getting it right.
It disappears the moment I look inside.
A ledger and a set of keys.
One key is instantly familiar. A spare to the gallery. I’ll be heading there next. I need to figure out if what my grandmother told us about the walls is true or something her mind created to fill in the gaps.
With the ledger tucked under my arm, I climb out from under the desk and leave the office. The walk down the familiar hallway feels longer this time. The weight of what I might find pressing in with even step.
At the door, I insert the key into the lock and pause, taking a deep breath before turning it.
“Here goes nothing,” I whisper as I step inside, my gaze lifting to the bare walls.