PAGE 7 — THE TRUTH COMES OUT

Ruth turned.

Thomas stood in the doorway.

He was holding a gun.

“Give me the box.”

Ruth stepped backward.

“Did you kill your father?”

Thomas shook his head.

“No.”

“Then where is he?”

“Alive.”

Ruth’s eyes widened.

“Where?”

Thomas lowered the gun.

“I didn’t want to hurt him.”

“What happened?”

“He discovered what I had done.”

Ruth stared at him.

“You stole the money.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Thomas’s expression hardened.

“Because I was drowning.”

He explained everything.

He had borrowed heavily to save his business.

Edward had refused to help him.

So Thomas secretly took money from the family account.

Edward discovered it.

He threatened to expose him.

Thomas panicked.

But he insisted he hadn’t attacked his father.

“Then who did?”

A voice came from the hallway.

“Me.”

They turned.

Eleanor stood there.

Thomas’s mother.

She was holding a revolver.

Ruth felt the room spin.

“You?”

Eleanor smiled sadly.

“Your father was going to give everything away.”

“To Ruth?”

“Yes.”

Thomas stared at her.

“You knew?”

“I knew everything.”

Eleanor explained that she had discovered Edward’s plan.

He intended to return the stolen land and money to Ruth’s family.

He also intended to expose the Whitmore family’s decades of corruption.

Eleanor couldn’t allow it.

So she confronted him.

They argued.

She struck him.

He fell.

She thought she had killed him.

But he survived.

And she hid him in an abandoned servants’ cottage on the property.

Thomas stared at his mother.

“You did this?”

“I did what I had to do.”

Ruth stepped forward.

“No.”

Eleanor raised the gun.

“You don’t understand.”

“I understand perfectly.”

Then a voice came from behind them.

“I don’t think you do.”

Everyone turned.

Edward Whitmore stood in the doorway.

Alive.

Bruised.

But alive.

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