CHAPTER 3 — The Girl in the Photograph
Weston believed he was protecting Holly.
He had no idea...
she had been protecting him from the beginning.
At 3:17 a.m...
an old man arrived at the estate.
No appointment.
No security clearance.
Just one leather briefcase and trembling hands.
His name was Gabriel Mercer.
Former intelligence analyst.
Retired twenty years earlier.
Weston almost refused to meet him.
Until Gabriel placed a faded photograph on the desk.
Weston's heartbeat stopped.
The picture showed a teenage girl standing beside three magnificent Friesian horses.
She couldn't have been older than sixteen.
Wind pushed her dark hair across her face.
One horse rested its forehead against her palm.
Exactly the way Midnight had.
The girl...
was Holly.
Only...
her name written on the back wasn't Holly Bennett.
It read:
Helena Ashcroft.
The last surviving daughter of the Ashcroft family.
A dynasty that had bred championship horses for generations...
until they vanished in a single night.
Weston frowned.
"I've never heard of them."
Gabriel's face darkened.
"That's because someone spent billions making sure no one ever would."
He slid over another file.
Inside were newspaper clippings.
Fire.
Explosions.
Bankruptcies.
Accidents.
Disappearances.
One family erased from history.
Every death officially ruled unrelated.
Gabriel leaned closer.
"They weren't accidents."
"They were executions."
Weston slowly looked back at the photograph.
"So Holly..."
"...is the last survivor?"
Gabriel nodded once.
"No."
"She's something far more dangerous."
Weston's eyes narrowed.
"What do you mean?"
The old man whispered only six words.
"She remembers who ordered them all."
Silence swallowed the room.
At that exact moment...
upstairs...
Holly opened Mary's bedroom window.
Midnight stood quietly beneath the moonlight.
The stallion suddenly raised his head...
and let out a deafening cry.
Not at the night.
Not at the wind.
But toward the tree line.
Hidden in the darkness...
twelve armed assassins had already surrounded the Hargrove estate.
Their leader lifted a rifle...
locked the scope on Holly...
and smiled.
"End the last Ashcroft."
May you like
He squeezed the trigger.
TO BE CONTINUED...
