Chapter 4 - The Ledger of Lies
The floorboards groaned softly beneath his bare feet as he closed the distance between the armoire and the bed. My heart hammered so violently against my ribs that I was certain the sound echoed off the plaster walls. I forced my breathing to remain slow and even, mimicking the steady cadence of deep slumber, though every instinct screamed at me to bolt upright and scream.
He stopped right beside my side of the mattress. For a long, terrifying moment, absolute silence hung in the room, broken only by Marcus’s heavy, rhythmic snoring.
Then, a cold draft swept across the bed as the heavy blanket was lifted just an inch. Something heavy brushed against my ankle—not a hand this time, but the corner of the leather ledger, sliding discreetly beneath my side of the mattress, right where my legs rested.
A trap. He had hidden the evidence of whatever dark secret that book contained right under my sleeping body, framing me or testing my awareness.
"I know you're awake, girl," his raspy whisper scraped against the silence, so low it was barely audible above the wind rattling the windowpanes outside. "A true daughter of this house doesn't spy. She learns her place."
He didn't wait for a response. With the same fluid, silent motion, he slipped back into the space between Marcus and me, pulling the heavy wool blanket back over his shoulders.
I lay frozen in the dark, the leather edge of the hidden ledger pressing uncomfortably against my left thigh. Every second ticked past like an eternity. The clock on the dresser crept toward 5:00 a.m., the first pale fingers of dawn beginning to bleed through the heavy velvet drapes, turning the shadows in the room from pitch black to an eerie, sickly gray.
Marcus stirred beside his father, stretching his arms with a loud yawn as the morning light illuminated the ceiling.
"Morning, Dad. Morning, sweetheart," Marcus said brightly, turning his head toward me with a smile that looked completely sickening in the harsh morning light. He leaned across his father’s chest, kissing my cheek. "How do you feel? Did you sleep well? The tradition always brings profound peace."
I stared into my husband's eyes—eyes that looked entirely sincere, completely oblivious to the psychological terror and hidden contraband resting just inches away from my body.
"I didn't sleep at all, Marcus," I said, my voice dangerously calm, devoid of any newlywed warmth.
Marcus blinked, his smile faltering slightly as he looked at my expression. "Well, adjustment takes time, honey. Dad is just trying to—"
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Before Marcus could finish his sentence, I reached down beneath the mattress, grabbed the heavy leather ledger by its spine, and pulled it out into the daylight, slamming it down flat on top of the comforter right between the two men.
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