Chapter 5 - The Property Beneath the Music
The gala was canceled.
Officially, Victoria had suffered a “sudden vocal issue.”
Unofficially, every influential person in the building understood something had happened backstage.
By midnight, lawyers were everywhere.
Alexander’s general counsel, Miriam Hale, arrived with property records dating back thirty-five years.
Elena sat in a rehearsal room drinking untouched coffee.
Maya remained with her.
“You can go home,” Elena said.
“No.”
“You could lose your job.”
“I’ve lost jobs before.”
“Not one like this.”
Maya smiled faintly.
“You sound like Sebastian.”
Elena looked at her.
Maya continued.
“Everybody keeps saying the truth is expensive.”
“It is.”
“So is lying.”
Alexander entered carrying a binder.
His face had changed since Sebastian’s last sentence.
Did you think your father was innocent?
Miriam placed documents across a piano.
“Orpheus Properties purchased the east annex and air rights in November 1996.”
Maya frowned.
“Air rights?”
“Development rights above the property.”
“How valuable?”
“Today? Potentially hundreds of millions.”
Elena stared.
Alexander pointed to another paper.
“The seller was a nonprofit entity partly controlled by the Reed Cultural Foundation.”
“And Celeste objected?”
“We think so.”
Miriam showed them meeting minutes.
The sale had been approved using Celeste’s signature fourteen days after she vanished.
Alexander said, “My father signed too.”
Elena watched him.
“That doesn’t mean he forged hers.”
“No.”
But he sounded as if he already knew where the road led.
Miriam continued.
“Orpheus was indirectly owned through two Delaware entities. One was connected to Sebastian Marlowe.”
“And the other?” Maya asked.
Miriam looked at Alexander.
“Harbor Meridian Trust.”
Alexander closed his eyes.
“My father’s private investment vehicle.”
Elena felt sick.
Richard Reed and Sebastian Marlowe had secretly purchased charity-controlled property from themselves.
At a fraction of its future value.
Celeste had discovered it.
Maya whispered, “How much did they make?”
Miriam answered.
“Orpheus refinanced and redeveloped portions of the site over three decades. Current cumulative value and distributions could exceed two hundred and forty million dollars.”
Elena stared.
Thirty years of silence.
Two hundred and forty million dollars.
Alexander looked toward the dark stage.
“My family’s foundation has donated almost forty million back to St. Aurelia.”
Maya said gently, “Using money partly made from property taken from it.”
Alexander laughed once.
“Yes.”
The irony was brutal.
He had spent years being praised for generosity while unknowingly returning fragments of what his father had helped steal.
Elena looked at the brooch fragments in an evidence envelope.
“Celeste said there were ledgers.”
“Orpheus ledger,” Maya said.
The note.
Alexander turned.
“Did she tell you where?”
“No.”
“Think.”
Elena closed her eyes.
October 14, 1996.
Celeste sitting beside her while Elena stitched a hidden pocket.
“She said, ‘If they take the copies, there’s another set where Sebastian never looks.’”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Maya asked, “Costume department?”
Elena opened her eyes.
“Maybe.”
They began searching old inventory records.
St. Aurelia had kept astonishingly detailed wardrobe logs.
Not because anyone expected them to solve a disappearance thirty years later.
Because opera companies were obsessive about expensive costumes.
At 2:14 a.m., Maya found an entry.
RED VELVET CLOAK — donor gala 10/14/96.
Returned damaged.
Transferred to Marlowe Costume Archive, 1998.
Elena stared.
“That’s Celeste’s cloak.”
Alexander looked at her.
“The one with blood?”
“Yes.”
Miriam said, “Where is the Marlowe archive?”
Victoria answered from the doorway.
“Connecticut.”
Everyone turned.
She had changed out of her gown.
Without stage makeup and diamonds, she looked younger.
More tired.
“My father stores old St. Aurelia costumes at the Marlowe estate.”
Alexander said, “Why?”
“He calls himself a preservationist.”
Maya said, “That’s convenient.”
Victoria ignored her.
“The cloak is probably there.”
“Will he let us inspect it?” Miriam asked.
Victoria laughed.
“No.”
“Then we pursue legal process.”
Victoria looked toward Elena.
“You won’t get it quickly.”
“Why?”
“My father moves things when he’s frightened.”
Alexander stiffened.
“How do you know?”
“Because he already called the house manager.”
Victoria held up her phone.
“I heard him say, ‘Clear the Founders’ Room before morning.’”
Miriam immediately reached for her phone.
“I can contact law enforcement.”
“On what grounds?” Alexander asked.
“Potential evidence related to financial fraud and a missing-person investigation.”
Elena whispered, “The police closed Celeste’s case years ago.”
Alexander looked at her.
“Then we reopen it.”
He called a retired detective he knew through a foundation board member, then insisted on speaking to the NYPD missing persons cold-case unit.
Money opened doors.
Elena disliked that.
Tonight, she was grateful for it.
At 3:06 a.m., a detective named Renee Foster agreed to review the original Celeste Reed file.
But a warrant would require probable cause.
Miriam began assembling evidence.
The forged-looking signature.
The hidden note.
Elena’s statement.
The brooch.
Victoria’s account that Sebastian possessed the jewelry.
Then Victoria said quietly, “I can get the cloak.”
Alexander looked at her.
“How?”
“It’s legally in the family collection.”
“You’d remove it without your father’s permission?”
“I’m a beneficiary of the trust that owns the collection.”
Miriam said, “Do not steal anything.”
“I said I can access it.”
Alexander studied her.
“Why help us?”
Victoria stared toward the costume room.
“Because my father just told me my entire life was purchased.”
Her voice cracked.
“And I want to know what currency he used.”
She left for Connecticut with Miriam’s written instructions not to alter, damage, or conceal anything.
Elena remained at St. Aurelia with Maya and Alexander.
At four in the morning, Alexander asked the question Elena had been dreading.
“Who delivered your seventy-five thousand dollars?”
Elena looked down.
“A lawyer.”
“Sebastian’s?”
“No.”
Alexander’s face tightened.
“Whose?”
Elena whispered, “Your father’s.”
Alexander stopped moving.
“Richard paid you?”
“Yes.”
“You said Sebastian threatened you.”
“He did.”
“But my father paid.”
“Yes.”
Alexander walked away.
Then Elena added, “I kept the letter.”
He turned slowly.
“What letter?”
“The one that came with the money.”
“Where?”
“My apartment.”
“What does it say?”
Elena looked directly at him.
“It says if I ever spoke publicly about that night, Richard Reed would make sure nobody believed me.”
Alexander stared at her.
The story had just shifted again.
Sebastian had frightened Elena.
May you like
But Richard Reed had purchased the silence.
And somewhere between those two men, Celeste had vanished.
