Free Web NovelChapter 67: Chapter 67 Giving them an option
_Rowena’s POV_
I chose the morning deliberately.
Alice was weakened. Not finished, not yet, but the ground beneath her had shifted significantly and she knew it. The arrests, the exposed network, the names Rita had given us. All of it had been quietly moving through the right channels and Alice could feel the walls closing even if she couldn’t see exactly where they were coming from.
That feeling of losing control was exactly what I needed her to have right now.
Because a distracted Alice was a slower Alice.
And a slower Alice gave me time to clean my own house.
I called the head of our family’s guards before breakfast and gave the instruction simply and without explanation. Seal the courtyard. Nobody in, nobody out, without my direct authorization. Every gate, every side entrance, every path that led beyond the walls of this property. I wanted it all closed.
"How long?" he asked. freēwebnovel.com
"Until I say otherwise," I said.
He didn’t ask anything else.
I was in my study reviewing documents when my assistant came to tell me what I had been waiting to hear.
One of Alice’s women had tried to leave through the east gate.
Her name was Lena and she had been in this household for two years, always quiet, always helpful, and always positioned just close enough to useful conversations without ever appearing to try.
She had a talent for being present without being noticed. I had noticed her a long time ago but I had waited because catching one messenger meant nothing. I needed the right moment.
This was the right moment.
She had been carrying a sealed note. The guard had taken it from her before she could destroy it. He brought it to me unopened.
I looked at the outside of it for a moment, at the handwriting, at the particular way the seal had been pressed. Who still delivers messages like this?
“Alice. Using a phone, Celeste can track things, she has the resources..” Kyra chuckled as she said.
I laughed along and set it aside without opening it.
I already knew what it said. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that Lena had tried to send it, which meant Alice was rattled enough to reach out through secondary channels, which meant she was more exposed than she wanted to be.
I told the guard to hold Lena in the east hall and treat her with courtesy.
Then I sent for the stewards.
There were eleven of them in total. Men and women who had been placed in positions of financial and household management over the past several years, some by Alice directly, some through people connected to her, some who had been here before Alice’s influence reached this household and had simply been persuaded along the way.
They filed into the main hall one by one and stood in an uneven line in front of me.
I sat down. I didn’t stand to address them. I didn’t raise my voice. I folded my hands on the table in front of me and looked at each of them in turn, slowly, without hurrying.
The silence lasted long enough to be uncomfortable.
Then I spoke.
"I know who you are," I said. "All of you. I know when you were placed here, who placed you, and what you’ve been reporting. I know which accounts were accessed and approximately how much was moved and where it went." I paused. "I’m not guessing. I’m not trying to frighten you into a confession. I’m telling you what I already have because I think you deserve to understand exactly where you’re standing before I tell you what comes next."
The hall was very quiet. I watched faces carefully. Some of them had gone still and I was guessing they were scared. freёwebnovel.com
Others had dropped their eyes. One woman in the middle of the line had her hands clasped so tightly her knuckles had gone pale.
"Alice is losing," I said simply. "That’s not a threat, it’s information. The network she built is coming apart and the people connected to it are being identified one by one. You were placed here as her people. But she is not going to be able to protect you when everything collapses. She will protect herself first. That’s who she is and I think most of you already know that."
A few of them shifted. They made small movements. The kind people make when something they’ve been trying not to think about gets said out loud.
"Here is what I’m offering," I said. "Once. I won’t offer it again after today." I looked along the line again. "If you confess, fully and honestly, and if the funds you took or moved are returned within the window I give you, you will be released from this household free and clear. No charges filed. No names passed to the Alpha King’s office. You leave and you start over somewhere else and this is finished for you."
I let that sit for a moment.
"If you choose not to take that offer, what I already have goes to the appropriate authorities and you deal with those consequences without any protection from me." I kept my voice even. "I’m not angry. I’m not looking for punishment for its own sake. I want this household clean and I want it done quickly and I’m giving you the most direct route to that outcome."
Nobody spoke immediately.
But I could see it moving through them. The wavering. The quiet internal calculations of people who had committed to something that had seemed safer and more powerful than it now appeared to be.
Alice had promised them protection and certainty and money. She had delivered the money. The protection and certainty were looking considerably less reliable this morning.
The woman with the pale knuckles looked up first.
"If we confess," she said carefully, "everything we know?"
"Everything relevant to this household and Alice’s operations within it," I said. "Yes."
She looked at the floor. Then back at me. Then she nodded once.
One by one, not all of them, but most, began to nod.
I looked at the two who hadn’t moved.
"You have until tomorrow morning," I said quietly. "Think carefully."
I stood up and left the hall.
