My Fiancé Was Reported Killed in France in 1918 — Then I Heard His Voice Threatening a Woman in a War Office and Saw a Boy With His Exact Eyes
The next morning, I arrived at the Bureau to find my usual passkey no longer worked for the primary ledger room. A curt notice on the door, signed by Arthur, declared my access revoked due to “pending internal review.”
My formal audit memos, meant for the Director, were gone from my desk. Arthur had intercepted them. He wasn’t just blocking me; he was cutting me out.
He stood in the hallway, leaning against the doorframe of his own office, a smug look on his face.
“Lost something, Caroline?” he asked, a subtle mocking tone in his voice. “Some things are beyond your purview. Especially matters of national security.”
“National security? Or your cousin’s criminal enterprise?” I retorted, my voice low but sharp.
He pushed off the doorframe, his demeanor shifting. “Julian had his reasons for needing to disappear. Reasons you wouldn’t understand. Reasons that involved… certain manifest discrepancies before he even shipped out. Grain shipments. Missing hundreds of thousands of bushels.”
My stomach dropped. Not just payrolls. Julian was involved in something far larger, far more dangerous. Arthur wasn’t just covering for Julian; he was implicated too. He must have held this over Julian, the evidence of falsified grain manifests, which forced Julian’s hand even further into the elaborate death hoax.
“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it,” Arthur said, a cruel smile forming. “Just know that if you pursue this, you’ll be the one facing charges. Tampering with classified documents. Obstructing a military investigation.”
Later that evening, as the gaslights cast long shadows in my small Arch Street boarding room, a soft knock came at the door. It was Beatrice. Her eyes were red, swollen.
“Caroline,” she pleaded, her voice thick with tears. “Please, just stop. Everyone thinks you’re… unwell. Mother and Father are so upset. You’re destroying the family name.”
She reached out, grabbing my arm, her grip surprisingly strong. “Why are you making up these stories about Julian? Can’t you just accept what happened? It’s over.”
I looked at her, truly looked, and saw not malice, but genuine, misguided fear. She truly believed I was unhinged by grief.
I pulled my arm away gently. “Beatrice, I am not making it up. Julian is alive. He’s a criminal. And he’s using a child.”
She shook her head, tears streaking her face. “You don’t sound like yourself. This isn’t you, Caroline.”
As she left, her retreating footsteps echoing in the narrow hall, I felt the last vestiges of family connection fray and snap. No allies left. No one to help me. I was completely alone.
The realization settled in my bones like an icy weight. Then, a cold clarity. If I had no one, then I had nothing left to lose. I would make my final move alone.
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