00:00That, said the voice from the doorway, is a very dangerous question to be asking in this room.
00:05Dump.
00:06Maya spun around, half expecting palace security.
00:11Instead, standing in the archived doorway was a man in his sixties, silver-haired,
00:17dressed not in a guard's uniform, but in the formal grey coat of the palace's private physician.
00:23Doctor!
00:24Whitmore, Adrian said slowly, recognizing him at once.
00:28You treated Isabel. You signed her death certificate.
00:32I did, Doctor Whitmore said, stepping into the room and closing the door quietly behind him.
00:38And I've spent three years waiting for someone to finally ask me the right question about it.
00:44Doctor Whitmore moved slowly toward the open filing cabinet, running a hand over the folder, Adrian still held.
00:51Sonkuri Shlomo, I need you to understand something before I say anything else, he said.
00:56I've served this family for thirty years.
00:59I delivered you, Adrian.
01:00I was in that operating room, the night your mother nearly died giving birth to you.
01:05Everything I did, I did believing it was to protect this family.
01:09Just tell us, Adrian said, voice tight.
01:13Is Isabel alive?
01:14Dr. Whitmore hesitated, glancing at Christina and Maya, as if weighing how many people should hear what came next.
01:23Yes, he finally said.
01:25Isabel Voss is alive.
01:27What taken on the words landed like a physical blow.
01:30Adrian sat down heavily on a nearby cabinet ledge, hands pressed to his face.
01:35Two weeks before the accident, Isabel came to me in confidence, Dr. Whitmore continued.
01:42She'd found evidence that the palace's shipping agreements with the Ashworth family were being used to blonder funds through falsified
01:50trade manifests.
01:51Money that was quietly funding something your father never wanted, made public.
01:56A private security operation, Dr. Whitmore said.
02:00Not palace guards.
02:01Something separate.
02:02Something your father controlled entirely outside official crown budgets, answerable to no one but him.
02:09Maya's stomach turned.
02:10Isabel found out the king was running a private, unaccountable security force off laundered trade money.
02:16She was going to expose it.
02:18Dr. Whitmore said.
02:20She told me the night before the accident that she planned to bring the evidence directly to the International Trade
02:26Council.
02:26I believe, though I was never told outright, that your father found out first, so he had her killed.
02:33Adrian said, voice hollow.
02:36No, Dr. Whitmore said quickly.
02:39I don't believe that, and I never did.
02:42I believe your father is capable of many things, Adrian, but not that.
02:47What I believe happened is this.
02:49Someone within his private security operation panicked.
02:53They staged the accident to silence her before she could go public, without the king's direct order, and possibly without
03:00his full knowledge.
03:02At least not until after it happened.
03:04Then why fake her death instead of just letting her actually die?
03:08Maya asked.
03:09Because I intervened, Dr. Whitmore said.
03:12I was the physician called to the scene.
03:15Isabel survived the crash, barely.
03:18When I realized what had actually happened, I made a choice.
03:22I told your father she'd died, and instead, with help from people I trusted completely,
03:28I got her out of Belmore and into hiding, somewhere his private operation would never think to look.
03:35Does my father know she's alive?
03:37Adrian asked.
03:39I don't know, Dr. Whitmore admitted.
03:41For three years, I've told no one, not even you, Adrian.
03:45Though it broke something in me every single day to watch you grieve a woman who was still breathing.
03:50I only kept the photograph and note in this archive as insurance, in case anything ever happened to me.
03:57Where?
03:58Are you she?
03:59Adrian asked, standing now, desperate energy replacing his shock.
04:04I need to see her.
04:06That's exactly what I was afraid you'd say, Dr. Whitmore said grimly,
04:10and it's exactly why I need you to think very carefully before you act.
04:14If your father's private security operation discovers Isabel is alive, especially now,
04:21especially with Miss Reyes and the engagement scandal already drawing public attention to this family,
04:26they will finish what they started three years ago.
04:29Maya stood quietly through all of it, watching Adrian's entire understanding of his own life collapse and rebuild in real
04:37time.
04:38She felt something complicated rising in her chest.
04:41Not jealousy exactly, but the sharp sudden awareness that whatever she and Adrian had started building over the past few
04:49days,
04:49now existed in the shadow of a wife, who wasn't actually gone.
04:54Adrian, she said carefully.
04:57If she's alive, this changes everything about what we agreed to.
05:01Maya, I need you to know, whatever happens next, none of what's happened between us has been a lie.
05:07I know, Maya said quietly.
05:10But you still have a wife, Adrian, a real one, alive somewhere, waiting for a family that told the entire
05:18world she was dead.
05:20Christina, watching the exchange, spoke up carefully.
05:23There will be time to sort out what this means for the two of you.
05:27Right now, we have a much bigger problem.
05:30If we don't get to Isabel before your father's people figure out we know the truth, none of this will
05:34matter anyway.
05:35Dr. Whitmore pulled a small worn notebook from his coat pocket, flipping to a page near the back.
05:42I have an address.
05:44A small coastal town, three hours from here, under a name that isn't hers.
05:49I check on her twice a year, always in secret, always alone.
05:54He handed the notebook to Adrian.
05:57Go tonight, he said, before anyone realizes this folder has been opened.
06:02As the four of them turned to leave the archive, the overhead light suddenly flickered once, then cut out completely,
06:10plunging the room into total darkness.
06:12That's not a power outage, Christina whispered, voice tight with fear.
06:18The east wing runs on an independent generator.
06:21Someone just cut it manually.
06:22In the pitch black, Maya heard the heavy metal door creak slowly open, followed by footsteps, deliberate and unhurried, moving
06:32directly toward them.
06:34Adrian, Maya whispered, reaching for his hand in the dark.
06:39Someone already knows we're in here.
06:41Coming up in episode six.
06:43In the dark, trapped in the east wing with an unseen intruder, Adrian, Maya and Christina must escape the palace
06:51before dawn to reach Isabel first.
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