Chapter 2 - The Funeral Photograph
Ronan did not believe Ivy.
Alexander died when Ivy was barely twenty.
At that time, she had supposedly been working in another state.
She didn’t join the Blackwood household until four years later.
So how could Alexander have given her the key?
Ivy refused to explain in the ballroom.
Vivienne laughed.
“Ask her why she changed her name.”
That stopped Ronan.
Ivy’s employment file said:
Ivy Lancaster.
But background review revealed no Ivy Lancaster before age twenty-two.
Earlier records belonged to:
Ivy Mercer.
Different surname.
Same birth date.
Same photograph.
Why change it?
“Family reasons,” Ivy said.
Ronan ordered no one to touch her and moved everyone into the library off the ballroom.
Lena stayed because Ivy insisted.
Vivienne stayed because she knew too much.
Then Ronan demanded proof.
Ivy produced none.
So Ronan called his mother’s old estate archivist.
Funeral photographs were retrieved.
One showed Alexander inside private family chapel before burial.
On his chest:
the brass key.
Visible.
Undeniable.
Then a second photograph.
Same chapel.
Twenty minutes later.
The key was gone.
Nobody had noticed.
Ronan stared.
“Who was in the room between these pictures?”
The archivist checked logs.
Three people.
The funeral director.
Ronan’s mother, Eleanor Blackwood.
And Vivienne’s father:
Graham Hale.
Vivienne’s smile disappeared.
Ronan looked at her.
“Your father was there?”
“He was Alexander’s lawyer.”
“Why did you say the key was buried if you knew it disappeared before burial?”
“I didn’t know.”
Ronan watched her carefully.
For once, she looked genuinely unsettled.
Then the archivist found something else.
A funeral inventory sheet.
The key was listed not as “personal effect.”
It was labeled:
BLACKWOOD KEY — UNIT 7.
Ronan frowned.
Unit 7?
No room in Blackwood Manor had that number.
No estate vault.
No company archive.
Then Ivy whispered:
“It wasn’t a room.”
“What was it?”
May you like
She looked at the key in Ronan’s hand.
“Your father called it the one place no Blackwood was allowed to inherit.”
