The Silent Guest

Chapter Seven

Claire Vaughn sat alone in the dim interrogation room, the buzz of the overhead light now a constant drone in her ears. The silence pressed in, not from the room, but from within. The kind that comes when someone close is gone, and the world keeps spinning like it doesn't matter.

Laura was dead.

And no matter how complicated their relationship had been… she was the only one who had tried to tell Claire the truth.

She closed her eyes, letting the past come in—slowly, like a tide.

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Thirteen Years Ago

Age Eleven – Saint Paul's Apartment Complex, East London

Her mother always smelled like lavender and old paper. Books surrounded them—stacked in crates, lining window sills, leaning like fragile pillars in their tiny flat. Claire never knew why her mother never let anyone visit. Why she used false names when she filled out school forms. Why she kept a suitcase always packed, under her bed.

She remembered the night she asked, "Why can't I use Dad's name?"

Her mother had flinched, just barely.

"It's not safe," she'd whispered. "That name carries weight. And danger."

"But who is he?"

Silence.

Then: "A man who once had everything. And lost it because of who he was."

Claire remembered that answer like a scar—simple, cryptic, and heavy with meaning she wouldn't understand for years.

She also remembered the night her mother came home shaking, a torn envelope clutched in her hand. Claire had peeked at it while her mother slept. A photograph of a man standing in front of a grand estate. Goodman Mansion.

On the back, just one word: Run.

They left the next morning. Different city. Different name. Again.

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Six Years Ago

Age Eighteen – Elise Vaughn's Flat, Manchester

Elise was colder. Calmer. Less afraid—but more guarded. She never spoke of her sister unless pressed.

"You want answers, Claire? Then don't dig. The Goodman aren't a family. They're a machine. They eat people like your mother."

"But she loved him," Claire argued once, voice shaking. "Didn't she?"

"She loved what she thought he was. Then she learned what he did."

"Who was he?"

Elise poured herself a drink and stared out the window. "Your father was Richard Goodman. And everything after that? Doesn't matter."

But it did matter.

Claire had dug anyway. Quietly. Carefully.

Found whispers online. Articles scrubbed clean. Mentions of a hidden child. The family denied it. Lawyers threatened journalists. Laura Goodman went silent. Elise got more paranoid.

So Claire had let it go.

Until two months ago, when Laura reached out.

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Two Months Ago

The Bench Behind the Goodman Library – Midnight

Laura looked different than she did in the papers. Her hair was shorter. Her eyes harder. She wore grief like a coat that had become skin.

"You're her, aren't you?" Laura asked softly.

Claire nodded.

They sat in silence before Laura finally said, "You deserve to know what they did."

She handed Claire a slip of paper: a number, an address, and two words. The ledger.

Claire remembered the tremble in Laura's hands. The way she kept looking over her shoulder.

"They killed your mother. Not directly. But they forced her to run. And run. And run until it broke her."

"I thought it was an overdose," Claire whispered.

Laura's smile was bitter. "That's what the coroner said. The Goodmans know how to write endings. But some of us still have chapters left."

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Now – Goodman Mansion

Claire opened her eyes again, breath shaky. The lamp still hummed. The walls were still too white.

But her world had changed.

She was no longer the girl Elise protected.

She was a Goodman now—acknowledged, hunted, possibly next.

The door creaked open. Rachel returned, file in hand.

"Tell me about the ledger," the detective said.

Claire's voice was hollow but certain. "It's the only thing that can destroy the Goodman name."

Rachel's eyes narrowed. "And if Adam has it?"

Claire hesitated.

Then: "Then someone else is going to die."