As we see what’s on the computer screen, it’s the family photo that Sebastian was looking for. However, Jessica’s face has been removed. “Don’t worry. I can put it back the way it was,” he tells the woman.
Suddenly, Holly’s face appears in the photo, and the designer fits it right in the spot where Jessica’s face used to be. Holly just smiles from where she sits.
“Your kids are very attractive,” he says.
Holly just laughs, “Of course. They take after me. My Penelope is going to be a classical singer. She has an amazing voice. Cross is smart. His grades are always at the top of his class.”
As he finishes manipulating the picture, he nods his head, “You must be proud.”
He prints out the finished picture. He grabs it from the printer and hands it to her, “Here you go.”
Holly smiles at the photo. “We’re back to being a perfect family.”
“Well, gosh! Doesn’t that look great?” Logan Lee says as he snatches the photo from her hand.
Holly looks at him in shock. “Who are you?” she screams at him.
Logan pulls the picture down from in front of his face, and Holly’s eyes go wide. She remembers him from his visit to the penthouse. “You are…” she stammers, fear in her eyes at being caught.
Logan dragged her into an alley and showed her the picture, “This is a great photo, but if Mr. Gaston finds out, he’s going to flip his lid.”
Holly is terrified that this man knows what she’s been doing now.
“Inside the penthouse, you’re his housekeeper,” Logan says to her, “But outside, you act like you’re his wife. That’s not creepy at all.”
Holly pleads with him, “Please, Mr. Lee. I beg you, don’t tell him.”
“You know, it seems like you may have been doing stuff like this for a long time now, right?” he asks her, looking at the picture again. He’s obviously toying with this woman. “I mean, you’ve been working for him for years now, right? Do you have feelings for Mr. Gaston?”
Holly’s eyes go a little crazy, “All I did was love him. I never tried to take anything from her.”
Logan cackles. “Doesn’t that outfit you’re wearing belong to Mrs. Gaston? Can you really say you never took anything from her?” Logan tisk tisks. “I hate to say this, but I’m pretty close with Mr. Gaston. I don’t think I can let you get away with this.”
Holly drops to her knees, again pleading, “What do you want?”
Logan leans over until he’s face to face with her. “Tell me everything you know about Sebastian and Jessica Gaston. Tell me everything you know about what happened to Layla Kwon. Or should I call her Anna?”
“Wait. How did Layla die at Madison Tower?” Juliana asks as they all gather at the Tower’s community center. “It said on the news that she died on the south side.”
Carson wonders, “If she really died at Madison Tower, how did her body get over to her apartment building?”
Cross sits there. “It’s obvious. Someone moved her body.”
Eyes go wide all across the room at the suggestion.
“Remember the day of the lighting ceremony?” Cross continues.
“Tell me everything you know about what happened on the day of the lighting ceremony at Madison Tower,” Logan asks Holly.
Holly has drunk quite a bit of alcohol and is spilling her guts to Logan. “It was the first anniversary of Madison Tower. The place was filled with VIP guests. Movie stars. Politicians. Pop stars.”
“Did you take any photos?” he asks her.
Holly bobs her head drunkenly, reaching into her purse for her phone. “Of course.” She pulls up her photos and hands her phone over to him. “Here you go.”
Logan flips through. At first, he skips a photo of the angel fountain, but something catches his eye, and he flips it back. He uses his fingers to zoom in on the wings of the statue and the mysterious shoe that was found there on the night of the party.
“I bought this sneaker for her,” he says. He holds the phone to her, “Where are these shoes now?”
A lone shoe is placed on the table in the music lecture hall by Penelope Gaston the next day. They had once again locked themselves in.
“Oh my God. It’s disgusting!” Juliana cries out. “Why do you have this?”
Penelope looks at the shoe. “This is Layla’s shoe. I saw it in the lost and found and brought it here.”
“What?” asks Juliana.
Penelope sighs, “This was the shoe that was on the angel fountain the night of the party.” She lays her phone down next to it. “If you don’t believe me, look. I took a photo of the shoe that night when it was on the fountain.”
As they all compare the photo to the shoe, Sloane suddenly gasps, covering her mouth. “I remember now!”
“That’s right!” Juliana says. “Layla used to wear those nasty sneakers around. Does that mean she really died there? At Madison Tower?”
Carson stands up, “We should tell this to the police. If it’s true, she died there and was moved, this could be a murder. Maybe the one who sent us that strange text earlier knows who killed her. Or maybe he thinks we did it! We need to report this!”
“Are you dumb?” Cross asks him. “This means that whoever killed her is one of our parents.”
It seems no one took that into consideration.
“What kind of bullshit is that?” asks Carson.
Penelope shakes her head, “He’s right. Layla was killed by someone at Madison Tower. Otherwise, there’d be no reason to move her body.” The
bell rings, so Penelope takes the shoe, walks over to one of the lockers, and places the shoe inside. She locks it with a combination lock.
As the teacher lectures them on Schubert and his 1,200 compositions, not one of them can keep their mind on what’s being said.
Mariah notices that all of them seem to be on edge this morning.
As the bell rings, the teacher excuses them from class, and as if on cue, their cell phone lights up.
“I see you found my shoe,” the text reads. There’s a photo of the shoe with it.
Sloane gasps out loud and drops her phone on the floor.
Juliana spins around to look at Carson, who is looking at the photo.
Soon they have all rushed back to the music room. Penelope opens up the locker, and sure enough, the shoe is gone. She digs through her books, but there’s no shoe. She angrily pulls everything from the locker, letting it fall onto the floor. “Who’s fucking with us like this?” she yells out. “Your pranks suck! Show us who you are!”
“This prankster is definitely someone nearby,” Cross tells them.
Carson starts trying to open other lockers to see if the shoe is in one of them as Logan walks by and peeks at them through the window before moving on. He pauses and leans against the wall outside the building.
Logan: This proves that Layla was killed at Madison Tower.
Riley is vacuuming the condo, very cheerful as the television plays in the background.
“BioGen, the first company in the country to attempt a treatment for respiratory diseases, turns out to have failed their clinical trial.”
Riley stops vacuuming as she stares at the television.
“Stock prices are plummeting. The stock market has stopped all transactions for the day as the move is being made to delist the company.”
Riley sinks to her knees, “I can’t believe it.” She scrambles across the floor to her phone and dials, only to get a disconnect message. “Answer the phone!” she screams and dials again only to get the same recording.
“My money,” she struggles to catch her breath as the realization hits that she’s lost everything. She grabs her jacket and runs out of the condo.
The so-called financial advisor is standing in Sebastian’s office. “The news just reported it, sir. There’s no way she doesn’t know by now.”
Sebastian is looking out the window, and he just smiles at the news. Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out a stack of cash and throws it onto the floor behind him.
The fake adviser’s eyes light up, and he drops down to pick it up and then hurries out of the office.
“Did she think I’d let her take my money and get away with it?” Sebastian chuckles to himself. “I cannot believe I let an idiot like that get the better of me.”
Riley is sobbing, “I’m such an idiot!”
She’s sitting across from Jessica at the showroom and completely inconsolable.
Jessica reaches over to pat her back, “That’s enough of that. Blaming yourself won’t change anything. How much did you lose?”
Riley lifts her head up, trying to catch her breath, she’s crying so hard. “I invested the money I made with the auction. I even mortgaged the condo. It was everything I owned. I invested a million dollars, and it’s all gone.” She starts wailing again.
Jessica is actually shocked, “Who would recommend such a thing?”
Riley tries to get her crying under control, “The investment consultant on Madison Tower’s community website.” Then she remembers the phone conversation that Sebastian was on in the hotel lobby. “Your husband also
got a call about this same company. I overheard his conversation, and that is what finally convinced me to invest in BioGen.”
BioGen? Come to think of it, Jessica remembers seeing the brochure from that company on Sebastian’s desk in the study. It’s starting to make sense now. “Did he plan this from the beginning?” she wonders aloud.
“Wait,” Riley says. “Do you think he tricked me on purpose? I swear I’ll kill him! I’ll murder him with my bare hands!” She rises quickly to her feet, and Jessica does as well, reaching out for Riley’s hand.
“What are you going to do? First, you don’t have proof. They’ll treat you like you’re crazy,” Jessica tells her, knowing full well that Riley could just rush off and make things worse.
Which, of course, was Riley’s plan. “What do you expect me to do? Just sit here? Those assholes did this to me on purpose. It was the first time in my entire life that I had any amount of money.” She drops back down onto the couch and buries her head in her hands, and just cries.
Jessica sits back down as well, “Listen, I can help you with all of this. Calm down.”
“Those assholes!” Riley screams out.
Suddenly, Jessica has an idea. “I know how you can get back your stolen money from my husband.”
Riley looks up at her, “How?”
Jessica reaches for Riley’s hand, “Do you trust me? I just need you to do me one favor.”
Tears stream down Riley’s face as she tells her, “I’ll do whatever you need me to do.”
The next thing we see is Riley at the library, researching, using books and the library computers.
Jessica is sitting at her vanity, brushing her hair, when her phone chimes.
She opens her phone and reads, “You don’t have much time left. Seven days and counting.”
Jessica moves to her safe, punching in the code and opening it up. She pulls out a large red jewelry box. As she opens it up, we see Zoey’s red ruby ring that she discarded.
We also see that it’s still stained with Layla’s blood.
FOUR MONTHS AGO
As the cleaning crew deposits their daily pile of trash bags in the basement of Madison Tower, waiting for it to be taken away, we see Jessica watching until the path is clear, and she walks towards the bags of trash.
Taking two bags labeled “Kline,” she rips open the bags and begins to dig through them.
She digs until she finds the ring.
As she looks at the ring, she pulls it from the box and just stares at it.
Somewhere in her subconscious, she remembers seeing this ruby ring on the hands that had Layla around her throat before being thrown over the side of Madison Tower.
Of course, those nightmares didn’t start occurring until after she found the ring.
The question she has is, was it really Zoey and Sebastian she saw on the alcove.
Each day, Jessica spends time with Riley, coaching her. On what? We aren’t quite sure just yet.
Jessica then finds herself in Sebastian’s study as she finds all the information that Sebastian could find on Kira Khan.
She takes photos of each page.
Back at the showroom, Jessica looks at the painting she made of Layla with the apple necklace. When Zoey found this photo, Jessica was quick to make a new painting, only with a heart necklace, and then she hid this one.
Today, she stares at her daughter in the painting, “I promise I’ll find the person who killed you. It’s time to take action.”
Her phone chimes again.
“You have two days left. Are you ready to tell the truth?”
Jessica takes a deep breath and dials.
“Zoey? Can you make some time for me? There’s something I need to tell you. Of course, I can meet you in the music room. One hour? Perfect.”
Jessica’s smile fades as she hangs up the phone. It’s time.
“Sir, your applicant, is here for the investment team,” Jasper walks in and tells Sebastian.
Sebastian nods and rises from his desk, “Send them in.”
As Sebastian reaches for the resume, Riley Oh walks into his office.
“Hello. My name is Riley Oh,” some of her accent has been cleaned up, but it still has that charm to it. She’s been rehearsing daily with Jessica. She sits down at the chair in front of Sebastian’s desk.
Sebastian just can’t believe what he’s seeing. This woman, who he’s been trying to get rid of, is applying for a job at his company?” He just chuckles as he drops the resume on his desk. “You have a way of surprising people,” he tells her. “It’s not a trait I like very much.”
Riley shrugs softly, “It can be a strength or a weakness, depending on how you consider it. I promise you’ll find it charming at some point. I hear that you’re hiring an experienced investor, so I applied for the position.”
“I also don’t like how brazen you are,” Sebastian tells her. “I admire your courage, but this interview ends here. I have no questions for you, and I have no desire to employ you. Next!” he yells out to Jasper.
Riley doesn’t move, “You’ll regret this.”
“I won’t regret it one single bit,” he tells her, reaching for the next resume. “You can go on and get lost now.”
Riley smirks, standing to her feet and turning towards the door. “Come in, please?”
Confused, Sebastian looks up.
The sounds of footsteps as someone walks into the office. “At last, we finally meet, Mr. Gaston. I’m Kira Khan. I am told you’d like to speak with me.”
Sebastian seems confused, “Kira Khan?”
Matthew walks into the music room with a very large bouquet of flowers, “These are for you. Mr. Gaston sent them over,” he tells her.
Zoey’s eyes light up with delight as she rises up to accept them. “Sebastian Gaston?” Zoey leans down to smell them when a voice says.
“How pretty.”
Jessica walks into the room.
Zoey’s smile fades as Jessica steps closer, “You seem like a woman in love these days.”
“Do I?” Zoey asks. “It’s always nice to receive flowers, don’t you think? Have a seat. What was it you wanted to discuss?”
Jessica nods to the red box on the flowers, “You should open that first.”
Zoey grins smugly at Jessica, “Should I?” How prime it would be for Zoey to open a gift from Sebastian right in front of his wife.
When Jessica doesn’t object, Zoey reaches over and picks up the red box. Without even looking at it as she makes eye contact with Jessica, Zoey opens the box, reaches in, plucks out the ruby ring, and holds it in her
hand. It’s not until she actually looks at it that she screams and drops it like it burned her.
The ring bounces off the couch and onto the floor as Zoey just looks at it, terrified. Meanwhile, Jessica is staring a hole in Zoey.
Jessica: I knew it was you. The one who killed my daughter.
TO BE CONTINUED