Page 213 of Heartless Legacy

“I’m surprised to see you at the dorms tonight.” I say to Finn when I walk into Holden’s room.

“Thea’s hanging out with LJ, and Deacon’s at the gym.”

“Isn’t it a little early for scotch?”

“Nope.” He pours me a drink, splashing some over the side of the glass.

“You might need this.” He drops clumsily onto the couch and takes a drink from the bottle.

“What’s happened?” I ask, looking to Holden for an explanation for Finn’s tipsiness.

Holden gestures towards the pile on the table. “I’ve been thinking about these charge books, and why your dad has so many of them.”

“Okay, what did you come up with?”

Holden says, “I think he’s forging the entries and giving them out to members in The League.”

I laugh because that makes total sense. What better way to endear people to your scheme than to bribe them with a higher position? “How many families do you think he’s meritoriously promoted?”

Holden answers, “I don’t know if he has yet. How many books did you see in his secret room?”

“Easily four or five other ones.” Nodding towards Finn, I ask, “What’s with him? Is this news that traumatizing?”

Finn says, “You should probably take that drink now, before he tells you the rest.”

“I’m good.” Lowering myself into the chair, I say, “Let’s hear it.”

“One of the books you gave me matches entirely with what’s in the archives. The other book has pages missing. When I went through the one that’s complete, I noticed the handwriting doesn’t match all the way through.”

I point out, “With the book getting passed down, through the head of the bloodlines, the handwriting wouldn’t match.”

“True, but the writing should be consistent over the years of whoever had ownership of it. Unless the custodian listed for the first fifty years had a split personality, he didn’t make all the entries.”

He grabs the books and flips to the last page of the one with the cover. “The second thing I noticed is that the paper doesn’t match. You can feel the texture of the pages is different between the two books and the coloring is off too.”

Next, he presents me with the pages of the book that was hidden. “All these pages feel, and look similar. But when you get to this first one, see how the colors on the lines and the spacing are different in the first few pages of this book?”

I nod and he explains, “It’s because it’s been cannibalized from other sources and re-glued.”

“You’re suggesting my family’s charge book is the forgery, even though it matches everything you read in the archives? Maybe the cover’s been rebound, because the glue wore off from normal wear and tear?” Looking over at Finn, I say, “Different handwriting and page texture aren’t exactly a smoking gun.”

Holden returns the books to the table and pulls his laptop into his lap. “You’re right. It doesn’t, until we factor in the missing documents from the archives.”

He clicks on a photo. “See the right side of this page? If we assume the names are listed in the order of the dollar amount, given, then this part of the pagesuggeststhat the fourth place position was shared by two families.”

I read it and can concede that a tie could have happened. “Us and someone else. Okay? What’s the big deal? That other family must’ve lost some kind of tie breaker, so here I am.”

Holden shakes his head. “Look again, Pax. Lester Cox’s name is fifth on this list.” He quickly adds, “We need to do more research. Iamresearching it, but I thought you had a right to know what I found so far.”

I’m gripping my glass now. “You think it’s real?”

He deflects my question. “We’d need a curator and authenticator to validate the paper and ink in the books.”

I press him for an answer. “But what is your gut telling you?”

“My gut is telling me that Thea was right, and that the clues we followed for the team building challenge are connected to the bloodline challenge, and somehow, we got a head start over the other prospects.” He looks at Finn and says, “You and I need to see if we can find our family’s charge books, too.” After a brief pause, he adds, “We need to be prepared. If someone else comes across this information, they could challenge us for our position.”

Things click into place. The challenge clue said there are forgeries out there. I gulp my drink before speaking. “The challenge isn’t really about missing chess pieces, is it?”

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