Chapter 3 - The Broken Seal
The chapel erupted into chaos as Sheriff Lawson ordered a temporary hold on all individuals present. Clara was led back to the transport van, but this time, the atmosphere had shifted completely. Guard Martinez, who had escorted Clara from the state facility that morning with cold detachment, looked at her in the rearview mirror with a new expression: profound curiosity.
"You knew it was going to be empty, didn't you?" Martinez asked as the van pulled away from the church grounds, heading toward the local precinct rather than back to the state prison.
Clara leaned her head against the cool glass window, watching the familiar pines of her hometown pass by like ghosts. "I didn't know for sure. I prayed I was wrong. Because if the casket was empty, it meant my father was either being held against his will... or he was a monster who let me take the fall for a crime that never happened."
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Meanwhile, back at the chapel, forensic investigators were already sealing the building as a potential crime scene. Richard Vance was furiously barking orders into his cell phone behind the church, while Eleanor sat alone in a back pew, her veil pulled back to reveal a face aged by decades of deception.
She pulled a small, silver key from her purse—a key with no label, worn smooth by years of nervous friction. She looked toward the altar, where the empty white casket sat open under the stained-glass window, a stark monument to a truth that refused to stay buried.
