Blood Never Lies

The letter sat on the desk in front of him, aged paper, browned at the edges, sealed with the old family crest of the Devereuxs. It had been hidden inside one of his late mother’s jewelry boxes, beneath the false bottom he hadn’t known existed until earlier that afternoon.

He’d been searching for his mother’s pearls. He found the truth instead.

Richard’s hand trembled as he broke the seal. The ink inside was faded, the handwriting painfully familiar, his mother’s ...