Imprisoned by secrets

Chapter 3

Seventeen years ago...

10-year-old Beatrice Rivera looked around.

The coast was clear.

She ran to the portrait of her grandfather and pressed the lower part of the frame. It gave way to a passage that was large enough for a small child.

Beatrice crawled in then she pressed an inner ledge which automatically sealed the entrance to the passage. It was still undiscovered and she wanted to keep it that way. At least for as long as she could.

Seconds after she disappeared, a servant walked by. He looked around furtively as if he expected something to leap out and attack her. After a while, he shrugged and hurried off on his errand.

Once inside, Beatrice switched on her flashlight. It took a while for her eyes to adjust to the sudden bright light. Her lips broke into a rare grin. She had made it!

She lived in an old mansion that had been built nearly a hundred years ago. Although Hector had discovered some of the passages, he hadn't found half of them. It was just as well that he didn't know about the other ones. If he did, he might have killed Beatrice for using one.

Beatrice had discovered the old map of the house accidentally while searching the old library for confiscated books. Since then, she had explored the passages undetected.

She was small and skinny so it was easy for her to slip in and out of most of the tiny passages without being caught. Besides, you had to know exactly where to look to find those passages.

She reached up to make sure her hairpins were still in place and straightened the indigo pinafore her mother had ordered her to wear that day.

Beatrice made a face as she remembered what her mother had said while dressing her up for the day.

"Your beauty is a weapon you must harness to its full potential. Never forget that." Leila had said. Leila continuously insisted on forcing Beatrice to tap into her sensual feminine side. Whatever that was.

Beatrice stopped to bring out the map from her pocket. She also checked if the book she had recently acquired from a bookstore several miles away from her house was well kept.

She had developed an interest in mental illnesses and had acquired a book on Obsessive Compulsive Disorder from a bookstore far from her home. It hadn't been easy hiding the book from the prying eyes at home but it was worth it. She had finally found what she'd read during the summer holidays.

If her father had found out about the book she had acquired and how she had gotten it, there would have been hell. He had forbidden her from reading such books since he claimed they tainted her mind and tarnished her opinions on life.

Hector liked to ensure he had full control of what Beatrice learnt, how she learnt it, and when she learnt it. It was his way of keeping her in check and molding her into what he wanted.

He had several psychology texts in his study but he had marked them so she wouldn't be able to steal any. She had also been recently banned from entering Hector's study and the home library.

The last time she'd borrowed one of the books from her father's study, her old instructor got sacked and her father had taken away her key to the home library. He had spoken to her with a smile on his face. Beatrice hated it when her father smiled.

Beatrice however, was determined to have her way so she bade her time for six months, and finally, she had gotten what she wanted. She was able to duplicate the key to the library. Not long after, she found the old abandoned plans to the house.