Callum’s hands curl into fists so tight, his knuckles ache.
Keir never talked about a daughter.
Not once.
Keir had told Callum about addiction and regret and mistakes made on tour.He’d confessed to failures with brutal honesty, like he believed the only way to survive was to drag the truth into the light and stare it down.
But a daughter?
“You’re telling me,” Callum says slowly, each word edged with disbelief, “that the man who raised me had a child he never mentioned?”
Bell nods.“I understand this is a shock.”
Shock doesn’t cover it.
It feels like betrayal.
Like Keir had kept a locked room in the castle and never trusted Callum with the key.
“She’s coming here?”Callum asks, voice flat.
“Yes,” Bell says.“She’s currently in the United States.She has been informed of Keir’s death and will be arriving soon.We’ll need her presence for certain legal formalities.”
Callum’s stomach turns.
A stranger walking through these halls.
A daughter stepping into a life Keir never spoke of.
And Callum – who had been rescued at fourteen, felt like he was twelve years old again, staring at a television screen while someone saysno survivors.
His voice comes out rough.“Why didn’t he tell me?”
Bell’s expression softens with something like regret.“I can’t speak to Keir’s reasons.But I can tell you the will includes provisions that suggest…he expected conflict.”
“Conflict,” Callum repeats, bitter.
Bell glances at the folder.“The castle.The estate.The rights.Keir’s holdings are significant.”
Callum’s gaze drifts to the stone walls, the shelves, the desk where Keir had sat pretending paperwork didn’t bore him.This place isn’t just property.It’s proof.It’s belonging.
The only real home Callum has ever had.And losing the castle would be crushing.
“You’re saying she gets the castle,” Callum says quietly.“But he said I was going to inherit the castle.”
“I’m saying,” Bell replies, “that the will acknowledges her legal claim.And that Keir also made arrangements for you.”
Callum snaps his eyes back.“Arrangements?”
Bell’s mouth tightens.“Yes.Keir was…very clear about your importance to him.”
Callum goes silent, the words refusing to come.Because that’s the part that hurts worst, Keir had cared.Callum knows he had.He knows it in every rule Keir enforced, every late-night talk, every time Keir showed up when no one else did.
And yet Keir had still kept this secret.
Bell continues, “There will be a meeting when Miss MacLaren arrives.Until then, I recommend you rest.”
Rest.
