Walten Files: Rosemary Novels & Stories

he said and tried to walk fast ahead of me but I held him down. “You know you can’t abandon me Marvin” I didn’t notice the flower at first, Marvin was rambling about some story that he read on Reddit or something...he was strange like that. Another one. I blinked, then sighed. Marvin’s words trailed off as he followed my gaze. “Again?” he asked, already grinning. I walked to the desk slowly. The rose was deep crimson, almost velvet to the eye. A small cream-colored card was tucked beneath its stem. I picked it up and read it.

Then she uttered a word that had my blood running cold. "Wolfsbane." "What?" I asked, wanting to make sure I had heard her properly. She nodded. "Yes, it is the only way your link can be weakened. Even broken. Whoever took Rosaline doesn't want you to find her." And that was when I saw it. At first, I was confused, but the closer I got, the stronger the scent was. I picked up the discarded object and inhaled its chemical contents. It was a gallon of gasoline.

But there was something horribly wrong with the picture, something Alina had been noticing a lot with the objects residing within the smothering walls of her home; the rose wasn't where she had last put it. There was no mistaking it this time; Alina knew for a fact that she had put the rose on her bathroom counter last night. She had even gone out of her way to mark the spot she had placed it with a damn dry erase marker, as if to prove to herself she really wasn't losing her mind. And lo and behold, there it sat on her nightstand instead, the red petals seeming to perk in excitement when her attention was locked onto its presence. The moon itself was glittering so profoundly.

Enough to fill the space with color and scent, the deep red catching against the dim light of the bar. They moved straight to the counter. “Delivery for Rose Rainer,” the first one said. “Can you sign?” Rose stared at them for half a second. “Yeah. That’s me.” She signed. “Where do you want them?” She glanced at the growing mass of roses, then gave a small shake of her head. “Anywhere they fit.” A card was placed in her hand. She opened it. Wild Rose. See you tonight. K. Vivian let out a sound somewhere between a squeal and a gasp.

Rosemary switched on her phone flashlight, its beam cutting through the darkness to reveal rows of metal shelves and stacks of yellowed files. “Be quick,” Damien whispered. “I’ll watch the door.” Rosemary made her way down the narrow corridor toward the old server room. Her fingers trembled as she pressed the power button. After several tense seconds, the screen flickered to life. “It’s still running…” she murmured. She opened one folder after another, her pulse quickening — until she found it. Project_AdriCorp_Confidential_Manipulation.avi Her heart pounded. “This is it.” But just as she copied the file onto her flash drive, the heavy sound of footsteps echoed from the entrance. Damien’s he

Rosa felt her body sway and before everything turned dark, she had heard someone yell, “Sir Wade!“ And then her body went still. That moment….the desperation in her eyes, the tremor in her voice, clung to him like a gum, refusing to let go. As Rosa was lifted into the ambulance, a piece of paper fluttered against his shoe. He bent to pick it up. It was her résumé. Rosa Hamon. Age 23……… He stared at the name for a long moment, then folded the paper neatly and slipped it into his coat pocket.

Just an older man with silver hair and eyes like oil; slick, dark, unreadable. They called him consigliere. Advisor. Manipulator. He smiled at her like he knew everything. Including why she was here. She avoided him for the rest of the day. But that night, as she cleaned the study, she found something. A black notebook, half-buried under a pile of folders. Inside, dates. Payments. Names. Including her father’s. One name was underlined in red. "Project 5B : Initiated by A.D." She blinked. Her breath caught.

*** "Sebastian? Sebastian! Sebastian where are you?" Gosh, where could he be? Zeke took the stairs to the back and proceeded to the green house. "Sebastian!" He called as he entered. He heard some rustling ahead by the rose plantation so he approached. He sighed he relief when he saw Sebastian sitting on a bench by the rose flowers. "Here you are." Sebastian didn't raise his head to him. Zeke joined him on the bench. Non of them said anything for the first two minutes until Zeke broke the awkward silence.

I opened the door just a few inches and saw a small cardboard box sitting on the carpet with no name and no return address, so I pulled it inside and opened the lid while the others crowded around me to see what was inside. Resting on a bed of white tissue paper was a single rose made of delicate glass and the stem was broken in half so it looked dead and jagged, and I knew immediately that it was a message from Elena Romano because that rose was the symbol of the investment firm we had burned down in Berlin.

Flavian reassured Cam, who thanked him. "And what else did this woman write in that diary?" I was curious, but they weren't getting to what I wanted to know. "Manu, Rose was found dead, drowned in Hat Lake. Here in the diary she writes that she was being threatened by Rita. There are several threatening notes here, they were also kept in storage, but they were all typed and printed. However, we found a recorder and a tape where the two of them talk and Rose threatens Rita, says she'll tell everything, she demands more money from Rita and Rita says this blackmail will end and Rose will regret it," Cam spoke and I felt like he was giving me a soap opera summary.