Chapter 1 — The Secret Pages of Room Seven

The phone rang at two in the morning. Trác Nhã Vân was still in the group's overseas office, with a stack of unsigned third-quarter reports before her. When she saw Uông Ngọc Diễm's name on the screen, a cold feeling ran down her spine. Ngọc Diễm never called at that hour unless something was wrong.

"Miss Vân." Ngọc Diễm's voice trembled and broke, as if she had needed all her courage to dial the number. "Diệu Kỳ... Diệu Kỳ was taken away by the police."

Nhã Vân stood up so quickly that her swivel chair rolled into the filing cabinet. "Where did they take her? What for?"

"People say... people say she killed Uncle Điền." Ngọc Diễm choked and needed several seconds before she could continue. "Uncle Mạc Vĩnh Điền. Last night, at home. The police came at midnight and sealed off the whole villa. The press has already picked it up; by morning it will be everywhere."

For a moment, Nhã Vân could not process the information. Mạc Vĩnh Điền—the man who had married her mother six years earlier, who still sat at the head of the dinner table every Saturday with a calm smile, who always said, “You two should treat me like family”—was dead. The person arrested on suspicion of killing him was Diệu Kỳ, the gentlest nineteen-year-old sister she had ever known, a girl who had never talked back to anyone in her life.

"I'll be right back." Nhã Vân reached for her coat before she could finish her sentence. "Where is Diệu Kỳ? Which police station?"

"At first she was at the regional station, but... I just got word that they transferred her for a mandatory psychiatric evaluation. She couldn't speak; she only sat there like a lost soul. The lawyer said her condition was so unstable that she was not fit to testify."

"Where is the appraisal?"

There was a short silence, enough for Nhã Vân to clearly hear Ngọc Diễm's breathing on the other end of the line.

"An Tâm Clinic."

Nhã Vân stood in the middle of the office, still holding the half-worn sleeve of her jacket. An Tâm was the group's psychiatric clinic, built by her father, Trác Vĩnh Khôi, nearly twenty years earlier with the hope of making it a place of healing even for the poorest. Why An Tâm? A serious murder case should have gone to a neutral state forensic facility, with no connection to the defendant's family. Yet Diệu Kỳ was in her family's own hospital.

"Who decided to move her there?" she asked. Her voice had regained its familiar calm, even though waves were breaking inside her.

"Ms. Chu said that the family's lawyer suggested, to avoid scandal, that Diệu Kỳ be taken care of better instead of being sent to a public detention center. She said she would personally take care of everything." Ngọc Diễm lowered her voice, almost whispering. "I don't dare argue, after all, Miss Chu has been close to our family since she was a child."

Chu Bảo Hạnh. The woman who carried Nhã Vân since she could not walk, who stood next to her mother at her father's funeral, who always appeared just when the family needed a shoulder to lean on. If anyone else had suggested that plan, perhaps Nhã Vân would have been immediately suspicious. But as Ms. Chu, it was probably just a way to protect Diệu Kỳ from the prying eyes of public opinion.

She put that thought aside, called the airport assistant to book a ticket as soon as possible, then called the family's private lawyer to learn more about the legal situation. While hastily packing a few clothes into her suitcase, her mind kept spinning with the only question: what really happened in that house last night?

Twelve hours later, Nhã Vân stepped out of the international airport, the flash lights of the waiting reporters flashed blindingly. She pulled down her hat, bowed her head and walked through the crowd, hearing the questions thrown behind her - "Does Ms. Van have any comments about her sister being suspected of killing her stepfather?", "Is Trác Gia Medical Group trying to hide the truth?" — the questions cut like knives, but she didn't stop, didn't turn around, just walked straight to the waiting car.

The family villa where she grew up is now surrounded by police barricades and camera lenses pointed directly at the iron gate. Inside, her mother - Mrs. Đoàn Ngọc Thư - sat crouched on the living room sofa, her eyes swollen, her hands trembling as she held a cup of tea that had long since cooled.

"Mom." Nhã Vân knelt down in front of her mother and held those cold hands. "I'm home."

Mrs. Ngọc Thư looked up, her red eyes looking at her eldest daughter as if looking for a last place to hold on. "Kỳ... she didn't kill anyone, Van. You know my sister's personality, she's gentle, she's afraid of insects, how could she..." She didn't finish her sentence, just put her head on her daughter's shoulder, her skinny body trembling every now and then.

"I trust you." Nhã Vân squeezed her mother's hand. "I will find out the truth, mom. But you have to tell me, what exactly happened last night?"

Ms. Ngọc Thư recounted in sobs: that night she went to do volunteer work in the province, only Diệu Kỳ and Mạc Vĩnh Điền were at home with a few maids who left early. Near midnight, the housekeeper heard a loud noise from Mr. Điền's private office, ran up and found the door locked. He kept calling but no one answered. By the time he broke through the door, Mạc Vĩnh Điền was lying motionless on the floor, his head hitting the edge of the marble table, while Diệu Kỳ stood frozen in the corner of the room, her sleeve torn, her body covered in bruises, her mouth stuttering wordlessly. The housekeeper panicked and called an ambulance, but when the ambulance arrived, Mạc Vĩnh Điền had no signs of life.

"She can't say anything, Van." Ms. Ngọc Thư choked. "No matter what the police asked, he just shook his head, trembled, and looked blankly. The forensic doctor said there were signs of serious psychological trauma, so..."

"That's why I brought you to An Tâm," Nhã Vân continued, her voice lowered.

Her mother nodded, then held her daughter's hand tighter. "Ms. Chu said she would take care of her herself, saying she would be treated much better than being detained at the police station. Mom... I don't know what to do anymore, Van. I only know to trust Ms. Chu, trust our lawyer."

Nhã Vân remained silent, looking out the window where the police lights were still flashing red and blue outside the gate. She tried to picture the scene last night, tried to imagine her shy younger sister standing in the corner of the room, trembling, speechless — and she didn't believe, not even for a second, that Diệu Kỳ could kill anyone in cold blood like what the press was making out.

But there is one thing that torments her the most: why was a serious case like this handled so quickly and smoothly? Why was there no lengthy crime scene examination, no witnesses other than the elderly and easily led housekeeper, and why was Diệu Kỳ immediately, within just a few hours, taken straight for psychiatric evaluation at her family's hospital, where all records and procedures were under the control of her acquaintances?

She stood up and walked into the hallway, where the family's personal lawyer was waiting with a stack of papers. He briefly explained: according to the law, the period of mandatory psychiatric evaluation can last from several weeks to several months depending on developments, during which time relatives were allowed to visit according to the schedule arranged by the hospital, but all medical decisions were under the authority of the treatment team.

"I want to see my sister today," Nhã Vân said, her voice without any hesitation.

The lawyer looked at her, slightly hesitant. "Ms. Chu Bảo Hạnh just texted, saying that Diệu Kỳ's condition is currently unstable and needs a few more days for the doctor to monitor before allowing a visit. She said it was for Diệu Kỳ's benefit." Nhã Vân nodded, not arguing further, but in her heart, a small seed of doubt had just been planted. She recalls every detail her father once told about An Tâm — about wanting it to become a place where all patients, rich or poor, are treated fairly and transparently. She also remembers Chu Bảo Hạnh, the woman who accompanied her family through many ups and downs, never once making her doubt.

But tonight, when sitting alone in her old room, looking at the family photo taken years ago hanging on the wall - her father, mother, she and Diệu Kỳ were still young, the whole family smiling brightly at the gate of An Tâm hospital on the inauguration day - Nhã Vân suddenly realized a cold truth: she had been away from home for too long, so busy with work abroad that she no longer clearly understood what was really going on inside this house, inside the very hospital that bears her family's name.

And now, her sister is in there, alone, with no one to speak up to protect her.

She opened her computer, found all the legal files related to the case, read and re-read every line of the police preliminary report, every statement of the housekeeper. The more she read, the more she saw that there were so many unexplained gaps: why were there no security cameras in Mạc Vĩnh Điền's private office that recorded anything, even though the entire villa had a modern surveillance system installed? Why is the preliminary forensic report just a few lines, without detailed analysis of the scene?

Nhã Vân closed the computer and looked out the dark window. She knew she couldn't just sit and wait for the lawyer, for the police, for Chu Bảo Hạnh to arrange everything. If she wanted to know the truth, she had to get inside herself—into the very place where her sister was being held, where no outsider could reach.

A bold thought began to form in her mind, vague but steadfast, like a seed that had just cracked its shell in the middle of the night: if no one let her in through the legitimate path, she would find another way.