Chapter 5
Eleanor’s first act was to fire me.
Her second was to accuse Maya of kidnapping Leo from county custody.
Her third was to offer a public reward for information leading to our arrest.
By noon, our faces were on every news channel.
Leo watched from his hospital bed.
“They’re calling Maya dangerous.”
Maya switched off the television.
“People can call me anything they want.”
“It isn’t fair.”
“No,” she said. “But truth does not stop being true because someone attacks it.”
Police protection remained outside Leo’s room, but Daniel warned us that Judge Holloway had issued another order.
“He wants Leo returned to county custody,” Daniel said.
“His brother created the false documents,” I replied.
“We filed for his removal. Until another judge rules, his orders remain active.”
Leo tightened his grip on Amelia’s letter.
“I’m not going.”
“No one is taking you,” I said.
Daniel looked uncomfortable.
“If deputies arrive with a valid order, resisting could damage our case.”
“Then make the order invalid.”
“I’m trying.”
Maya walked toward him.
“Try faster.”
For the first time, Daniel looked frightened of our housekeeper.
I almost smiled.
Then the hospital fire alarm sounded.
Leo’s face lost color.
The last emergency alarm had been used to abduct him.
I checked the corridor.
Nurses moved calmly toward the stairwell.
A smell of smoke drifted from the lower floor.
“This could be another diversion,” Maya said.
The police officers separated.
One remained with us while the other checked the elevators.
A doctor entered carrying scrubs.
His mask covered most of his face.
He approached Leo’s IV line.
Maya stopped him.
“What are you giving him?”
“Medication for anxiety.”
“He doesn’t need it.”
The doctor reached into his pocket.
Maya slapped his hand away.
A syringe fell onto the floor.
The police officer drew his weapon.
The man ran.
Security caught him near the stairs.
He was not a doctor.
He worked for one of Grant Holloway’s private investigation firms.
The syringe contained enough sedative to keep Leo unconscious for hours.
Someone still needed him incapable.
We moved him to a protected floor under an assumed name.
That evening, the new judge canceled Holloway’s orders and granted me temporary sole custody.
It was our first victory.
It did not feel safe.
Eleanor controlled my company, several family accounts, and the mansion’s legal ownership while the divorce proceeded.
Daniel advised me not to return to Whitmore House.
“She can claim you’re trespassing.”
“It is my home.”
“On paper, Blackwood Industries owns it. At this moment, she controls the company.”
Leo lowered his head.
“She won.”
“No,” Maya said. “She gained a room. That is not the same as winning the house.”
We stayed at a small hotel registered under Daniel’s name.
I had owned private jets, apartments, and vacation properties.
That night, all I truly possessed was one room with two beds and a broken coffee machine.
Leo chose the bed near the window.
Maya planned to sleep in the chair.
“You should take the other bed,” I said.
“And where will you sleep?”
“On the floor.”
“You’re forty-six.”
“I noticed.”
Leo looked between us.
“Maya can share my bed.”
She smiled.
“Problem solved.”
I lay on the carpet beneath a spare blanket.
For the first time since Amelia’s death, Leo and I spent an entire night in the same room.
He asked questions in the darkness.
“Did you love Eleanor?”
“I thought I did.”
“Did you love her more than me?”
“No.”
“It felt like you did.”
I closed my eyes.
“I loved how easy she made my life. She handled the house. She organized everything. She told me you were happy, and I believed her because it allowed me to keep working.”
“So you chose easy over me.”
“Yes.”
The word hurt him.
A lie would have hurt more.
“I am sorry.”
“What if work gets busy again?”
“Then work waits.”
“Can billion-dollar companies wait?”
“They will learn.”
Maya spoke from the other bed.
“Promises sound strongest in dark rooms. Morning is where they are tested.”
I stared at the ceiling.
“Then watch me in the morning.”
Leo eventually fell asleep.
Maya remained awake.
“Amelia trusted you,” she said quietly.
“I failed her too.”
“She hid those documents because she believed you would find them when Leo needed you.”
“She also knew I did not read what I signed.”
“You were careless.”
“I was arrogant.”
“Yes.”
Most employees would have softened the truth.
Maya never did.
“Why aren’t you afraid of me?” I asked.
“I was.”
“What changed?”
“I watched you kneel on the marble floor and hold your son. Powerful men rarely kneel unless someone is watching.”
I thought about Eleanor’s press conference.
Millions had watched her perform concern.
Nobody had watched Maya enter the woods for Leo.
“After this ends, you’ll never work as a servant again.”
She turned toward me.
“That isn’t your decision.”
“I meant—”
“I know what you meant. But saving Leo does not make me your responsibility.”
She was right.
Gratitude could become another form of control if I was not careful.
Before sunrise, my phone vibrated.
An encrypted message had arrived from an unknown sender.
The attached photograph showed Grant Holloway entering Eleanor’s suite at Whitmore House.
Beneath it was a sentence.
I know what happened to Amelia.
The sender requested two million dollars and immunity.
Daniel traced the message to the mechanic who serviced Amelia’s car.
He was alive.
He wanted to meet me alone at an abandoned warehouse.
Maya read the message.
“It’s a trap.”
“Probably.”
“Then don’t go.”
“He may know who killed my wife.”
Leo sat up.
“You are not leaving us again.”
His words stopped me at the door.
For years, I had treated danger as something I faced alone.
That was another form of absence.
I sat beside him.
“I won’t go alone.”
We contacted the police and arranged surveillance.
Two hours later, I entered the warehouse wearing a recording device.
The mechanic stepped from behind an old truck.
His face was scarred.
“I damaged Amelia’s brakes,” he whispered. “But she wasn’t supposed to die.”
“Who paid you?”
“Grant.”
“On whose order?”
Before he answered, a gunshot cracked through the building.
The mechanic fell.
Police rushed inside.
I dropped behind the truck.
A second shot struck the concrete near my head.
The shooter escaped through a rear door.
The mechanic grabbed my sleeve.
May you like
“Eleanor,” he gasped. “She was in the other car.”
Then his hand went still.
