Chapter 3
Caroline’s parents had not been inside the house since the funeral.
I knew that because the housekeeper, Mrs. Bell, had once told me in a whisper.
“They blamed him,” she said. “Then they disappeared behind grief.”
Now they stood in the foyer, soaked from rain and fury.
Richard and Helen Whitaker.
Caroline’s father held a cane in one hand and a leather folder in the other.
Helen’s eyes went straight to Leo in my arms.
“My grandson,” she whispered.
Leo looked at her, uncertain.
Then he tucked his face against my chest.
Pain moved across her face.
Victoria had done this too.
She had turned a baby’s fear into proof against everyone but herself.
Ethan stepped forward.
“Helen, Richard, Victoria lied to you.”
Richard’s jaw tightened.
“She said the maid hurt him.”
“She tried to hurt him,” Ethan said. “Not Sarah.”
Helen looked at me.
I saw judgment there.
Not cruelty.
Fear.
“Why are you holding him?”
“Because he’s scared,” I said quietly.
Richard lifted the folder.
“Victoria sent us a video.”
Ethan went still.
“What video?”
Richard placed a tablet on the hall table and pressed play.
I saw myself in the drawing room.
Holding Leo.
Turning away from Victoria.
Then the clip jumped.
Victoria crying.
Me saying, “Stay away from him.”
Then it cut again.
The iron was on the floor.
Victoria shouted, “She attacked me!”
My stomach dropped.
Edited.
Fast.
Dirty.
Just enough truth to make a lie look clean.
Helen covered her mouth.
“She said Sarah has been unstable.”
Ethan grabbed his laptop from the living room and opened the original footage.
“Watch all of it.”
Victoria’s version died in less than a minute.
Helen began crying when she saw the steam drift into the crib.
Richard sat down slowly.
“My God.”
Ethan played the night footage next.
Victoria’s whisper filled the foyer.
If you had died with her, he would already be mine.
Helen made a sound I will never forget.
Not a scream.
Something worse.
A mother hearing the echo of her daughter’s danger too late.
Richard stood with murder in his eyes.
“Where is she?”
“Gone,” Ethan said. “For now.”
Helen looked at him.
“For now?”
“I called the police.”
Richard slammed his cane against the floor.
“We warned Caroline about that woman.”
Ethan froze.
“What?”
Helen wiped her face.
“Caroline called me two weeks before she died. She said Victoria kept coming to the house when you were gone.”
Ethan stared at her.
“She never told me.”
“She tried,” Richard snapped. “Did you listen?”
Ethan flinched.
Richard’s anger cracked open.
“No. You let your mother tell you she was anxious. You let Victoria say she was jealous. You let everyone treat my daughter like a fragile thing instead of a frightened woman.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
“I know.”
“No,” Richard said. “You don’t.”
He opened the leather folder and pulled out a letter.
“Caroline mailed this to us the day before she died. It arrived after the funeral.”
Ethan reached for it.
Richard pulled it back.
“We didn’t give it to you because we thought you already knew.”
Ethan’s voice broke.
“Please.”
Helen took the letter with shaking hands.
“She wrote it for you.”
Ethan unfolded it.
I looked away, but I heard his breath change as he read.
Then his knees nearly buckled.
Dr. Reeves caught his arm.
“What does it say?” I whispered.
Ethan looked at me like he was seeing the house collapse around him.
“She said Victoria threatened Leo.”
Helen sobbed.
“She said Victoria told her there were ways for a baby to stop being inconvenient.”
The room spun.
Leo stirred and whimpered.
I pressed my cheek to his hair.
Ethan kept reading.
“She said if anything happened to her, check the nursery stairs camera.”
Mrs. Bell, the housekeeper, appeared in the hallway.
“There was no camera there,” she whispered.
Everyone turned.
She clasped her hands.
“Not after that night.”
Ethan’s eyes narrowed.
“What do you mean?”
Mrs. Bell looked terrified.
“Mrs. Blackwood asked me to make sure the stairs camera was working. I checked it the morning she died. It was working.”
Ethan stood very still.
“And after?”
“The camera was removed before the police came.”
Richard whispered, “Who removed it?”
Mrs. Bell looked at the floor.
“Mr. Ethan’s mother.”
Ethan’s mother, Madeline Blackwood, lived in the guesthouse on the estate.
A proud widow with silver hair and a voice like polished steel.
She had never liked Caroline.
She had never liked me.
But Victoria worshiped her.
Ethan turned toward the window.
The guesthouse lights glowed through the rain.
“Daniel,” he called to security, “bring my mother here.”
A voice answered from the hall.
“Sir, Mrs. Blackwood left twenty minutes ago.”
Ethan turned.
May you like
The security guard held up his phone.
“With Victoria.”
