Chapter 1 - Nathan Vale walked into his destroyed penthouse office and froze.Three masked intruders lay unconscious across the floor.
One was sprawled against the glass wall overlooking Manhattan. Another had crashed through a marble side table. The third was face-down beside Nathan's desk, one hand still wrapped around a handgun.
And sitting in Nathan's leather chair was Maggie Rowe.
The woman who cleaned his penthouse every night.
Her gray uniform was torn at the shoulder.
Blood ran slowly down her left arm.
Across her lap rested a cast-iron skillet.
Nathan stared at her.
Maggie stared back.
For years, she had moved silently through his home, wiping fingerprints from windows, polishing silver, emptying ashtrays, replacing flowers.
He had barely learned her name.
Now she looked like the only person in the room who knew exactly what was happening.
“Tell me who sent them,” Nathan said.
Maggie tightened her fingers around the skillet.
“Those men aren't the ones you should fear.”
Nathan looked at the unconscious attackers.
“What are you talking about?”
“The person who wants you ruined has been eating dinner with you for years.”
Nathan's expression changed.
He followed Maggie's gaze toward the dining room.
The chair at the head of the table was empty.
A dinner plate still sat there.
Steam rose faintly from an untouched cup of coffee.
Nathan slowly lowered his gun.
“What did you do?”
“Survive.”
Maggie pushed herself out of the chair.
She winced.
Nathan noticed blood soaking through the sleeve near her ribs.
“You're hurt.”
“Not badly.”
“You're bleeding.”
“I've been bleeding before.”
Her answer was so calm that it unsettled him.
Nathan stepped toward her.
“Who are you?”
Maggie looked at him for several seconds.
Then she reached into her uniform pocket.
She pulled out a cracked brass security key.
Three numbers had been scratched into the back.
9-1-7.
Nathan immediately recognized the number.
“That's one of my father's old security codes.”
“No.”
Maggie shook her head.
“It belonged to Pier Nine.”
Nathan's stomach tightened.
Vale Harbor had been closed for years.
Pier Nine was where his company had once stored imported machinery before moving operations elsewhere.
It was also where Nathan's father had lost a dockworker named Thomas Rowe.
An industrial accident.
At least, that was what Nathan remembered.
Maggie noticed his expression.
“My husband was Thomas Rowe.”
Nathan stared at her.
The name landed like a stone dropped into deep water.
“You're his wife?”
“I was.”
“You never told anyone.”
“Because people who asked questions about Thomas usually stopped asking.”
Nathan looked again at the attackers.
“What does Thomas have to do with this?”
Maggie glanced at the brass key.
“He found something twelve years ago.”
“What?”
“A book.”
Nathan frowned.
“What book?”
Maggie stepped closer.
“He called me the night before he died.”
Her voice remained steady, but something underneath it trembled.
“He told me he had discovered proof that the accident at Pier Nine wasn't an accident.”
Nathan felt the room grow colder.
“Why didn't you go to the police?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“They showed me the accident report.”
Nathan waited.
Maggie whispered,
“Then they told me Thomas died alone.”
She looked directly into his eyes.
“He didn't.”
A sound came from the hallway.
Nathan spun.
Nobody.
His security system should have been screaming.
Instead, every camera had gone dark.
Maggie noticed.
“They disabled your cameras twenty minutes ago.”
“How do you know?”
“I watched them do it.”
Nathan stared at her.
From the moment he entered the penthouse, he had assumed Maggie was a victim.
Now he wasn't sure what she was.
“Don't open your father's safe,” she said.
Nathan froze.
“What safe?”
“The one behind the library.”
Nathan's eyes narrowed.
“My father died fifteen years ago.”
“I know.”
“And you know about a safe inside my house?”
“I've been cleaning this house for four years.”
She leaned closer.
“You thought I was cleaning your floors.”
Nathan said nothing.
“I was looking for something.”
A metallic click echoed from the hall.
One of the masked men moved.
Nathan raised his gun.
Maggie swung the skillet.
The attacker's eyes opened just before she struck him across the jaw.
He went still again.
Nathan stared.
Maggie dropped the skillet onto the floor.
“Now,” she whispered, “we have less than an hour.”
“Until what?”
“Until they realize I didn't die.”
Nathan's phone vibrated.
One message.
No number.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LET THE MAID DIE.
Nathan looked at Maggie.
She didn't seem surprised.
Instead, she looked toward the dining room.
Then she said quietly,
“Now you understand.”
Nathan's eyes darkened.
“Understand what?”
Maggie looked toward the empty chair at the head of the table.
“They weren't here to kill you.”
May you like
She pointed at herself.
“They were here to kill me.”
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