Chapter 4 - Ten Minutes to SurrenderThe mansion erupted into motion.
Armed guards rushed through the corridors. Somewhere beyond the staircase, glass shattered beneath hurried footsteps. A security alarm began pulsing through the building, low and relentless.
Lily screamed against my chest.
I pressed my face to her hair and whispered her name, but my own voice sounded unfamiliar.
Nathan remained crouched beside us.
His pistol was steady in his hand.
“Can you run?” he asked.
I nodded.
“Good. When I tell you, follow Calder through the service corridor. Don't stop. Don't look behind you.”
“What about you?”
“I'll handle this.”
“No.”
He turned toward me.
“Grace.”
“You said we were going to work together.”
“This is not a negotiation.”
“Then don't expect me to trust you when you refuse to tell me anything.”
For a heartbeat, he looked almost angry enough to shout.
Then another gunshot interrupted him.
A guard stumbled into the hall, blood darkening his sleeve.
“Mr. Blackwood! They're inside the west entrance!”
Nathan moved instantly.
He dragged the wounded guard behind the staircase and pressed a hand against the man's shoulder.
“Stay with me.”
The guard nodded through clenched teeth.
Nathan looked at his security chief.
“Calder, get them out.”
Calder appeared from the corridor, holding a compact rifle.
“East suite. Now.”
He led us through a narrow door hidden behind a decorative wall panel.
The service corridor smelled of dust and cleaning products. My footsteps slipped on the stone floor as I hurried after him, one arm wrapped around Lily and the other gripping the wall.
“Who are they?” I asked.
“People who made a very expensive mistake,” Calder replied.
“Why do they want my daughter?”
He didn't answer.
I stopped.
Calder turned sharply.
“Mrs. Miller, keep moving.”
“Why does everybody know something about my child except me?”
His expression tightened.
For the first time, I noticed a small scar running from the corner of his jaw to his neck.
“Because someone spent years making sure the truth never reached you.”
“Who?”
Before he could answer, a door slammed ahead of us.
A man stepped into the corridor.
He wore a dark suit and carried a handgun.
Calder raised his weapon.
The man smiled.
“Put it down.”
Calder didn't move.
The stranger aimed at Lily.
Everything inside me stopped.
I turned my body, shielding her with my own.
“Don't,” I whispered.
The man looked at me with bored curiosity.
“Give me the child.”
“No.”
He lifted the gun.
“Then you both die here.”
A shot exploded behind him.
The stranger dropped.
Calder pulled me forward so abruptly that my shoulder struck the wall.
“Move!”
We ran through the corridor and emerged into a small security room beneath the east wing. Monitors filled one wall. A steel door stood opposite the entrance, leading to the underground garage.
Calder locked us inside.
“Stay here.”
“Where are you going?”
“To help Nathan.”
He pressed a small black button beneath the console.
A second lock engaged.
I stared at him.
“What is that?”
“An emergency lock.”
“Can I open it from inside?”
“No.”
My blood ran cold.
“You're locking us in?”
“To protect you.”
“That's what Victor said, isn't it?”
Calder froze.
I stepped toward him.
“You knew about the threats.”
His silence answered me.
“You knew my baby might be Nathan's daughter, and you let me hide behind a laundry cart while armed men walked through this house.”
Calder's face hardened.
“I knew someone was watching you. I didn't know the child was Nathan's.”
“But you knew someone wanted her.”
“Yes.”
The word struck harder than I expected.
“Then why didn't you tell me?”
“Because every time information moved through this household, someone died.”
He glanced at the monitors.
“Your sister wasn't the first person Victor threatened. And she won't be the last.”
I stared at him.
“What did you say about my sister?”
Calder looked back at me.
Too late.
I had already heard it.
“Emily,” I whispered. “What do you know about Emily?”
He hesitated.
Then the security monitors flickered.
Every screen went black.
A second later, one of them illuminated.
A woman appeared on the screen.
Her hair was shorter than I remembered. Her face was pale, and there was a bruise beneath her left eye.
But I knew her.
I would have recognized her in a room full of strangers.
“Emily!”
My sister looked directly into the camera.
Behind her stood a man whose face I couldn't see.
“Grace,” she whispered.
My knees nearly gave way.
Emily had disappeared two months earlier after leaving our apartment to buy medicine for Lily. I had searched hospitals, called friends, and begged strangers for help.
Three days later, someone had left her scarf outside my apartment door.
I had assumed she was dead.
Now she was staring at me from a video screen.
“Emily, where are you? Are you hurt?”
Her lips trembled.
“Listen to me. You have to take Lily and leave the mansion.”
I moved closer to the monitor.
“Why? What's happening?”
My sister glanced over her shoulder.
The unseen man said something.
She flinched.
Then she turned back toward the camera.
“The man you're trusting isn't the one you should fear.”
I swallowed.
“Nathan?”
Emily's eyes filled with tears.
“No.”
She leaned toward the camera.
“It's Daniel.”
The screen went black.
For a moment, I couldn't move.
Then a message appeared across the monitor.
YOU HAVE SEVEN MINUTES LEFT.
Calder swore beneath his breath.
“What does that mean?” I demanded.
He was already moving toward the door.
“Stay here.”
“No!”
He turned.
I held Lily tighter.
“If you leave me behind, I'll break every screen in this room until you tell me what's happening.”
Calder stared at me.
Then, surprisingly, he laughed once without humor.
“You really are his daughter-in-law.”
I blinked.
“What?”
But he had already opened the door.
He didn't correct himself.
He didn't explain.
He simply pointed toward the stairs and said, “When I return, you may hate every answer I give you. Until then, keep the child quiet and don't trust anyone who knows your name.”
Then he disappeared into the corridor.
I sat beneath the monitors, shaking.
Lily had finally fallen asleep against my chest.
I kissed her forehead.
“It's okay,” I whispered, though I had no idea whether it was true. “Mommy's here.”
A soft sound came from the console.
A new video had appeared.
Emily again.
This time, she was holding something in her hand.
A photograph.
The same photograph I had hidden beneath my mattress.
Nathan and me at the country estate, taken the morning after he survived the shooting.
We were standing beside a fireplace.
His arm was around my waist.
My head rested against his shoulder.
Neither of us was smiling.
We looked exhausted, frightened, and impossibly young.
Emily looked into the camera.
“Grace, if you see this, you need to know the truth about the night Lily was born.”
She swallowed.
“Daniel wasn't there to hurt your baby.”
A shadow crossed her face.
“He was there because he believed Nathan had been murdered.”
My heart stopped.
Emily leaned closer.
“And the man who tried to kill Nathan nine months ago…”
The door behind her opened.
She turned toward the sound.
The video trembled.
May you like
Then she whispered the final words before the screen went dark.
“Was Nathan's own father.”
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