Chapter 3 – The House Was Watching Me
Adrian was taken away twenty minutes later.
His final words followed me all the way to the hospital.
Take Emma and leave the city tonight.
Doctors examined my back, shoulder, and wrist.
Nothing was broken.
Emma was unharmed.
That was all I cared about.
Rachel stayed beside me.
At 2:13 in the morning, Thomas entered my hospital room.
He closed the door behind him.
“Claire, we have a problem.”
I sat straighter.
“What happened?”
“File Seven was accessed before the federal investigators opened it.”
“By who?”
“We don’t know.”
Rachel frowned.
“Someone hacked it?”
Thomas shook his head.
“Someone already had authorized credentials.”
My skin went cold.
“Adrian?”
“He was in custody.”
“Margaret?”
“Being questioned.”
“Then who?”
Thomas looked at me.
“That is what worries me.”
He placed a tablet on my blanket.
“Your father identified four people involved in the financial scheme.”
Margaret Blackwood.
Adrian Blackwood.
Blackwood CFO Victor Lang.
And one unidentified person listed only as M.
Rachel leaned closer.
“Margaret?”
“No.”
Thomas tapped the screen.
“Daniel specifically wrote that M was not Margaret.”
I stared at the letter.
“Someone else was involved.”
“Yes.”
“Someone my father couldn’t identify.”
“Yes.”
Emma stirred beside me.
My instinct was immediate.
I pulled her closer.
Thomas noticed.
“You shouldn’t return to the Blackwood house.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Your apartment isn’t safe either.”
Rachel looked at him.
“She can stay with me.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because they know where you live.”
Rachel went silent.
Thomas gave me a hotel key card.
“Federal investigators have arranged a secure location.”
I stared at it.
“How did my life become this?”
Nobody answered.
At sunrise, Detective Hale returned.
He had more bad news.
Margaret had been released pending further investigation.
I laughed once.
It sounded empty.
“Of course she was.”
“Claire.”
“She has friends everywhere.”
“She also has enemies.”
“That never stopped her.”
Hale pulled up a chair.
“We recovered security footage from the ballroom.”
“Good.”
“There’s something you should see.”
He opened his phone.
The footage showed me falling.
Margaret screaming.
Adrian moving toward me.
Then the police entering.
Hale rewound it.
“Watch the upper balcony.”
A figure stood behind the railing.
A man.
Dark suit.
Watching everything.
The moment Thomas Mercer entered the ballroom, the man disappeared.
“Who is that?”
“We hoped you could tell us.”
Hale enlarged the image.
The face was partially obscured.
But I recognized the posture.
The shoulders.
The silver watch.
My throat tightened.
“No.”
Rachel looked at me.
“You know him?”
I stared at the screen.
May you like
“That’s Dr. Malcolm Reed.”
“My father’s doctor.”
