Chapter 2 - ELEVEN MISSING MINUTES
Victor did not ask Serena to explain the camera blackout.
He asked Daniel to lock the security office door.
That frightened her more.
“I am not being held prisoner in this house,” Serena snapped.
“No,” Victor said. “You’re being asked to stay exactly where I can see you.”
Ethan had stopped screaming, but every time Serena raised her voice, his fingers tightened around Victor’s shirt.
I noticed.
Victor noticed too.
Daniel pulled up the authentication history.
The system required two things to disable a camera manually: Victor’s administrator credential and a physical security token normally stored inside his private office.
Victor stared at the screen.
“The token is in my desk.”
Daniel’s expression told me otherwise.
Victor handed Ethan to me.
The baby buried his wet face against my shoulder.
“Stay here.”
“I’m coming.”
Victor looked at my stomach.
“You were just kicked.”
“I was also just accused of hurting your son.”
Serena rolled her eyes. “You’re enjoying this.”
I faced her.
“No. I’m memorizing it.”
That shut her up.
Victor and I crossed the foyer to his office.
The desk drawer showed no damage.
No broken lock.
No scratches.
Victor unlocked it.
The velvet-lined slot inside was empty.
He stood motionless.
I had worked in that house for nine months. Victor was not warm. He wasn’t chatty. He could silence a room by walking into it.
But I had never seen him afraid.
Not until then.
“Who knows where you keep it?” I asked.
“My security director.”
Daniel was still in the other room.
“My attorney.”
He was in New York.
“And Graham.”
The name made something click in my head.
“Graham Cole?”
Victor turned.
Graham was Victor’s chief of staff. Forty-two, immaculate suits, soft voice, perfect manners.
He managed Victor’s calendar, travel, contractors, household vendors, and dozens of details Victor considered too small to touch personally.
He also hated finding me in rooms he didn’t expect me to be in.
“What about him?” Victor asked.
“I saw him upstairs yesterday.”
“Where?”
“Outside the nursery.”
Serena spoke from behind us.
“He had every reason to be there.”
I turned.
She had followed us.
Victor’s jaw tightened. “I told you to stay put.”
“Oh, please. Graham brought the insurance folders. That’s hardly criminal.”
I hadn’t mentioned folders.
Victor’s gaze shifted slowly toward her.
Neither had he.
Serena realized it a second too late.
She lifted her chin. “He told me.”
“When?”
“This morning.”
Victor pulled out his phone.
He called Graham.
No answer.
Again.
Voicemail.
Victor opened his calendar.
Graham was supposed to be at a lunch meeting four blocks away.
Daniel entered behind us.
“Mr. Blackwood.”
Victor glanced up.
Daniel held a tablet.
“I checked exterior access.”
“And?”
“Mr. Cole entered the house at 1:06.”
My pulse jumped.
The attack happened at 1:23.
“When did he leave?” Victor asked.
Daniel stared at him.
“He didn’t.”
Every person in that office went silent.
Graham Cole had entered the mansion seventeen minutes before Serena dragged Ethan into the foyer.
No camera showed him leaving.
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Which meant Serena’s accomplice might still be inside.
📖 We started searching the mansion for Graham, but what we found in Ethan’s nursery changed the question from who helped Serena to what they were hiding. 👇
