Chapter 3 - The Camera Above the Balcony
Brandon stood so quickly that his knee struck the fountain ledge.
He barely noticed.
His eyes stayed fixed on the small camera mounted beneath the balcony roof.
"It shouldn't have recorded," he said.
Margaret's voice dropped. "Shouldn't have?"
"The exterior cameras are motion-triggered. I turned the courtyard zone off this morning."
"Then why is the light blinking?"
He did not answer.
I memorized every word.
This morning.
Turned off.
He had disabled the camera before our confrontation.
That meant the push had not been a sudden loss of temper.
He had prepared the space.
The pain in my ribs was almost secondary to that realization.
Brandon looked down at me and seemed to understand that I had reached the same conclusion.
"Don't start building a story in your head," he said.
"You turned off the camera before you pushed me."
"I turned it off because we were having a private conversation."
"Before I arrived?"
His jaw flexed.
Margaret stepped between us. "Enough."
She pointed toward the villa.
"Delete whatever it caught."
Brandon hesitated.
"The system sends impact events to the local recorder."
"Then delete the recorder."
"It's not that simple."
Her expression sharpened. "You designed the entire smart-home installation because you didn't trust the security company. Don't tell me now you can't erase one camera."
That sentence gave me another piece.
Brandon had personally controlled the camera configuration.
If footage disappeared, he could not blame an unknown technician.
He looked from his mother to the blinking red light, then toward the fountain.
The USB still lay hidden beneath the bronze grate.
He had to choose.
Evidence he could see might exist above us.
Evidence he could not find might be somewhere near me.
He chose the camera.
"Stay with her," he told Margaret.
Then he ran inside.
Margaret waited until the door slammed behind him.
She crouched beside me with the slow care of a woman lowering herself at a charity luncheon.
"You should have signed the transfer papers."
I stared at her.
"What transfer papers?"
A tiny pause.
Too tiny for anyone who was not looking for it.
"Don't play stupid."
"The documents on my phone weren't transfer papers. They were copies of wire instructions and a trust amendment with my signature forged on the last page."
Margaret's eyes hardened.
"Same difference."
"No. It isn't."
I studied her face.
"What were you trying to transfer?"
She stood.
"You are in no position to ask questions."
"Then why are you afraid of a USB?"
She stepped on my shattered phone.
The remaining screen cracked beneath her cream-colored heel.
"Because people like you mistake possession for power."
"People like me?"
"Women who marry into money and then become sentimental about names on paper."
My stomach turned.
The villa was mine before I married Brandon.
My father had bought it through a family trust years before his death, and my name had remained on every legitimate record I had ever seen.
But Margaret's words were not about the villa alone.
They were about something larger.
A sound came from inside the house.
Not the security chime.
Brandon shouting.
"No. No, no, no."
Margaret's head turned.
He shouted again from somewhere deeper inside.
"Who accessed the archive?"
She looked toward the door.
I looked toward the blinking camera.
Someone had accessed the footage before Brandon reached it.
May you like
And neither of us knew who.
📖 Discover who touched the security archive before Brandon—and what Emma learns about the planned transfer Margaret accidentally exposed in CHAPTER 4. 👇
