Chapter 3 - The Wolf at the Gates
"Hide!" I whispered, pulling Elena back into the darkened bedroom. "If he sees you alive, he will kill us all."
"No," Elena said, her dark eyes flashing with a fierce, reckless light. "If I hide, he wins. He takes Rafael to Switzerland, and I spend the rest of my life rotting in this room until my heart gives out. I am done hiding, Sarah."
"Elena, please, listen to me," I begged, grabbing her thin shoulders. "You are weak. You haven't walked outside in four years. Julian has security guards, lawyers, and the police in his pocket. If you just march down there without a plan, he will claim you are a lunatic who broke out of a mental ward. We need proof."
Elena paused, her chest heaving as she fought down her rage. She looked at me, then at the floorboards near the mahogany bed. "Proof," she whispered. "I have proof."
She rushed over to the bed, dropped to her knees, and pried up a loose wooden plank. From the hidden cavity underneath, she pulled out a thick, black leather-bound ledger covered in dust, along with a small digital voice recorder.
"Julian kept his secret accounts in a safe in this room before he turned it into my prison," Elena said, thrusting the ledger into my hands. "He forgot about the secondary floor safe behind the wardrobe. This ledger lists every illegal transaction, every bribe paid to local officials, and the original, un-edited transfer of my shares—signed under physical duress, with visible bloodstains on page forty. And this recorder..." She held up the small black device. "...contains a conversation between Julian and Sterling from three weeks ago, discussing how to slowly poison Rafael’s kidney medication so he would suffer organ failure before the end of the year."
My hands shook so violently I nearly dropped the heavy book. This wasn't just corporate corruption; it was attempted murder, kidnapping, and treason.
"This is enough to put Julian away for the rest of his life," I gasped.
"Only if it reaches someone who can't be bought," Elena replied grimly.
Suddenly, loud footsteps echoed down the dusty hallway of the east wing. The heavy oak doors swung open with a bang.
"Rafael!" Julian’s voice shouted, arrogant and brimming with anger. "What is the meaning of this? Sterling told me you gave the key to a maid! Have you completely lost your mind?"
Footsteps were approaching the bedroom rapidly. We were trapped.
"In here!" I whispered, shoving Elena into the walk-in closet behind a rack of moldy fur coats. "Stay quiet, no matter what happens!"
I slammed the closet door shut just as the bedroom door crashed open.
Julian Duarte stepped into the room. He looked remarkably like Rafael—the same razor-sharp jawline, the same piercing dark eyes—but where Rafael carried a quiet, solemn gravity, Julian radiated pure, toxic arrogance. He was dressed in a ten-thousand-dollar tailored suit, flanked by two towering private security guards in black suits.
He swept his gaze across the room, his eyes narrowing when they landed on me.
"You," Julian sneered, stepping over the charcoal drawings on the floor. "The floor cleaner. What are you doing in this wing?"
I stood my ground, my back pressed against the closet door, my hands hidden behind my apron where I had tucked the ledger and the voice recorder. I forced my voice to remain steady, relying on every bit of courage I had forged as a mother raising a child alone.
"Mr. Duarte sent me to inspect the room," I said, looking him dead in the eye. "He wanted to check on the condition of the furniture before the estate appraiser arrives."
Julian stared at me, his lip curling into a contemptuous smile. "The appraiser? Rafael doesn't have the authority to call an appraiser. I own this estate. I own everything in it. Where is the key?"
"I returned it to Mr. Rafael," I lied smooth as glass.
Julian took a slow step toward me, his heavy leather shoes crunching over the dried paper on the floor. "You're a terrible liar, Sarah. Sterling told me what happened in the garden. Your little brat was poking his nose where it doesn't belong, asking about crying ladies." He stepped uncomfortably close, his breath smelling of expensive cigars and peppermint. "Where is Elena?"
"She's dead," I said coldly. "Isn't that what you told the world four years ago?"
SLAP!
The force of his backhand struck my cheek so hard my head snapped sideways, and I stumbled against the closet door. Pain exploded across my face, and the taste of copper filled my mouth.
"Don't play games with me, you pathetic peasant," Julian hissed, leaning in close, his fingers grabbing my hair and pulling my head back. "I know she's alive. I know she's been humming that damn song. Where is she?"
Inside the closet, I heard a sharp gasp. Elena was about to burst out.
I clamped my jaw shut, glaring at Julian with pure hatred, and subtly pressed my back harder against the closet door to keep it sealed.
"Do whatever you want to me," I spat, wiping the blood from my lip with the back of my hand. "You're too late, Julian. Rafael knows the truth. The whole house knows."
Julian’s face twisted into a mask of rage. He released my hair and turned to his security guards. "Search the room. Search the whole damn wing. If you find Elena, double her dosage and throw her in the basement cell under the wine cellar. As for this maid..." He looked at me with cold, dead eyes. "...throw her out of the house. If she tries to leave with any property, call the police and have her arrested for grand theft."
"Sir!" one of the guards shouted, pointing out the boarded window.
Julian marched over to the wooden planks and peered through the gaps. Down below, in the courtyard, three black SUVs with tinted windows were roaring up the long gravel driveway, kicking up clouds of dust. They didn't belong to Julian’s legal team.
On the side of the lead SUV was the gold seal of the State Attorney General’s Office.
Julian’s eyes widened in sudden, blind panic. "What is this? Who called the State Attorney?"
Down in the garden, sitting upright in his wheelchair beneath the blooming jacaranda tree, was Rafael. Standing right beside him was my six-year-old son, Noah, holding Rafael’s satellite phone in his small hands, waving happily at the arriving vehicles.
Rafael had used the satellite line—the one connection Julian couldn't block—to call in the highest authority in the state.
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Julian turned back to me, his face red with fury. "You... you set me up!"
"I didn't," I smiled through the blood on my face. "Noah did."
