Chapter 3 - THE FOOTSTEPS IN THE HALL
Arthur’s heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He looked from the headlights flashing through the heavy velvet curtains to his trembling wife.
“Julian?” Arthur hissed, his mind violently rejecting the idea. “Julian was the one who pulled me out of my depression. He organized your funeral. He stayed with me for three months so I wouldn’t be alone.”
“He is a monster,” Grace wept, pressing a kiss to the baby’s head. “He told me everything, Arthur. The Blackwood Trust. The inheritance. If you didn’t produce an heir by your thirty-fifth birthday, the entire estate and the company reverted to him.”
Arthur’s thirty-fifth birthday was tomorrow.
The pieces clicked together with sickening precision. Julian hadn’t been comforting a grieving brother; he had been keeping watch. Making sure Arthur didn’t move on. Making sure no other woman stepped into Grace’s place before the deadline. But Julian hadn’t accounted for Grace being pregnant before the crash.
A heavy, authoritative knock echoed from the massive oak front doors.
“Arthur? Are you in there? It’s Julian. My phone showed your security system tripped.”
The voice was warm, concerned. The voice of a loving brother.
Grace whimpered, burying her face against the baby’s blanket. The infant stirred, letting out a soft, unhappy squeak.
“Shh,” Arthur breathed, kissing Grace’s forehead. He pulled her up from the sofa. “We can’t stay in this room. If he bypasses the front door, he’ll check the study first.”
“Arthur? Open up, mate. I brought that scotch you like.”
Arthur guided Grace silently toward the back of the study. He pushed aside a heavy mahogany bookshelf, revealing the old servant’s passageway his grandfather had built during Prohibition. It was narrow, dark, and smelled of dust and damp wood.
He ushered Grace and the baby inside, pulling the heavy door shut behind them just as the sound of splintering wood echoed through the house.
Julian hadn’t waited for an answer. He had broken a window.
In the pitch-black tunnel, Arthur wrapped his arms around Grace, pulling her against his chest. He could feel her heart racing like a trapped bird.
Heavy footsteps echoed on the hardwood floor just beyond the wall.
“Spread out,” Julian’s voice drifted through the wooden panels. The warmth was entirely gone, replaced by a cold, venomous edge. “She’s on foot. She couldn’t have gone far. Check every room. If you find her, you know what to do. The baby comes to me unharmed.”
“And your brother, sir?” another man asked.
There was a chilling pause.
“If Arthur gets in the way,” Julian said softly, “make it look like a murder-suicide. Grief finally broke him.”
Arthur squeezed his eyes shut, a white-hot rage igniting in his chest. His own brother.
They stood in the dark for what felt like hours, listening to the men tear apart the study. Furniture was flipped. Books were swept off shelves.
Then, Arthur felt something warm and wet seeping through Grace’s sleeve onto his hand. He touched her arm in the dark. It was slick with fresh blood.
“Grace?” he mouthed against her ear.
“The window at the lodge,” she mouthed back, swaying slightly against him. “When I broke out.”
She was losing blood. Fast. They couldn’t hide in the walls all night; she would bleed to death, and the baby would starve.
Suddenly, a flashlight beam sliced through the darkness from the far end of the tunnel.
One of Julian’s men had found the basement entrance to the servant’s passage.
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“I got something down here!” the man yelled.
Arthur looked at Grace. There was no going back.
