Chapter 10 - NINE O’CLOCK, ONE LAST TIMEVincent’s escape lasted eleven hours.
She didn’t.
At 8:58, her hands began shaking.
At 8:59, she ran upstairs.
At nine, she locked the door.
Autumn found Dominic standing outside it.
His shoulders sagged.
“I thought catching him would fix this.”
Autumn sat beside the door.
“Her body doesn’t know he’s caught yet.”
“He’s in federal custody.”
“Her body remembers two years.”
Dominic leaned against the wall.
“How long?”
“I don’t know.”
He looked frustrated.
Not with Wren.
With himself.
“I can fix businesses overnight. I can move people. Make calls. Change things.”
“She isn’t something to fix.”
Dominic looked toward her.
“She needs time to learn that tomorrow can be different from yesterday.”
Behind the door, the crying softened.
Dominic sat on the floor beside Autumn.
For twenty minutes, neither spoke.
Then the lock clicked.
Wren opened the door.
“Can you stay?”
Both of them?
Autumn smiled.
“Yes.”
That became the new nine o’clock ritual.
Not forcing the fear away.
Meeting it.
Some nights Wren cried.
Some nights she talked.
Some nights she simply sat between Dominic and Autumn while the clock passed nine.
Vincent’s arrest detonated across Chicago.
Federal prosecutors announced a sprawling investigation involving financial crimes, bribery, conspiracy, and Isabelle Calloway’s death.
The media surrounded the estate.
Dominic’s companies came under scrutiny.
Several were legitimate.
Several were not.
Dominic voluntarily turned over records.
Marco cooperated.
Gabriel did too.
For the first time in decades, the Calloway family began exposing itself rather than protecting itself.
It cost Dominic millions.
Then tens of millions.
Associates abandoned him.
Former allies called him a traitor.
Threats arrived.
Dominic did something no Calloway man had ever done.
He accepted the consequences.
Autumn noticed the mansion changing.
Armed men gradually disappeared.
Locked rooms opened.
The east wing, once used for meetings nobody discussed, became storage.
The underground office was emptied.
Dominic removed Vincent’s portrait from the library.
Wren watched.
“What are you doing with Grandpa?”
Dominic looked at the photograph.
“I don’t know.”
“Throw him away.”
Dominic almost did.
Then stopped.
Instead, he carried the portrait upstairs.
Wren frowned.
“Why keep it?”
“So one day, when you’re older, you can decide what memories you want.”
Wren considered that.
“Can we put him in the attic?”
Dominic smiled.
“Absolutely.”
Autumn laughed.
It was the first time she heard Dominic laugh without restraint.
Weeks passed.
Autumn expected her temporary employment contract to end.
Instead, Dominic asked her to stay.
“As Wren’s nanny?”
He hesitated.
“As whatever title you want.”
“That sounds suspiciously like you don’t know what my job is.”
“I don’t.”
“I cook terrible eggs.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“You’re difficult.”
“I’ve been told.”
“Frequently?”
“Mostly by you.”
She smiled.
Their relationship had changed.
Neither acknowledged it.
Not yet.
The greater complication came from Gabriel.
Federal investigators offered him reduced charges in exchange for testimony.
Dominic supported the deal.
But Wren refused to see him.
Gabriel understood.
“I don’t deserve forgiveness,” he told Dominic.
“That isn’t my decision.”
One afternoon, Gabriel left a package.
Inside was a notebook.
Every page contained a letter to Wren.
Not excuses.
Confessions.
Apologies.
Memories of Isabelle.
He did not ask her to read them.
Autumn stored the notebook in Wren’s closet.
Months later, Wren opened it herself.
Meanwhile, therapy began.
Not the cold clinical sessions Wren had previously hated.
Autumn found a trauma specialist who used art and play.
Wren drew houses.
Always houses.
At first, every house had black windows.
Then gray.
Then blue.
Eventually, one appeared with the front door open.
Autumn noticed.
So did the therapist.
Nobody celebrated.
They simply let the door stay open.
One Friday evening, exactly three months after Vincent’s arrest, Autumn heard music coming from Wren’s room.
She stopped in the hallway.
The music box.
The original one.
Dominic heard it too.
He appeared at the opposite end.
Both froze.
Nine o’clock.
Autumn rushed forward.
Then stopped.
Wren’s door was open.
The child sat on the carpet.
The music box rested before her.
She had wound it herself.
The silver ballerina turned.
The melody that once meant terror filled the room.
Wren looked up.
“I changed it.”
Autumn entered slowly.
“Changed what?”
“The batteries are gone.”
Dominic crouched beside her.
“You opened it?”
“Marco helped.”
Inside, the transmitter had been removed.
Only the mechanical music mechanism remained.
Wren smiled faintly.
“Now it only plays when I want it to.”
Dominic’s eyes filled.
“That sounds good.”
Wren nodded.
Then closed the lid.
Nine o’clock passed.
No tears.
Autumn looked at Dominic.
He looked at her.
Something quiet passed between them.
Hope.
But the Calloway story was not finished.
Because two days later, federal investigators discovered an encrypted folder on Isabelle’s drive.
One nobody had opened before.
It contained a document titled:
DOMINIC — READ ONLY AFTER VINCENT IS CAUGHT.
Dominic sat alone in his office before opening it.
Autumn stood near the window.
Wren was downstairs.
Dominic clicked.
Isabelle appeared again.
This recording was different.
She looked exhausted.
“Dominic,” she began, “if Vincent has finally been stopped, there is one more truth you deserve.”
Dominic leaned closer.
“I spent years trying to persuade you to leave the family business.”
He closed his eyes.
“You always said you couldn’t. Too many people depended on you. Too many enemies would come after us.”
She paused.
“But there was another reason you never admitted.”
Dominic whispered:
“I was afraid.”
Isabelle on the screen seemed almost to answer him.
“You were afraid that without the Calloway name, you would be nobody.”
Autumn saw the words strike him.
Isabelle continued.
“So I prepared something.”
A legal document appeared.
A trust.
A large one.
Created using Isabelle’s personal inheritance.
Completely separate from the Calloway businesses.
Enough money to ensure Wren would never depend on criminal wealth.
Enough to let Dominic walk away.
Isabelle smiled.
“If you’re finally ready, you can choose who you are without your father.”
The video ended.
Dominic remained staring at the screen.
Autumn asked quietly:
“What are you going to do?”
He looked out the window toward the gates that had once guarded an empire.
Then toward the lawn, where Wren was chasing bubbles.
“I think my wife just gave me permission to become unemployed.”
Autumn laughed.
Dominic did too.
Then the office phone rang.
He answered.
His expression slowly changed.
“What?”
Autumn straightened.
Dominic listened.
Then:
“When?”
He hung up.
“What happened?”
“Vincent.”
Autumn’s stomach tightened.
“What about him?”
“He collapsed during transport.”
“Is he dead?”
Dominic looked toward the music box on the shelf.
“No.”
May you like
His expression hardened.
“He escaped.”
