Chapter 2 - The Rules of the HouseNathaniel Ashford had spent most of his adult life believing money could buy solutions.
He expected Henry to meet him at the front doors of Ashford Manor.
Instead, the first person Nate saw was a maid who had been dead for five years.
His suitcase slipped from his hand.
The woman stood halfway across the marble foyer, gripping a mop so tightly her knuckles had turned white.
Her uniform was gray.
Her dark hair had been cut shorter.
She looked thinner than he remembered.
But Nate would have known those green eyes anywhere.
“Anna?”
The maid froze.
A silver bucket beside her tipped slightly.
Water rippled across the polished floor.
At the top of the grand staircase, Nate’s mother turned.
Eleanor Ashford was sixty-three, elegant, perfectly composed, and wearing enough diamonds for an evening gala even though it was barely three in the afternoon.
“Nathaniel?”
Nate barely heard her.
He took one step toward the maid.
“Anna Mercer?”
Her face lost all color.
Five years earlier, Anna had been his younger sister Claire’s closest friend.
She had practically grown up at Ashford Manor.
Then Claire died in a boating accident.
Three days later, Anna disappeared.
Police believed guilt had driven her away because Anna had been with Claire the night she died.
Months later, authorities announced that Anna was presumed dead after her abandoned vehicle was discovered near a flooded quarry in Pennsylvania.
Nate had attended a memorial service without a body.
Now she was standing twenty feet away holding a mop.
“Nate!”
The voice came from upstairs.
His wife, Vanessa, rushed down the staircase wearing a cream dress and an expression of delighted surprise.
“You weren’t supposed to land until tonight.”
She threw her arms around him.
Nate did not move.
His gaze remained on Anna.
Vanessa followed it.
For half a second, something flashed across her face.
Fear.
Then it disappeared.
“That’s Elena,” Vanessa said.
Nate slowly looked at her.
“What?”
“Our new housemaid. Elena Torres.”
Anna lowered her eyes.
Nate felt something cold settle inside his chest.
He knew Anna’s face.
He knew the tiny scar beside her eyebrow from the summer she had fallen off Claire’s bicycle.
He knew she hated lilies and drank tea with too much honey.
He knew she had once stood beside him at Claire’s funeral and whispered, Something about the accident doesn’t make sense.
And he knew she was not Elena Torres.
“Where’s Henry?” Nate asked.
Vanessa smiled too quickly.
“With his tutor.”
“I want to see him.”
“Of course.”
Nate bent to lift his suitcase.
As he passed Anna, her hand moved.
Barely.
Her fingers caught the sleeve of his jacket.
Nate stopped.
Nobody else seemed to notice.
Her lips barely moved.
“Don’t react.”
His heartbeat slammed against his ribs.
Anna continued staring at the floor.
“If they know you remember me…”
A pause.
“…they’ll kill your son.”
Nate’s entire body went still.
“Sweetheart?” Vanessa called.
He forced himself to keep walking.
Every instinct screamed at him to turn around.
To grab Anna.
To demand answers.
Instead, he smiled at his wife.
Six months negotiating hostile corporate acquisitions had taught Nate one useful skill.
He could smile while realizing someone intended to destroy him.
“Long flight,” he said.
Vanessa touched his arm.
“You look exhausted.”
Nate looked toward the second floor.
“Henry?”
“He’s in the schoolroom.”
He climbed the stairs.
Behind him, he heard Eleanor speak sharply.
“Elena. Clean that water.”
Nate did not turn.
He found Henry sitting alone at a little desk overlooking the east gardens.
The boy looked smaller than Nate remembered.
His blond hair needed cutting.
Dark shadows rested beneath his eyes.
“Nate?”
The tutor stood.
Nate barely acknowledged him.
“Dad!”
Henry jumped from the chair.
Nate dropped to his knees and caught him.
For several seconds, he simply held his child.
Alive.
Warm.
Safe.
For now.
“I missed you,” Henry whispered.
Nate closed his eyes.
“I missed you more.”
Henry pulled back.
“Did you bring the airplane?”
Nate almost laughed.
“I brought three.”
The boy smiled.
Then the smile disappeared when footsteps sounded in the hallway.
Henry immediately looked toward the door.
Nate noticed.
“Everything okay, buddy?”
Henry nodded too fast.
The door opened.
Eleanor entered.
Henry’s shoulders tightened.
That frightened Nate more than Anna’s warning.
His mother had always adored Henry.
At least Nate had believed she did.
“Nathaniel,” Eleanor said, “you should rest.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’ve traveled fourteen hours.”
“I said I’m fine.”
For once, Eleanor did not argue.
Her eyes moved to Henry.
“Your grandmother and I need to discuss business.”
Henry slid closer to Nate.
Nate rested a hand on his shoulder.
“Business can wait.”
Eleanor smiled.
It never reached her eyes.
“Some things cannot.”
That night, Nate pretended jet lag had knocked him unconscious before ten.
Vanessa fell asleep beside him around midnight.
At 1:17 a.m., Nate opened his eyes.
He dressed quietly.
Then he slipped into the corridor.
Ashford Manor had forty-three rooms, three staircases, and enough hidden service passages to make secrecy possible.
Nate remembered most of them from childhood.
He found Anna in the downstairs laundry room.
She spun when he entered.
He locked the door.
“You have thirty seconds,” he whispered. “Start talking.”
Anna stared at him.
Her eyes filled with tears.
“You really remember me.”
“Of course I remember you.”
She covered her mouth.
Nate stepped closer.
“Why are you alive?”
Anna shook her head.
“Wrong question.”
“You told me someone will kill Henry.”
“They will.”
“Who?”
Anna looked toward the ceiling as if the walls themselves were listening.
Then she reached beneath her uniform.
She pulled out a folded photograph.
Nate took it.
His stomach dropped.
The photograph showed Henry asleep in his bedroom.
Beside his pillow was a small digital clock.
The date on the display was three nights earlier.
On the back, someone had written four words.
NEXT TIME, NO WARNING.
Nate looked up.
“Who gave you this?”
Anna’s voice trembled.
“The same people who killed Claire.”
Nate stopped breathing.
Anna stepped closer.
“And Nate…”
Her next words destroyed the last safe thing in his world.
“Claire’s death wasn’t the reason I disappeared.”
“What was?”
“I disappeared because I found out who ordered it.”
Nate stared at her.
Anna’s eyes shifted toward the hallway.
“And the person who ordered your sister killed…”
May you like
She swallowed.
“…is living inside this house.”
Related Stories
