Chapter 27

The handcuffs clicked around Marcus's wrists, but he was smiling as the envelope slipped from his fingers and landed at my feet.

"He knew everything." Marcus's voice carried across the restaurant even as the officers pulled him toward the door. "From the very beginning, Miss Whitley. Ask him about the report dated two weeks before you applied for that nanny position."

I stared at the envelope. Cream-colored paper, expensive weight. The kind that held documents people didn't want found.

"Sloane—" Dominic's hand reached for my arm.

I stepped back. "Don't."

"It's not what you think."

"Yeah, no, I'm pretty sure it's exactly what I think." My voice came out flat. Dead. "You knew who I was."

The officers were reading Marcus his rights, but Marcus kept his eyes on me, that smile never wavering even as they guided him through the door. He'd gotten what he wanted. The handcuffs were just accessories.

Dominic moved closer. "Let me explain—"

"Did you know?" The words scraped out. "Before I showed up at your house that day. Before I ever applied for the job. Did you know who I was?"

His silence was answer enough.

I bent down and picked up the envelope. Papers had spilled out, scattered across the floor like evidence at a crime scene. One of the officers started gathering them, but I grabbed his wrist.

"Those are mine."

He looked at Dominic, who nodded once. The officer stepped back.

I collected the papers with shaking hands. A medical examiner's report. Lab results showing elevated levels of something I couldn't pronounce. A timeline spanning six months, each entry marking another doctor's visit, another symptom my mother had dismissed as stress or age or just being tired.

"Sloane, please." Dominic's voice had gone quiet. Careful. "I need you to understand—"

"You need." I stood up, clutching the papers against my chest. "That's interesting. Because what I need is to not hear your voice right now."

"The documents Marcus has are incomplete. He's manipulating—"

"So are you." The words came out sharper than I intended, but I didn't take them back. "You've been manipulating me since the day we met. No, before that. Since you decided to hire me knowing exactly who I was and what you could use me for."

His face hardened. "That is not what happened."

"Then what did happen, Dominic? Because from where I'm standing, it looks like you found out your dead brother had a kid, and you thought, what? That you'd bring me in close, see what I knew, make sure I wasn't a threat to your precious family legacy?"

"I was trying to protect you."

I laughed. It sounded wrong, brittle. "Yeah, that tracks. The Ashford family protection plan. How's that working out for everyone?"

A muscle jumped in his cheek. He looked past me, toward the door where they'd taken Marcus, then back. "I have been searching for James's family for three years. Long before I knew about you."

"Convenient story."

"It is the truth."

"Your truth or the actual truth? Because I'm starting to think those are two different things."

The restaurant manager appeared, wringing his hands, asking if we needed anything, if we were alright. Dominic dismissed him with a look that could have frozen water.

"I understand you are angry," he said when we were alone again. "You have every right to be. But if you would just let me explain—"

"No." I shoved the papers back into the envelope. "I need to read these first. Without your voice in my head telling me what to believe."

"Sloane—"

"I'm not running." The words surprised me as much as they seemed to surprise him. "I'm not disappearing or hiding or pretending this didn't happen. But I need space. I need to think. And I need you to not be there while I do it."

He went completely silent. Not trailing off, not searching for words. Just stopped, like I'd cut a wire.

I walked past him toward the door. My legs felt disconnected from my body, like I was piloting myself from somewhere far away.

"Where are you going?" His voice followed me.

"Back to the mansion. To pack."

"You are leaving."

It wasn't a question, but I answered anyway. "Yeah."

"Please. Just give me one hour to—"

"Goodbye, Dominic."

I pushed through the door before he could say anything else, before the look on his face could make me change my mind, before I could do something stupid like believe him.

---

The taxi driver didn't ask questions when I gave him the Ashford mansion address, which was good because I didn't have answers. My hands were still shaking as I opened the envelope in the backseat.

The first document was a private investigator's report. Dated three weeks before I'd applied for the nanny position. Subject: Sloane Marie Whitley, age 24, current residence Cambridge, Massachusetts. Daughter of Catherine Whitley, née Chen.

I flipped to the next page. A family tree, meticulously documented. Catherine Chen, married to James Ashford, deceased. One child, gender unknown, whereabouts unknown. And then, in red ink, someone had drawn a line connecting Catherine to my name.

My mother's maiden name. Her connection to the Ashford family. Everything laid out in neat, professional paragraphs.

At the bottom, a handwritten note in script I didn't recognize: "Potential liability. Recommend preemptive contact."

The taxi hit a pothole. Papers scattered across my lap.

I gathered them with numb fingers, forcing myself to keep reading. Medical records from a hospital in Cambridge. My mother's name at the top. Admission dates spanning six months, each visit coded as routine checkup or follow-up appointment.

But the lab results told a different story. Elevated levels of thallium in her blood. Increasing with each test. A poison that mimicked heart disease, that caused the exact symptoms she'd been experiencing. Fatigue. Confusion. Irregular heartbeat.

Someone had been killing her slowly. Methodically. Making it look natural.

The next document was a memo, marked confidential. From Marcus Ashford to someone named Victoria Ashford. Instructions for monitoring Catherine's condition. Updates on her declining health. And at the end, a single line that made my stomach turn: "Problem will resolve itself within the month."

Victoria Ashford. Dominic's wife.

I read it again, trying to make the words mean something different. But they stayed the same, black ink on white paper, proof that someone in the Ashford family had wanted my mother dead.

The taxi pulled up to the mansion gates. I paid the driver with bills I didn't remember taking from my wallet and walked up the long driveway on autopilot.

The front door opened before I reached it. Patricia stood in the entrance, her expression carefully neutral.

"Miss Whitley. We weren't expecting you back so soon."

"I'm just here to pack." I moved past her toward the stairs.

"Mr. Ashford called. He said—"

"I don't care what he said."

My voice came out harsher than I intended, but Patricia just nodded, like she'd expected it. Like she'd seen this scene play out before with different actors.

I took the stairs two at a time, my footsteps echoing in the cavernous space. The hallway to my room stretched endlessly, portraits of dead Ashfords watching from the walls. All those faces, all that legacy, built on what? Lies and poison and people who got in the way.

My room looked exactly as I'd left it that morning. Bed made with hospital corners. Books stacked on the nightstand. Iris's drawing of the three of us taped to the mirror, stick figures holding hands under a crayon sun.

I pulled my duffel bag from the closet and started throwing clothes into it. Didn't bother folding. Didn't bother organizing. Just grabbed handfuls of fabric and shoved them in.

A knock at the door made me freeze.

"I'm fine, Patricia."

"It's not Patricia."

I turned. Patricia stood in the doorway anyway, holding a tea tray like this was a social visit and not me fleeing the scene of my life falling apart.

"I said I'm fine."

"You're packing." She set the tray on the dresser. "That's not fine."

"Yeah, well, that's what happens when you find out everything was a lie." I grabbed my toiletries from the bathroom, dumped them in the bag. "When the person you trusted knew exactly who you were and decided to play you anyway."

Patricia poured tea into two cups, the sound of liquid hitting porcelain too loud in the quiet room. "Mr. Ashford has been searching for James Chen's family for three years."

"So he said."

"It's true." She held out a cup. I didn't take it. "I was there when he started. After his brother died, he became obsessed with finding out if James had left anyone behind. He hired investigators, searched records, followed every lead."

"Convenient timing, starting that search right after his brother died."

"Grief makes people do strange things." Patricia set the cup on the nightstand. "He blamed himself for not knowing James better. For not being there when James needed him. Finding you was his way of making amends."

I yanked open a drawer, grabbed the few pieces of jewelry I owned. "Or it was his way of making sure I wasn't a threat."

"Both things can be true."

That made me stop. I looked at her, really looked at her. She stood with her hands folded, her expression calm, but something in her eyes was urgent.

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because you deserve to know the whole story. Not just the parts Marcus wants you to see." She moved closer, lowering her voice even though we were alone. "That envelope he gave you. Did it mention Victoria?"

My silence was answer enough.

Patricia's mouth tightened. "Victoria Ashford was Marcus's daughter from his first marriage. She died two years ago. Cancer."

The room tilted. "What?"

"Whatever documents Marcus has, whatever they say about Victoria ordering your mother's death, they're fabricated. Victoria was many things, but she wasn't a murderer. And she's been dead for two years, which makes her a very convenient scapegoat."

I sat down on the bed, my legs suddenly unable to hold me. "Why would Marcus frame his own daughter?"

"Because she can't defend herself. Because it protects whoever actually did it. Because Marcus Ashford has been manipulating this family for forty years, and he's very, very good at it."

The medical records. The memo. All of it pointing to a dead woman who couldn't confirm or deny anything.

"How do I know you're telling the truth?" My voice came out small. "How do I know this isn't just another layer of lies?"

Patricia pulled out her phone, scrolled through something, then handed it to me. A news article from two years ago. Victoria Ashford, philanthropist and art collector, dead at forty-three after a battle with ovarian cancer. A photo showed a woman with Dominic's eyes and Marcus's smile, standing in front of a painting at some gallery opening.

"I'm not asking you to trust Mr. Ashford," Patricia said quietly. "I'm asking you to question Marcus. To wonder why he waited until now to give you those documents. To ask yourself what he gains from destroying your relationship with Dominic."

I handed back the phone. My hands were shaking again.

"I need to think."

"Of course." Patricia moved toward the door, then paused. "For what it's worth, I've worked for this family for twenty years. I've seen Mr. Ashford with dozens of women. Dates, girlfriends, even his wife. He was never with any of them the way he is with you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means he looks at you like you're the only real thing in his life. Like everything else is just set dressing." She opened the door. "That's not something you can fake. Not even Dominic Ashford is that good an actor."

She left before I could respond, her footsteps fading down the hallway.

I sat there on the bed, surrounded by half-packed bags and scattered papers and the ruins of everything I'd thought I knew. The envelope lay on the nightstand, its contents a mix of truth and lies I couldn't untangle.

My mother had been poisoned. That much seemed real. The medical records, the lab results, the timeline of her decline. Someone had killed her slowly, carefully, making it look like natural causes.

But who? Victoria, who was already dead? Marcus, who'd given me the documents in the first place? Someone else in this family of liars and manipulators?

And Dominic. Dominic, who'd known who I was from the beginning. Who'd hired me anyway, brought me into his home, let me get close to his daughter. Who'd kissed me like I mattered, touched me like I was precious, looked at me like Patricia said he did.

Was any of it real? Or was I just another problem to be managed, another liability to be neutralized?

I stood up and went back to packing. Grabbed the rest of my clothes from the closet, my books from the nightstand, the few personal items I'd accumulated during my time here. Everything fit into two bags, which felt about right. My whole life, condensed into carry-on luggage.

The drawing Iris had made caught my eye. The three of us, holding hands, smiling. I'd been here less than two months, but somehow that little girl had worked her way into my heart, made me care about her future, made me want to stay.

I pulled the drawing off the mirror and folded it carefully, tucking it into my bag.

A sound from the doorway made me turn.

Iris stood there in her pajamas, clutching her stuffed rabbit, her eyes wide and solemn.

"Are you leaving because of what Mommy said?"