Part 2
Celeste’s voice remained calm. “It is from one of the stanchions in the gallery. The girl must have pulled it down when she became agitated.”
Mara shut her eyes.
Adrian turned toward her. “Did someone tie your wrists with this?”
She could feel Celeste watching.
She could feel Mr. Bell not watching.
A year earlier, when Mara’s mother had gone into the hospital in Providence, Celeste had arranged two weeks of paid leave before Mara had worked at the estate long enough to earn it. She had sent flowers with a handwritten card. She remembered birthdays. She complimented good work in front of guests and corrected mistakes in private.
Until that afternoon, Mara had never heard Celeste raise her voice.
“No,” Mara whispered.
Adrian remained still.
“You don’t have to answer in front of anyone,” he said.
Celeste reached the marble floor. “She has answered.”
Adrian stepped between them.
It was not dramatic. He simply altered his position until his body blocked the straight path from the staircase to Mara.
“Don’t come any closer.”
For the first time, Celeste’s expression changed. Not much. A small tightening around her mouth.
“You have just arrived.”
“I noticed.”
“You have no idea what occurred.”
“That’s why no one is leaving.”
Celeste gave a restrained smile. “The staff member is confused.”
Mara looked at the water.
Staff member.
Not Mara.
Adrian took a black smartphone from his inside jacket pocket. He glanced at the screen, then at Mr. Bell.
“Who is head of security tonight?”
“Daniel Hsu,” the steward said.
“Call him.”
“Adrian,” Celeste said.
He made the call himself.
While it rang, he crouched beside Mara again. His free hand hovered for a moment, as if he was judging whether any contact would frighten her. Then he placed it lightly behind her shoulder, not pressing, simply there.
Daniel Hsu answered on the third ring.
“This is Adrian Vale,” Adrian said. “Come to the entrance hall. Bring Dr. Mercer if he’s on the property. Lock the private service wing and the surveillance room. No one enters either space without you. Preserve all interior camera footage from today, including backups and access logs.”
Celeste’s champagne glass shifted in her hand.
Adrian looked at her as he continued.
“And Daniel—disable remote deletion privileges. Now.”
The quiet in the hall changed shape.
Mr. Bell lowered the place cards.
Celeste’s fingers tightened around the glass stem. The crystal trembled once, tapping faintly against one of her rings.
“Adrian,” she said, “you are embarrassing yourself.”
He ended the call.
“Probably,” he said. “But not for the reason you think.”
From the corridor beyond the library came the distant, measured sound of security shoes crossing stone.
Celeste looked toward it.
For one naked instant, alarm broke through the practiced superiority of her face. Her lips parted. The champagne glass tilted in her hand.
Mara looked up at Adrian.
He did not offer reassurance. He did not say everything would be fine.
He only stayed where he was, between her and the staircase, while the footsteps drew closer.
Daniel Hsu arrived with two officers from the private security team and Dr. James Mercer, the physician retained for large events at the estate. Daniel was a broad-shouldered man in his fifties who wore reading glasses on a cord and spoke in the low, patient voice of someone accustomed to managing intoxicated donors and malfunctioning alarms without attracting attention.
He took in the room before asking questions.
The toppled urn. The broken cord. The water. Mara’s position. Adrian’s hand behind her shoulder. Celeste with the champagne. Mr. Bell holding place cards like evidence he had forgotten to discard.
“Secure the west corridor,” Daniel told one officer. “No radios unless necessary.”
Celeste drew herself upright. “Daniel, the reception begins at eight.”
“Yes, Mrs. Vale.”
“Nearly three hundred guests are expected.”
“Yes, Mrs. Vale.”
“You will not create a spectacle in my entrance hall.”
Daniel looked at Adrian.
Adrian said, “The reception is postponed.”
Celeste gave a small laugh that carried no amusement. “You cannot postpone an event you did not organize.”
“The house is held by the family trust. I’m a co-trustee. The liability alone—”
“Do not use that word as though you have suddenly developed an interest in this house.”
The words landed harder than her tone suggested.
Adrian’s hand withdrew from behind Mara’s shoulder.
For a moment, he looked less like the heir in the portraits and more like a tired man who had walked into an old argument wearing new clothes.
Then he turned to Daniel. “Postpone it.”
Celeste set her champagne glass on the lowest stair. “You have always enjoyed arriving late enough to feel morally clean.”
No one moved.
Mara wished she could become smaller than her uniform. Her knees hurt against the marble. The wet hem of her black skirt clung to her calves. She became aware of Dr. Mercer standing nearby with his medical bag, waiting for permission to approach.
Adrian looked at her.
“Would you let the doctor examine your wrists?”
Mara hesitated.
Celeste exhaled through her nose.
The tiny sound decided it.
“Yes,” Mara said.
Dr. Mercer crouched at her side. “I’m James. May I take the cloth?”
Mara loosened her grip.
When the cloth came away, both wrists were visible.
No one said anything for several seconds.
The marks were darker now. Parallel bands crossed the inside of her right wrist, with a slightly deeper impression near the thumb. Her left wrist had one unbroken red ring.
Dr. Mercer asked her to turn her hands palm-up, then palm-down. He checked sensation in her fingers and watched her flex them.
“Any numbness?”
“No.”
“Pins and needles?”
“Earlier.”
“Pain?”
“Only when I move them.”
He glanced at the cord in Adrian’s hand. “May I see that?”
Adrian placed it on the dry corner of a silver tray.
May you like
Daniel immediately told one of the officers not to touch it. The officer took several photographs, including the cord beside the urn and the water pattern around it.
Celeste stared at the process with growing irritation. “This is absurd.”
