Chương 4
He did not greet Adrian.
He crossed directly to his children, knelt, and held them both so tightly Noah complained that he could not breathe.
Daniel released him at once. “Sorry.”
“You always squeeze too hard,” Noah said.
“I know.”
“You say that every time.”
“I know that too.”
Iris buried her face against her father’s chest. Daniel placed one hand behind her head, his fingers spread protectively through her loosened hair.
When he looked at Adrian, his expression was not anger yet. It was worse. It was the stunned appraisal of a person finding damage where he had believed there was shelter.
“What happened to her face?”
“She scraped it running,” Emma said.
Daniel glanced at her. “Running from what?”
Emma opened her mouth, then closed it.
Adrian answered. “From Celeste.”
Daniel stood.
He was ten years younger than Adrian and several inches shorter, but for one moment the difference in physical size seemed irrelevant. Bernard moved slightly between them, uncertain whom he was protecting.
“Where is she?” Daniel asked.
“With the police.”
“You let her near them?”
“I let her near all of us.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“No.”
Daniel looked toward the doors of the library, where one of the officers was speaking to Celeste. “I want my children out of this house.”
“The storm is worsening,” Bernard said. “The cottage road hasn’t been cleared.”
“I didn’t say off the property. I said out of this house.”
Adrian nodded. “Thomas can take you to the cottage.”
“I don’t need Thomas.”
“The service road is iced.”
“I know the roads. I maintain them.”
The old hierarchy of the estate had always rested on the fiction that respect traveled in both directions. Adrian had believed Daniel spoke to him plainly because they trusted each other. Now he saw how much of that trust had depended on Adrian never forcing the distinction between owner and employee into the open.
Daniel turned to Iris. “Can you walk?”
“I ran.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Yes.”
Noah tugged his father’s sleeve. “I left my good shoe in the orange room.”
“You have both shoes.”
“My other good shoe.”
Daniel closed his eyes for a second. “We’ll find it tomorrow.”
“What if someone takes it?”
“No one wants one child’s shoe.”
Celeste emerged from the library.
Daniel saw her.
The room quieted again, though fewer people remained to witness it.
He did not move toward her. Adrian was grateful for that and ashamed of the gratitude.
Celeste’s face had changed. The police interview had removed the last traces of social polish without disturbing her makeup. She looked tired, irritated, and suddenly closer to her actual age.
“I did not hurt your children,” she told Daniel.
He stared at her. “You locked my son in a room.”
“The latch closed.”
“He says you used a key.”
“He is six.”
“He knows what a key sounds like.”
“He was frightened.”
“Because you locked him in a room.”
The female officer stepped between the conversation and its next possible form.
“Mr. Hale, we’ll need you and the children in the study,” she said. “Ms. Marrow, please wait in the library.”
Celeste looked at Adrian. “Are you going to allow this?”
He almost asked what she expected him to do. Then he understood. She expected him to restore the world they had occupied an hour earlier, where her inconvenience mattered more than anyone else’s fear.
“The officer asked you to wait,” he said.
Celeste’s eyes narrowed. “You have known me for two years.”
“I know.”
“And you have known those children how long?”
Adrian looked at Iris.
She had grown up on the estate. He had attended her christening and forgotten her fifth birthday. Lydia had once taught her to float in the pool. After Lydia’s death, Iris had left drawings outside Adrian’s study door until Celeste asked Emma to stop the children from entering the main house uninvited.
“Her whole life,” he said.
Celeste nodded as though he had confirmed a private suspicion.
“That explains more than you think.”
She returned to the library.
Daniel took the children away through the staff corridor. Iris looked back once. She did not wave. The torn sleeve of her dress hung open at the shoulder, revealing a white undershirt beneath the expensive cream fabric.
Adrian had paid for that dress as part of the staff family clothing allowance established by his mother. He had approved the account each year without knowing which families used it. The realization was trivial, administrative, and more humiliating than it should have been.
By two in the morning, the guests had gone.
The officers took the envelope as potential evidence after photographing it on the tray. Celeste left in a hired car because Adrian would not allow one of the estate drivers to take her. She was not arrested. The officers had made no promises about what would happen next.
Julian departed last, after speaking privately with Margaret.
He found Adrian standing in the entrance hall beneath the portrait of Adrian’s grandfather.
“This has nothing to do with the Northbridge transaction,” Julian said.
“Why would it?”
“I don’t know what was in that envelope.”
“No one does.”
“Celeste said it concerned a family trust.”
“Celeste said many things tonight.”
Julian buttoned his coat. “The exclusivity period ends Monday.”
“A child was locked in a room.”
“And that is appalling.”
“You sound inconvenienced.”
“I am trying to separate two matters that should not be confused.”
“They were confused before I entered the conversation.”
Julian’s mouth tightened. “You signed a term sheet.”
“I know.”
“The board has relied on your representations.”
“I know that too.”
“If you delay because of a personal dispute—”
Adrian stepped closer.
Julian stopped.
Adrian did not threaten him. He had never needed to. That had once pleased him.
“The road is dangerous,” he said. “Bernard will see that your driver follows the lower route.”
May you like
Julian stared at him for several seconds, then walked away.
Margaret waited until the front doors closed.
