Chương 2
Helena looked at her. Dana’s face was patient without being kind. Helena appreciated that.
“I don’t think so.”
“You have a head injury.”
“A shallow cut.”
“You may still have glass in it.”
Helena swallowed. “Then yes.”
Dana nodded once and stood.
Through the mansion’s windows, Adrian appeared as a pale shape moving behind the chandelier. Vivian remained at the table. Samuel had finally left the doors, though Helena could not see where he had gone.
The protection protocol had been approved three days earlier after a judge reviewed messages, photographs, a sworn declaration, and an incident in the parking garage beneath Helena’s office. The written order prohibited Adrian from contacting or threatening her. A separate emergency arrangement, funded through Locke Meridian’s insurer while the company’s board investigated its chief executive, placed a security team within five minutes of any location where Helena agreed to meet members of the family.
She had not been ordered to attend dinner. She had gone because Samuel claimed he possessed original documents connected to the death of a marine engineer named Leah Kim.
He had also promised Adrian would not be there.
The ambulance arrived first, followed by two county deputies whose expressions suggested they had been told the address and expected trouble of a different kind. One recognized Dana. He listened while she explained the protective order and the activation record. The other entered the house.
Helena sat beneath a silver emergency blanket while a paramedic cleaned the cut. He was young, with a tired blond mustache that did not match the rest of his face.
“This might sting,” he said.
“It already does.”
“People always say that right before they discover a new category of sting.”
Despite herself, Helena almost smiled.
The paramedic used tweezers to remove a sliver no larger than a grain of rice. He placed it in a clear evidence container and asked Helena the date, the address, and whether she had lost consciousness. She answered each question correctly. When he asked who the president was, she stared at him.
“Is that required?”
“Not exactly.”
“Then choose a better question.”
He glanced at Dana, decided Helena was sufficiently alert, and applied a narrow adhesive strip above the eyebrow. The blood trail remained visible beneath it, thin and darkening.
A deputy came out of the mansion carrying the black phone in a clear bag. Another officer followed with photographs of the dining room on his tablet. Adrian remained inside with his attorney on speakerphone. Vivian had denied seeing the glass leave his hand. Samuel had said he was facing the driveway.
No one had seen anything, apparently, except Helena.
Dana sat beside her in the vehicle while the deputies discussed whether the physical evidence and active order were enough to detain Adrian. Their voices were low, but fragments reached Helena through the open front door.
“…statement…”
“…probable cause…”
“…video disabled…”
That last phrase made Helena look up.
Dana followed her gaze. “The interior security system stopped recording thirty-one minutes before your activation.”
“Stopped?”
“Someone shut it down.”
“Adrian controls it.”
“His lawyer will say the system was being serviced.”
“It wasn’t.”
Dana’s expression did not change. “Then someone will have to prove that.”
Helena looked through the windshield at the wet driveway. Rainwater reflected the headlights in long white streaks. She had spent thirteen years proving things for people wealthy enough to treat facts as employees. A fact was useful when it arrived on time, dressed correctly, and understood who signed its paycheck.
The deputy returned twenty minutes later.
“We’re taking Mr. Locke in,” he said. “He’ll be processed. What happens after that is not my decision.”
Vivian emerged behind him.
She wore a dark-plum velvet gown and emeralds at her throat. From a distance she might have been leaving an opera. She walked past the deputy and stopped near the vehicle, just outside Dana’s reach.
“Helena.”
Dana rose.
Helena remained seated.
Vivian’s face had recovered its composure. Only the movement at the base of her throat betrayed her.
“You should think carefully before you make a statement you cannot correct.”
Helena looked at the woman who had once sent orchids to her office after Helena negotiated a merger that saved the family nearly eighty million dollars in tax exposure. The card had been handwritten. Vivian never permitted assistants to imitate her handwriting. She considered forged intimacy vulgar.
“I already made my statement,” Helena said.
“You were frightened.”
“Yes.”
“Adrian frightened you.”
“Yes.”
“He has been under pressure.”
“That is not a correction.”
Vivian’s eyes shifted toward the paramedics, the deputies, the four vehicles. She lowered her voice.
“This family has protected you.”
Helena felt the adhesive strip pull slightly when she raised her eyebrows.
“From what?”
Vivian’s expression hardened.
A deputy led Adrian out with his hands cuffed in front of him. His dinner jacket remained immaculate except for one dark spot near the cuff, probably wine. He looked at Helena as he passed.
“You think this makes you credible?”
The deputy touched his arm. “Keep moving.”
Adrian did, but slowly.
“You advised every decision you’re calling criminal now,” he said. “Remember that when they ask who built the walls.”
Helena said nothing.
His words stayed with her long after the vehicle carrying him disappeared down the hill.
At the hospital, a nurse removed the silver blanket and gave Helena a blue plastic bag for her belongings. Helena declined the bag and held the black handbag on her lap. The phone remained with the deputies. The gold clasp had acquired a faint scratch that she rubbed with her thumb until she noticed what she was doing.
May you like
Dana sat near the door while a physician examined the cut and confirmed there was no serious injury. Helena’s blood pressure was high. Her pupils responded normally. She would likely bruise near the eyebrow. The doctor advised her not to drive, drink, work, sign contracts, or make “major life decisions” for the rest of the night.
“That removes most of my evening plans,” Helena said.
